With my curvy shape, pants are not my favorite thing to shop for. If the waist fits, the legs are sausage casings for my thighs. If the legs fit then I am channeling the sagging pants generation. I just cannot win when it comes to pants. Well… until I found the Marissa and Julie fit pants at LOFT. After a representative from a PR company reached out to me about being the featured blogger at the LOFT store grand opening in Baltimore, I quickly scoured the brand’s website to find just the right outfit to wear! When I saw these plaid pants I knew that I just had to have them. Unfortunately the responsible grown up in me knew I had to wait to purchase them until after all my bills were paid and money was stashed in my Smart Piggy account.
The minute I had some shopping moolah, I was hitting purchase and typing in my shipping address for these bad boys. As far as the LOFT grand opening, it is still happening but I will not be partnering with them. If you follow me on twitter then you know exactly why. Some PR companies assume that they can take and take from you and not give much in return. I am not some newbie blogger that is just interested in some free clothes and happy with whatever is thrown my way. My blog is my baby and my readers are my friends and because of that I take it seriously. It is not a hobby to me. This PR company wanted me to “use my pull” to get bloggers to post the invite on their blogs, attend the event and then post again. They wanted me to mix and mingle at the event, do instant updates to social media and snap pics while there. They requested my list of go-to Baltimore bloggers but they could not even put me on the invite. No mention of me AT ALL! Instead they put someone else on the invite. Someone who has better reach in the fashion world but not in the blogger world. When I questioned it, the representative responded back to me with “due to spacing we could not include all of our partners”.
Spacing?!?!?! There is so much white space on this invitation that I am truly shocked that this was her reason, well excuse. Although I am not a top blogger with super star stats, I am however a blogger with worth and who deserves respect. It may not be the case but I really believe that this PR Company was trying to use me for my contacts and not because they valued me enough to host this event. Without hesitation, I promptly emailed them and politely declined being their “featured” blogger. I hold absolutely no responsibility to LOFT and still very much love their brand. It’s the middle man that I have no fondness for. It may sound petty but at the end of the day, I work just as hard as top bloggers. I may not have escalated to the top echelon of bloggerdom but I am still a decent blogger and if you reach out to me for a collaboration then please make sure it is a give and take. I value everyone I work with and I value my readers so all I ask is that anyone who wants to work with me, value me as well!
