If only I would get what I paid for....

Call me crazy but I am a sucker for a sweet gift. I see it, I love it, I gift it. Done. A few weeks ago I received Williams-Sonoma Halloween catalog and I fell in love with these. 

How stink in' cute are they, huh? Oh, and they were mini's so how could you possibly go wrong? They're "figure friendly", and they're a fruit, ahem... ok, so fruit might be a stretch but hey, they're still "mini" (that's my story and I'm sticking to it!). 

Needless to say, I just loved them and I ordered them as a gift for my sister who like me, loves all things Halloween. I didn't tell her about it, I figured it would be more fun if she just received them, out of the blue, so to speak. So I waited, and I waited, and I waited, and no word on my gift. It had been so long that I was beginning to think that maybe they hadn't received my order. Hmmm. I'd have to go through my emails and see if I had received a confirmation. Too much going on, so I put it on the back burner for the weekend. THEN, just yesterday, my sister (who was scheduled to arrive last night for a weekend visit with me, calls me and says she had received the caramel apples and thanked me. She says she thinks I might have ordered them a while ago because the card read, "I can't wait to see you, in a few weeks!"We had a laugh about it and she packed them in her suitcase to share (you can't leave caramel apples in the fridge for days on end, they're perishable, ahem!)

So.... when she unpacked her suitcase last night and handed me these to put in the fridge I was a little taken aback.

Is it just me, or do  you see what the problem is? Here, let's do a side by side...

Needless to say I was on the phone with Customer Service first thing this morning. And yes, they are sending a replacement, but the whole thing was that it was a surprise... a HALLOWEEN surprise, not an "I look like I could have been bought at a supermarket" surprise. The lady at customer service asked me what apples my sister received, I told her she received, "The I'm too ugly for your website apples! The I could have been picked up at Walmart's produce department apples. The I'm so NOT Halloween apples... with the cheap red twisty tie bow!" and she told me "We do sell red bow apples on our website." She did. I went back and checked, and no they do not! 

They're too freakin' ugly to be sold at WS. 

OK, I'm breathing...breathing...

Sometimes I get all worked up over stuff like this because when you send a present based on what you see in an image, you expect the recipient to get what you paid for. I didn't pay $30 for four crappy looking apples. I paid for cute little apples with spider web drizzle and Halloween bows. I got big clunky apples with red twisty ties. I mean really, that was not what I paid for, and if I had seen these side by side I would have thought they were comparing Walmart to WS. 

I shop at both, I know the difference. 

This happens to me more often that I care to admit. I order this gorgeous bouquet, I pay extra to send the "premium" size and then I get a picture and I think, "If that's premium what the hell is regular?" but for the recipient it's a beautiful surprise so I "let it go"... and I have to tell you, I have just recently decided that I will no longer "Let it go". I will get what I pay for or complain; because $65 for a bouquet of flowers that looks like the $9.95 bouquet from the supermarket is not OK. I would like to pay for Mini Halloween Caramel apples and have my recipient receive something "close" to mini Halloween Caramel apples, and not some "generic looking, red twisty tie apples, I could have picked up at Walmart and sent in a flat rate envelope for half the price" apples. 

I would really just like the recipients of my gifts to get what I paid for... is that too much to ask?