Gather round friends, as today is a very special today. Today, I am going to review my very last Jennifer Love Hewitt Fancy Box.
I think we all knew this day was coming, but with a heavy heart and a lighter wallet I present to you my November Jennifer Love Hewitt Fancy box. This post will contain cursing, so prepare yourself.
As you may recall the Fancy folks told me that they stopped sending us the brochures that explain the items and why the celebrity chose them “as part of Fancy’s initiative to be more green and adapt more eco-conscious practices…”
How noble, because it’s not at all important for us to know what the hell these things are and why they’re in there. But seriously folks saving the planet is so important, it’s not like they left in a ton of other extraneous packaging…..
Please be sure to take note of those Fancy stickers. Now why would we want information on our items when we could have a stupid popsicle sticker instead?
So once again I have no idea why or how these items relate to J Love, so I’ll take my guesses and I’d love to hear some of yours in the comments.
Archipelago Hope Holiday Gift Box Candle (Fancy Retail: $26 Current Sale Price: $7.80)
Verdict: Gift
Lisa’s Guess at J. Love’s Reasoning: “It was 70% off so Fancy told me to put it in the box to jack up the value. Merry Christmas!”
So this got small points for being seasonal, but let me tell you this is a manly candle—like this is the manliest candle to ever candle. And while it does seem “holiday” and the packaging is nice, the scent is just too strong for me. I was going to see if I could find someone on my Holiday gift list who’d like it, but my boyfriend took a shine to it and so I gave it to him. I just can’t be in the house if he chooses to burn it.
Style Book: Fashionable Inspirations (Fancy Retail: $21.00 Current Sale Price: $6.30)
Verdict: Gift
Lisa’s Guess at J. Love’s Reasoning: “I like Fashion and since Fancy won’t let me send you any actual fashion pieces from their site, here’s a book about it instead.”
I’ve actually gotten the Style Book Part II in another Fancy box, so I guess I was overdue for the first one in the collection. I love fashion, but I’m not really a coffee table book person. I pin cool stuff to my Pinterest board and leave the free space in my apartment for more nail polish and cookbooks. I do have someone who I think will appreciate this book (and the other one I received) so I’ll gift it to them.
Mr. & Mrs. Who? Playing Cards (Fancy Retail: $8.00 Current Sale Price: $2.40)
Verdict: Miss
Lisa’s Guess at J. Love’s Reasoning: “Right after I get vajazzled I like to play strip poker and show off my rhinestones.”
I am guessing that these are the right cards because I didn’t want to open them (on the chance I might give them as a gift). Now here’s where a brochure would come in super handy because there is no way to tell on the plain outside box that these “cards commemorate icons from the world of the music, art, entertainment and fashion in a very minimalist pop art style.” I’m so happy I didn’t accidentally give these away to my BIL or my boyfriend’s Dad thinking they were just a regular deck. I don’t really play card games so these are a miss for me.
Japonesque Precision Metal Eyelash Curler (Fancy Retail: $14 Current Sale Price: $4.20)
Verdict: No bueno, Fancy
Lisa’s Guess at J. Love’s Reasoning: “You probably already have an eyelash curler, but you can never have too many. Especially little ones that are only for the corners of your eyes…”
So another dupe product for me and yet another reason why I’m canceling. Fancy isn’t even trying to keep customers from receiving duplicate items. They are sending whatever they want out and just refunding you a couple dollars. And without the brochures to back up the curation, they can just grab stuff from the clearance shelves and call it a day.
Clover Bracelet? (Fancy Retail: ??? Price: $1.19)
Verdict: A riddle, wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma
Lisa’s Guess at J. Love’s Reasoning: “I think you know by now I wasn’t involved with this box at all, right?”
At first glance this is a cute, albeit flimsy bracelet, but we are going to dive deeper.
First, let’s look at the baggie which reads “deck heart bracelet”. Hmm, when we look up deck heart bracelet on Fancy, we get this valued at $15. But our bracelet is clearly not a heart, nor is it probably worth $15. As I search all through Fancy I find this link with no price. Curiouser and curiouser. When we follow it to where we can purchase this bracelet, the price is…drumroll…$1.19. Yes, you read that correctly. For less than the cost of a diet soda, you can own this itty bitty, super tiny bracelet.
Did I mention it’s tiny? I’ve never once had a problem fitting into a bracelet—usually even child sizes will fit. My wrist clocks in at around a 5 ½ inches and this one is actually snug on me (which makes it very difficult to clasp.) Since it looked so tiny I decided to measure it. This is way too tiny to send out in a generic sub. It’s my understanding a woman’s “small” size bracelet is at least 6 ½ inches and this one doesn’t make it close to that. Plus the styling shows it a little loose and drapey. There are not too many women that will be able to wear this bracelet in that manner.
OVERALL
Verdict: Fuck you and the horse you road in on…
Was that harsh? Yes. Did Fancy deserve it? Absolutely. Excluding the bracelet which is not the item listed on the bag, the “retail” value of this box is $69. With the sale prices and the $1.19 the bracelet is actually worth, we come to a whopping $21.89. With my discount from their last fuck-up I paid $34.95 for this box. Not much math needed to see I got totally screwed.
Fancy has moved from an unpredictable sub box, to rip off artists (who aren’t even good enough at it to do it subtly). They have a great concept and with a little effort could be an amazing sub, instead they opt to be lazy and deceitful. I advise Jennifer Love Hewitt to get her name off this box as soon as possible, because being associated with this much crap is going to do so much more damage to her reputation then dating Jamie Kennedy or Vajazzling ever could.
Did you get any Fancy boxes lately? Were they as full of clearance junk as this one?
THE BACKSTORY
Fancy Box is a monthly subscription service that curates items that are popular on the Fancy website. There are a few different subscription options. They all cost $39 (unless otherwise noted) plus shipping (an additional $7.95).
#1 –Fancy box (Original)
This box features a collection of some of the most fancy’d items, curated by the fancy community. Each box includes $80.00+ of products in the categories of your choice.
The categories you can choose from include: Men’s, Women’s, Kid’s, Home, Gadgets & Media. It also lets you customize your Tshirt size and your cell phone type.
#2 Fancy Food Box
Each Fancy Food Box includes five or more food products – anything from cookies and chocolates to teas and sauces – along with a selection of tasty recipes and pairing suggestions.
#3 Celebrity Curated Fancy Box
Each box includes $80.00+ of products. Most boxes are geared toward men or women though they do include unisex items.
They include:
- Verbal Fancy Box
- Cocha Rocha Fancy Box
- Jennifer Love Hewitt Box
- Kelly Rowland Box
- Snoop Doggy Dog Box (This box is $42 before shipping)
- T-Pain Box
- Nicky Hilton Box
- Isaac Mizrahi Box
- The Rockettes Box #4 New Mystery Boxes!
You’ll receive $30+ retail value worth of goods. Just pick an option, Men’s or Women’s, and they’ll pick out some items that tickle your Fancy. Cost is $10 plus shipping (estimated 7.95).
#5 Culinary Fancy Box!
Get a collection of the best home goods hand-picked by our Fancy curators each month. Each box includes $80.00+ of products.
COUPON CODE: FOLLOWUP10 to Save 10%
Lisa Preziosi 
Wow, what a disappointment! Im actually sad you got this box. 😦 Thanks for always being honest and I agree JLove should defiantly take her name off this box. She probably has no idea whats going on lol!
At this point I actually feel the need to warn people away from this box. I had accepted that it was really one of those hit or miss subs, but this is on a different level that almost feels like they are trying to cheat their customers. It’s really disappointing.
Woah what a terrible box!!! Sounds like a total con job. I’d be so angry too!
Yeah I felt like this was one of those reviews where I just had to warn people not to waste their money.
Wow! I’ve been impressed with Jennifer Love Hewitt’s box in the past, but that’s just a ripoff!!
I’ve loved some of the Jennifer Hewitt boxes and thought some were very strange, but this one was clearly just Fancy getting rid of stuff they couldn’t sell. Very disappointing.
You are so funny LOL Love your posts, and yes.. this box looks like a total disappointment. Except the Style Book, but only because I don’t have one. 🙂
Thanks! If you want the style book, it’s on like super clearance at Fancy, so now’s the time to grab one.
I really think that Fancy pretty much just killed themselves by removing the brochure. These items would mostly suck even without it, but some reasoning as to why they were put in the box would go a long way to making it seem like less of a rip off.
You cancelled at the right time! I order a Fancy Food Box subscription for my dad for Christmas on December 23rd (late, I know) and received an email on December 29th saying they were no longer shipping the Food Boxes and had switched my order to a Mystery Box. Knowing that my dad definitely wouldn’t like that, I asked if I could switch to a Culinary Box instead. They said that the only box they were continuing with was the Mystery Box, and suggested that I cancel if I didn’t think my dad would like that, as all orders would be shipped as Mystery Boxes in January. (Mind you, they still had all the boxes listed for sale on December 29th, once they knew they wouldn’t be fulfilling those orders.) I cancelled, but yesterday got an email saying that my Food Box had shipped, despite their claim that only Mystery Boxes would ship. My dad called me confused to let me know he received it today (I had filled him in on the cancellation,) but said there was not 1 food item in the box – it seemed to be more of a Culinary Box than anything. There was nothing on it indicating which box it was supposed to be. I emailed the company yesterday after getting the shipping notification, asking why they had shipped an order when I had cancelled, and how they could have shipped a Food Box when they said they were finished. I have yet to receive a response. Coupled with your review, Fancy seems like a major scam to me. They knowingly sold me (and I’m sure plenty of other people) a subscription that they had no intention of filling. It seems like they’ve been getting cheaper recently as well, so perhaps they’ve run into money problems and are trying to get rid of their “mystery” items in inventory by duping people into buying other boxes and then switching. I figured I would share my experience to warn anyone who might still be considering their mystery box, although I don’t know why they would after reading what a rip off your last box was.
I’m sorry for your experience. It definitely sounds like Fancy has gone downhill. It’s really a shame because they had an interesting concept, but it’s pretty clear they aren’t putting any time, energy (or money) into their sub boxes.