Blick Art Materials

I usually don't have trouble with Blick. Choice of supplies is very good and while they lack in some areas, they are still better than most art supply chains. However, their customer service leaves something to be desired. Recently I purchased a VanDyke Brown from Utrecht. These are supposed to be artist-grade oil paints. Generally, I'm pretty happy with Utrecht, but this paint was sub-par. VanDyke Brown should be almost black and this was low on pigment. When I complained, I was told I would need to return the item at my own expense since it was "not defective." I've spent literally thousands of dollars at Blick over the years and responses like this make me feel like I am not valued as a customer. I would have appreciated having the value of the paint applied toward a better brand. I was also working towards a tight deadline, which I mentioned in my email and which CS ignored completely. Makes me wish Amazon carried more art supplies as they generally treat me with much more respect as a customer, even though I spend far less money there. I've started searching for alternate venues to purchase my art supplies. Happily I found that Masterpiece carries a much more extensive range of canvases on their own site than Blick does on theirs. Not with the discounts that Blick offers at times, but it might be worth it to get away from the headaches of dealing with Blick customer service.

This is not the first time I've had an issue like this. I purchased a varnish that damaged a painting. I felt as if CS treated me as if I was stupid and knew nothing about varnishing paintings. They then charged the wrong debit card and created and overdraft issue with my bank. (They didn't bother to ask me before charging or tell me they were going to charge me for a replacement varnish.)

I placed an order two days ago, and I found out that they haven't shipped the items yet. I see this as pure laziness or a very bad business conduct.

I can't stop collecting art materials, and DickBlick is one of my main suppliers. Excellent quality and a good return policy!

Made my first purchase on their website after reading recommendations from other artists. Got a set of their acrylic paint for my upcoming painting classes. Signed up for their email list and received a welcome email with 10% off which I couldn't use because according to customer service the paint set was excluded from the discount offer. Less than twelve hours later I received an email advertising free shipping for order s of $25 or more. Since my order was not shipped yet I called and asked if I could get a credit for the shipping fee or if the fee could be waived. I was told that wouldn't be possible that gen though the merchandise was not shipped yet. It didn't make any sense to me and if I could cancel my order I would. And also as a first customer I hoped for a more accommodating store. Too many other options of crafting stores for me to buy supplies from. Too bad for them because they just lost a customer that would be repurchasing their paint and other supplies since I am just etartijg to learn to paint and I am in neeed of all types of supplies and would be loyal to this company if they showed they appreciate my business. But since they act like they don't need ne customers I will spend my money somewhere else.

Love this company. Have ordered from them for years. Service is quick... can't help slow postage service!

Apparently buying an e gift card isnt as easy as it sounds when you're ordering it from dick blick. Also the worst customer service I have ever had

A huge selection of drafting and drawing materials at fantastic prices.
Great communication and fast shipping.

I've been using Blick Art Materials for decades as a professional artist. I always use the tracking app with both Blick and the shipping company they use, FedEx. I see when my shipments leave Blick, where they go from there and where they are shuffled by FedEx. I also always send Blick a check instead of using a credit card. So, that should take longer because they have to okay my check in a different city and state before shipping my goods. I admit, I have had problems in the past with my shipments but each time I've discovered that it is FedEx that has failed me. I live in Kentucky and worked as a shipper in a nationally know printing company at one time. I know that Blick packages goods well on seeing the packages. The problem is almost always one of two things. The first is the FedEx takes a good deal of time in shuffling your packages from state to state before it gets to you or me. In my case, Illinois to Wisconsin to Indiana then to Kentucky. It's inconvenient but it is what it is. Blick does not cause that. We do when we select a shipping choice. The other problem is that we, the consumer, often don't read reviews of the products and service offered by Blick. The descriptions online are fairly precise and if they aren't enough for the consumer then a phone call before ordering is needed. I've had to deal with FedEx a few times because of shipping damage and if you think Blick's shipping and packing is bad you should try working with FedEx. They are like working with AT&T. You are truly only a number with them. They do nothing to rectify your problem. I've talked to several nice folks when calling Blick and I always have my numbers and full information ready when doing so. Things go smoothly ordinarily. Be sure of what you are ordering before ordering and if any questions arise call them before ordering. Hope all your orders from all companies turn out well.

I'll use Blick again but not because I'm happy.

If I could Blick to do some things differently, it would be to package things better, stop using Fedex since they are the ones who seem to literally throw stuff on their box corners out of the trucks, check the quality of the goods before they are packaged.

Credentials: I'm a professional artist who paints full time for a living and sells around 70K worth of art a year. (I'm a former tenured professor of art and art history.) I by all my supplies through Blick but, I still am annoyed by them.

I feel about Blick the way the I feel about Amazon, they don't care about how you feel: provide poor customer service but they have the monopoly.

I order almost all my supplies from Blick, canvas panels, stretched canvas, Winsor Newton paints, brushes, the whole shebang. I have ordered the same products and amounts from other sites and the prices are comparable but often the quality, delivery time, and customer service are worse. So Blick is able to beat grade "C" companies with a "B-" although at times I've had an "A" level experience too.

I always expect things to arrive damaged or poorly packed. How things are shipped sucks, and often things are damaged. Paint tubes are poorly packed and busted open or cut by the other items in the boxes and corners of canvas panels are sometimes damaged, and stretched canvas is often loose due to poor warehouse conditions or poor packing, but Blick always replaces them if you get in touch.

For example, I just got a shipment of 18x18x1.5 inch stretched canvases and the boxes were really messed up (the canvases were okay to use just loose or dented) easily fixed, I have had to spray canvas retentioner on every canvas to tighten them back up. I've actually got in touch with the owners by figuring out their emails and they have offered me coupons and discounts.

Attempted to order oversized canvases but handling fee was too much. Sales representatives said to place an order as that is the only way they can reduce the handling fee and promised that they would not process the order until they get confirmation from me that I am ok with the reduced handling fee.
Next thing I get is the shipping email. They processed the order without my consent with $150 handling fee.
To make long story short, my order was already shipped according to the email confirmation and I talked to the supervisor who said she will mail the $150 coupon the following week. I even made a note that I talked to *, the supervisor and was promised $150 coupon instead of returning my whole order as I felt little funny about the supervisors attitude.
But lo and behold, I get a "return" email the following week - even without the handling fee. First they charged me without my consent and now they refund without my consent and took out $150 handling fee!
I call again and raised an issue why my return was processed and how they didn't even refund the handling fee back. The sale representative ends up saying she was the one who got the phone call that I said I wanted to return. I asked if they have a recording of phone conversation and she says yes but the call gets cut off and she is never calling me back.
On top of that, they are having some phone problem and the line gets cut off in the middle of the call multiple times and I'm at their mercy to get the call back.
I call again and got connected with second person and she is also not calling back after getting cut off.
I'm wasting my time and energy calling them to make sure that they refund all my money while they repeat their process/cancel/process/cancel with no reasonable answer as to why they charged me in the first place and wasting my time.
This is my second time experiencing bad online order process with them.
I'm never ordering anything from this web. They are unprofessional and shady.

*Personal information redacted by admin

Thank you for your quick and good service! Answered all my questions and solved all my problems very quickly!

Easy to read graphics and easy to navigate. Quick replies to questions about products. Good prices and good quality materials.

Wow! A customer service rep yelling at me because they didn't ship the order correctly? Incredible. I'll be doing my business elsewhere next year.

The shipping algorithm used by DickBlick is extraordinarily inefficient. We will not be doing business with this company again.

Best customer service and the best art supplier hands down I buy all my company's art supplies from them ( Pure Zulu)

I received 2 gift cards for Xmas for DickBlick art supply. I'm an artist, so I was excited about spending them. I placed an order on Jan. 5th and everything went downhill from there. 1st this site takes it's time sending your order information. So then I wondered did the order even go through or not. Some days later they finally inform me the majority of what I ordered was on back order! Keep in mind they just had a big sale, but clearly didn't plan for the supply demand. I could have dealt with that, but then they had another big sale with the very same items being offered, but they can't fill my order. That's just plain poor business practice on their part. Information on the backordered items were like an up and down seesaw, as the dates would move all over the place. When calling for the order status and the remaining balance on the gift cards I was left on hold and on the phone for over a total of 3 hours all in! I was even told one guy in their accounting office would call me back to correct things, he never did. And some of the customer service reps did not update their records after my phone calls with them. One again not a good business practice. For heaven sakes how hard can something so simple be? Their system is very clunky not only for customers, but also for their employees. For instance one item finally landed on a actual date as to it's availability come May! I choose to cancel that part of the order, because after all what artist want's to wait 5 months to receive their much needed supplies? In turn adjusting my gift card balance took more time on the phone and an act of god to resolve it... really! So then I ordered a replacement item for the one canceled, once again everything flipped up side down. Even though I had entered my GC numbers accurately, their site kept insisting on charging the whole balance to my CC! More phone calls were needed to straighten that out. Finally a final order was placed and has yet to arrive. Come the end of this week it will have been 2 months without total resolution. And if you think I'm being critical and picky, I would like you to consider that I've placed 3 orders with Jerry's Artarama in the meantime, which were received with the week of placing said orders without without any issue. That's the way a well run system should work. DickBlick has lost my business forever.