Arcbazar Inc

This was my third positive experience with Arcbazar. This time the task was to complete a landscaping design for my backyard around a theme. I received five excellent drawings out of six entries.

Did not use their services.

Using Arcbazar was a great experience from the beginning to end! The website was easy to use and the communication was excellent. It was remarkable how easy, efficient, and non-time consuming it was obtaining these designs; no taking off work to let them in the house etc. The follow-up from Arcbazar was top-notched. We had 13 designers from around the world sign up for our kitchen remodeling project and ended up with a total of 6 designs. 3 of these designs provided excellent ideas on how to rearrange our kitchen after knocking down the wall between the dining room and kitchen to open the space up; ideas we would have never thought of! Our first choice ended up being the design submitted from France! We love it! It has a bit of a European feel to it; beautiful, welcoming, cozy, and very functional. After the kitchen is completed, we plan to use Arcbazar again for a basement remodeling project.

We took a chance on arcbazar and in the end it did not pay off. We offered a substantial amount in hopes that we'd get a substantial number of designs. In the end we only received 4 (1 more than the required amount for the winners to get paid.) The designs weren't very appealing although there were some elements of a few of the designs which we liked. However, for the few good suggestions which we'll implement the $1700 was not worth the money. I would not use arcbazar for re-decorating suggestions again.

Wasn't so simple to use the interface, but once the brief was uploaded I sat back and waited for the designers to come forward. Three responded with very different takes on the brief, which was fantastic. I worked with the winner who performed full architectural services for the remodel.

We were a little hesitant to spend real money on a design contest, but I must say we were pleasantly surprised. Over 20 designers signed up, with almost 15 different designs submitted. Of these, I would say probably 6-7 were quite well thought through, with details about where to acquire suggested furniture, options for colors, furniture arrangement, etc. We got lots of good ideas for our project. Definitely worth the money.

I purchased an online deal for design services. I felt the process was cumbersome and not for me. You had to document with photos and dimensions, upload everything and explain what you wanted in writing rather than just speaking to a design consultant. I had some issues uploading information and you have to call to get assistance which I didn't feel was helpful. I decided to just pass. This service is probably fine for someone who has the time to put into it but I preferred a service where I could speak to someone and get design help in describing what I wanted. If I knew what I wanted, I would consult a design service in the first place. I feel like I just gave my money away.

THIS IS A SCAM!!!!!!!!!! I bought the $25 coupon and it turns out that it really cost min. $300 for the service. I want my $25 back!!!!

Arcbazar's website makes creation of a contest quick, easy and affordable. The sponsor is able to detail out the requirements for the design, and the designers have the opportunity to post questions throughout the process. Posting of design files makes review of submissions very orderly, and the ranking page for final results is easy and well thought out. Arcbazar's global reach afforded us the opportunity to work with designers from multiple countries who had varied solutions that were creative, clever, functional and aesthetic. Our particular contest ran for 4 weeks which enabled us to set exptecations with our PTA and keep on track with our timeline. The nice thing about having 7 design submissions is that we can pick the best facets of each to come up with our final plan. During the process I had the opportunity to talk with the support team at Arcbazar, and they always answered within 3 rings. They were great advisors for our project.

tI was surprised about the amount of time invested by each. I was pleased to see many design plans and alternatives, rather than paying a fee of three times as much to one local person for only one design. Several entries were by talented architects who showed me how to move walls to accommodate extra bedrooms, and how to create a more modern flow in the house. Some submissions had a greater focus on the furniture and for each piece suggested there was a website link list to allow me to find the exact store to order it from, and their price. In the end, I will likely combine parts of the plan from the two architects, the bathroom layout and finishes from a different submission, and the furniture suggestions of several different submissions, by room. The presentations submitted by each looked like photographs of an after development. My prize reflected a lot of areas I was open to feedback on. I am aware that some people pick one or two rooms for a total prize of $500 or less. My $4,000 prize was divided 60% to first place, 30% to second place, and 10% to third place. All of the other entries were not paid, unfortunately. These were very professional efforts, and useful to me.

My wife and I really liked the competition. The hardest part was deciding a winner because many of the designs had aspects that we really liked and this gave us a lot of ideas for how we will remodel our kitchen. I think had we offered more money we would have gotten more designs (we had 6 designs submitted) but in the end I think it worked well.

Ana and Imdat at Arcbazar were incredibly responsive and supportive; Ana responded to one of my calls with a phone call in the evening from an airport (she was picking someone up)! I was amazed at the response to my competition. Twenty-six (26) architects from all over the world--from across the US to Europe and Asia--signed up for the project. In the end, I received 16 submissions, virtually all included detailed plans, elevations, perspectives, and photorealistic renderings. A couple even included websites and prices to purchase recommended furnishings. The depth and professionalism of these design submissions was extremely impressive. Two or three of the designs were very successful in providing all the design elements that I wanted for the condo unit. Rather than implement one of the designs in its entirety for the unit, I was able to pick and choose elements that I liked and create a design myself (I have a little experience in architectural design). I brought this "montage" to a meeting with the builder and project architect. They liked the design and will have no problem in implementing the new plan. This is the first time that I'd encountered "crowdsourcing" and initially I felt a bit uncertain about what it entailed. I dug a little deeper into Arcbazar's website and was won over by the membership of the company's Board of Directors. Since beginning the project I've become an Arcbazar enthusiast, sharing my experience with others who are astounded that, for a modest price, one is able to get professional design services from not just one but several designers.

I submitted a project after purchasing the discount for 25. dollars on Angie's List. Arcbazar accepted my project and I paid in full up front. There was some interest and a few sketchy drawings submitted and I responded to any and all requests from the architects. Deadline passed and was extended. It passed again and Arcbazzar closed it as unfinished. Still no problem. When they refunded my money they did not use their own cash in PayPal and PayPal charged me for the transaction so I lost around 50 dollars in the deal just with PP fees. With my own PP account if I send funds that are in the PP account there is no charge. So I lost the 25 to Angie and around 50 (I can get the exact amount) to PayPal. 75 dollars to find out I screwed myself. I wrote to Angie but received no reply or even concern from them which surprised me. Not much else to say except beware that you will lose if the contract is not filled. Buyer beware.

Lost 25 dollars...service not performed

It went great. We only got two plans but both were great! If I would have increased the price, I would have a greater response I think.

They were very responsive and quick response to my emails. However, out of 16 submissions, I narrowed down to 8 and still did not find any designs to fit my expectation. I understand that this is a competition but for the amount I paid, I expected the result to be a little bit more creative. I felt like I have to pick whatever design available and it did not really fit the layout that i was expecting to see so I was a little disappointed. Anyway, this service cannot replace to have an actual designer come in and drawing a layout based n an accurate measurement I ended up purchasing another Angie's List big deal for much less $55 to have contractor/designer come in and take measurement and drawing a conceptual layout for my kitchen which turn out to be very good but overall this service for this company was ok for me because it's a bit pricey for the result I received.

It was the worst money I have ever spent. I would never recommend them to anyone. It was shoddy work. I followed their instructions carefully and I went above and beyond and nobody followed my instructions. They provided enough information that I still had to pay them. I would not use them for a deal like this in the future.

This is a service that allows designers/architechts to bid on housing designs. We have a remodel we are considering and wanted to get some ideas of what we should do based on what we think we can do. This service allowed us to see multiple design ideas for a set price versus using a local designer with one or two ideas at a higher price than this service provided. If we use the design that won (which we plan to) then this will end up being an overwhelming success.

they were phenomenal. We told them what we wanted and they gave it over to their designers. They exceeded our expectations with their designs. i would use them again in a moment.

It was great. I was looking for help to space plan a remodel of a bedroom into a master suite. There are examples on their site that you can look at to try and get a sense of what information you should write up in your project description. I emailed the support team to ask if they would review my info before i luanched the project. They did and gave me some great feedback. I launched the competition and logged in once a day to see if there were any questions posted on the project wall for me to answer. I paid $500 upfront - the total amount of my award plus the ArcBazar fee. (Their FAQ's state that if you don't get submissions you get it back.) I had over 20 designers sign up and 15 submit designs. I ranked the designs and logged on the project my top 3 (in order) and then you can do some honorable mentions as well. The $500 is split and awarded to the winning 3 designers by ArcBazar. The reason I gave a B on responsiveness was they have on-line chat help, but there were times when I tried to use it that it wasn't on. Then I found their email and sent a separate note. (I hesitated and almost gave them an A, because some of the email replies were super fast, but I stuck with my first thought of B.) There are a couple of things on the website that were not great, but workable. They were related to the fact that I had so many designers submit responses - 1) the list of designers would sort differently when I went in and out of it; and 2) downloading the submissions you had to do 1 by 1 and page by page. (Until I emailed customer service and then they created a zip file for me :-)). Their customer service folks said some enhancements are coming soon, so hopefully these won't be an issue for long. I highly recommend this to anyone thinking of a build/remodel project. There's no way that I could have gotten this many ideas from working with 1 person or firm and no way for $500.

Have no idea who this provider is.

I repeated call but they never call back

The process was a lot of fun. You simply submit your requirements. This could be pretty much anything - bathroom upgrade, new home, really just about anything. In my case it was a curb appeal project on a budget. I submitted pictures of my home as well as some site dimensions. You then specify how much you would like to spend and how long the entrants have to submit proposals. The website suggests a price but it is really up to you how much you want to spend. This part was a little tricky for me. I really didn't have anything to go by and to be honest the amount the website proposed was more than I wanted to spend. I ended up browsing the other contests to sort of see what others were doing. In the end I think I ended up with a price I was comfortable with and got a fair amount of entries. During the contest, the entrants can (and did) post questions on "the wall". Any time someone either entered or posted something, you get an email indicating so. That was a really nice feature. You always knew what activity was taking place. I ended up getting 7 entries out of 14 that signed up. I'm guessing I would have had more if I had paid more None of the entries were anything I would go with 100%. But, that's the great thing about this. You get different ideas and you can sort of pick and choose what you like. At the end of the contest, you pick 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners. They then split the amount you committed. This was a fun experience. The website is extremely easy to use. No extra bells and whistles to clutter things up. The folks at arcbazar are helpful as well. When I originally set things up, I did not really give my project a very descriptive name. Ana emailed me to suggest something better and offered to change it for me. Quiet helpful. I would definitely do this again for any project. It was especially helpful for me because I really didn't have a good idea in mind, so it gave me a lot of ideas.

I was completely new to this kind of a competition and i was guided through every step with prompt and very clear advice. The process was smooth and very well run. We had 22 designers from all over the world sign up and 10 submitted very complete and wonderful designs. each design was unique and different approach to the design challenge. I will use Arcbazar again.

It's too bad that I had to rate this company a C to trigger AL's dispute resolution---all because the company would not honor the terms of a coupon I had purchased thru AL's Big Deal. After having originally saying they'd honor, they subsequently tried to say the coupon was expired (the coupon itself says "does not expire" but that they'd honor at their new rates (50% decrease in the value of the coupon)) and then said it was "a pity" that it had come to this over $60. They did eventually honor the coupon in full but not having their facts right (including what they said in their own emails) and then trying to blame or shame me for not accepting their new terms is absolutely ludicrous for a company where a customer can post a public review that will be taken seriously. Frankly, had it not been that I like the concept and was pleased with the work done by the folks submitting designs I would have rated them lower. I first learned of Arcbazar in May 2012 when they had a Big Deal offer on AL. I knew that at some point in the next year or so I was going to re-side my house and was intrigued by the concept of crowdsourcing. At that time there were not many projects posted on their website (I'm not sure just how long they'd been in business) but the coupon was a great price and didn't expire so I bought one. Fast forward to a year later. I was ready to plan the re-siding project and by this time there were quite a number of projects on the web and I was impressed by the quality of the final products. So I launched a competition. The instructions were easy to follow and within a couple of days I had everything together that I needed to do so---description of the project, scope, specs, photos, etc. When I got to the point of paying (which you do as soon as you launch the project) I found that not only was the value of my coupon cut in half, the fees I had to pay Arcbazar were increased by 50% over what was stated on the coupon. So I saved what I'd entered as a draft and sent an inquiry to the support website...several days passed with no response. Then I left a messge on VM. Several days passed and I finally got a response to my email saying they'd honor the coupon, just enter the code when I paid and they'd immediately refund the difference. So I did. Days passed, designers began to sign on to the project but no refund. The competition was set to run for a month. I thought maybe I'd get the refund when it closed so I waited. The competition closed with 7 out of 16 designers who had signed up actually submitting. One was quite weak, essentially stating that my proposal didn't give them a lot to work with. The others all showed an effort--some more than others--but all interesting and overall causing me to look at possibilites differently than I had been doing on my own. While my project won't be exactly like any one of them I likely will incorporate pieces from several. As the competition closed I sent an email, again to "support", asking a question that really needed a very quick turn around. Again, no response (still none to that email, 6 days later). Four days after the close of the competition and three days before I had to vote to award the design fee) I decided I need a tweaking of the submissions of two designers---one of a file that is too big to print and another one with a very distracting element in the middle of one of the design views. I sent an email to support asking for help with those issues and also for my refund. Just to be sure I'd get a response I also called. Again I was sent to VM (I do wonder if anyone ever answers the phone there). I did get a response. Arcbazar was willing to contact the two designers with my requests (I had to provide a bit of information which I did right away). I hoped to hear back in time for the responses to factor into my award decisions. One I heard back about today, the day I have to vote. The other I'm unlikely to hear back from. This would be no problem if I didn't have a deadline, imposed by Arcbazar, that I have to respond by. The response to my request for a refund, however, was not so accommodating. In my first inquiry (before I launced the competition) about the change in terms of the coupon I was told in an email that when I entered the coupon code it would be processed at the "new conditions" but that they would then refund the difference (neither happened). Now in the second email (after the competition ended) I was told that in the first email they agreed to honor my "expired" coupon---which was not said in the first email. Also, I was told they had looked at my coupon, which, had they done, they would have seen that it clearly states "does not expire". Further, I was asked to "understand" that they have "new conditions" that would not allow for a refund of the full amount due per the coupon I had purchased. My response was that that was not consistent with the terms of the coupon (no expiration date for the terms stated on the coupon), that I'd need to talk to AL to see how this might be handled and that I was willing to abide by AL's decision and hoped they would be, too. Since I hadn't gotten a response to that email by two days later I contacted AL to start the dispute resolution. Two days after that I got an email saying they'd refunded to the full coupon value but that it was a "pity", they're a small start-up, not trying to make money, and that likely AL will agree that they changed their fee structure a long time ago. All of which may be true but they're clearly not getting the point---they sold a non-expiring coupon at certain terms---they can't arbitrarily decide not to honor that in the future. Beyond AL, I don't think that state would allow that. I probably would have rated this service an A as I do like the concept, understood and was willing to accept the risks regarding what I might or might not get back, and the final results fully met my expectations. Overall, I'm happy I listed with Arcbazar and this experience would not stop me from doing so again in the future. But, this totally preventable awful customer service (over and over poor response time, unprofessional character of their emails to me, and not wanting to honor their coupon) puts another blemish (I see I'm not the first to rate them poorly) on an otherwise very good product. What a shame.