'I was mainly there for her to talk to'
And the story behind the infamous Mornington sign
My enduring memory of my school’s formal (I’ve blanked the others) was being told to wear gloves, so our grubby sweat-soaked male hands did not leave a stain on the reputation of the young women.
#Memories
Young people put a lot of effort into these events, much like everything in your late teens, until they eventually become embarrassing photos of your youth.
But imagine if the dress you ordered never arrived?
Well, an alleged scammer has reappeared in Dunedin, and young women appear to be the target.
Ashburton-based Cali Kirkcaldie featured in a 2018 FairGo story, after complaints over missing orders and undelivered refunds.
Her former company, Cemented by H, specialised in concrete collectibles, such as Disney, Lego and Star Wars figurines.
The items were popular (who knew!) and sold largely via a Facebook page. So far so good, apart from some of those paid-for orders failing to arrive.
Kirkcaldie, now known as Kelly Smith, moved to Dunedin, where she set-up a new company: Fox Ocean Collective.
That company was registered to an Auckland address, a New Zealand Post private box.
By 2020, Smith, now known as ‘Kelly Vie’, was working out of a business address on Cumberland St, which traded as ‘Concrete Jungle’.
That company specialised in indoor house plants - captialising on the growing household trend - but the same issues that dogged her Ashburton-based business soon resurfaced.
Concrete Jungle attracted a slew of complaints from around the country, after orders of house plants were not delivered and money not refunded.
Some who complained online about the company were issued with cease and desist letters from a prominent Dunedin legal firm.
Vie, short for her middle name ‘Vienna’, claimed to multiple buyers that the reason for the delivery/refund issues was that she underwent eye surgery at the end of 2020.
By the end of that year she closed the store to the public, but plants could still be seen inside, and by May 2021 she reopened again to have a plant sale.
It was around this time that Smith - now known as Cali Smith - began her move into the growing industry of dress rentals, with her company: SharedwardrobeNZ.
That company used social media to market dresses to young women, who would hire them for special occasions. ‘A designer rental platform offering a safe space for you to rent and lend stylish pieces!’, the company’s blurb says.
A former worker, who I’ve agreed not to name, said Smith claimed to have about 100 dresses, but she doubted that statement.
The majority of dresses were ‘vendor dresses’ - those owned by other women, which in turn would be rented by others.
Many of the dresses featured on SharedwardrobeNZ’s Instagram page “I have not seen”, the former staff member said.
“I don’t believe that they are there.”
The former worker was employed by Smith earlier this year and believed the role would be about sorting orders, “but I was mainly there for her to talk to”.
“She really enjoyed telling me stories.”
Meanwhile, Smith had moved the office from Cumberland St to Jetty St, where she spent some time trying “desperately to keep alive” a lot of indoor plants, her former employee said.
It was at the Jetty St office where Smith would offer her flights and talk about giving her clothes. None of those flights eventuated, but she did receive a damaged skirt and top.
“I don’t know whose they were.”
Smith ended up cancelling a lot of the rental orders, claiming a dress was stuck in drycleaning:
“I think she was very airy-fairy about everything.”
She was still owed a small amount of money by Smith, and it is understood other employees were making complaints to several Government departments about the business.
The employee left as Smith began selling off some of the company’s dresses.
The company’s Instagram says it was under new ownership from June 1, about the same time as more claims emerged from disgruntled customers, about no tracking numbers - let alone packages - arriving as promised.
Among the lengthy terms and conditions on the company’s website included: ‘Further, any suspected fraudulent, abusive, or illegal activity, including violations of the Agreement and any additional Shared Wardrobe policy, may be referred to appropriate law enforcement authorities or other appropriate third parties’.
No one answered at the Jetty St office on Wednesday, while a message to the site ended with an automatic bounce-back message: “Thanks for getting in touch with us, in the most part our Instagram is fully automated and our messaging system is unmanned.”
“Our store is now permanently closed and no longer taking bookings, consignment or try-ons.”
Those with a store credit were told that there would be a list of vendors on their website to redeem their credit with, while a sale of items began last month.
A later email requesting a phone number was met with the following reply:
“Hi Hamish,
Works a bit hectic in our office today and tomorrow with the handover of new ownership.
‘‘How can we help,’’ said the unsigned email.
I replied: “Hey Kelly, I'm writing a story about some employees and customers disgruntled about the service they had at Shared Wardrobe, including no tracking numbers, and parcels not being delivered.”
Still no response.
If you are reading this Kelly/Cali, give me a call. And if you have been impacted by these companies mentioned, please email me at hamish.mcneilly@stuff.co.nz.
I wrote a Dunedin Police roundup earlier this week, which mentioned a drunk driver totalling a New Zealand Post post box in Caversham over the weekend.
A few people contacted me to ask who uses mail.
Well, inside the damaged post box were 12 mail items, which were gathered up by a manager and sent out for delivery.
Last week I featured a story on Cr Lee Vandervis, and the next morning I got my hands on the Court of Appeal decision. You can read about that here, if you haven’t already.
This week is shaping up as a big one for jailhouse lawyer Arthur Taylor.
His last report to Probation is today (Wednesday), while his parole ends on Monday.
Taylor has completed every day of a 17 year and seven month sentence.
He was looking forward to getting the GPS tracker (or as he describes it, a “bloody ball and chain”) removed, which he had worn on his right ankle for three years.
Look. At. The. Size. Of. It.
I had a lovely chat with Karyn Booker, who is getting ready for early retirement after closing down her Mornington shop, Bag of Bargins, on May 31, after 12 long years on Mailer St.
No, that isn’t a typo.
I asked Booker how Bags of Bargins came about.
“Well, my husband, who couldn’t spell, we had a fight one day and I said, ‘Why am I always doing everything’, and he took off and did the sign-writing, business cards, everything.”
That’s how Bags of Bargins came about, with the couple opening their first shop in the mid-1990s, selling secondhand items and, increasingly, collectibles.
Booker said she was a big Dr Who fan, and moved away from antiques and secondhand goods to focus more on collectibles, which she and and her husband enjoyed collecting.
“I turned to toys, dragons and fairies.”
When her husband died in 2002, she kept trading under the iconic sign.
She planned to have a pop-up shop in South Dunedin later in the year, to sell some of the collectibles she had left.
And she had no plan to change the name:
“I will never change anything.”
As for the sign:
“I will leave it up there, to remind people that I existed until someone pays to remove it.”
Some weeks she worked up to seven days a week, and had never had a holiday longer than a few days.
Now, she was looking forward to taking a few months off and hitting the road.
Thanks Karyn, and enjoy your retirement.
My Dunedin tune of the week is from a long lost band called In A Circle. This track, In a Dream, was recently restored from the original cassette to SoundCloud a few weeks ago.
The band was supporting The Verlaines at The Oriental in 1986.
Even cooler than this track is the tape deck used to upload it. PHWOAR!
Thanks for sharing Sharon and David!
Meanwhile, big news at my house with the discovery of two feijoas on one of our trees. I reckon they’ll be ready by August…
Tweet of the Week was too easy this week.
Nice one Elliot.
Have a great week.
It must hurt to realize, at some stage in the future, that you're stupider than Kelvyn Alp.
Not that he's not stupid, it's just that he's not *that* 💉💉 stupid.