The Little Bazaar - Frequently Asked Questions
 

Frequently Asked Questions

Including our terms and conditions

Questions when you are still Searching and Shopping?
First, please sign up at the bottom of the specific style page to be notified via email whenever it will come back!
Many of our items are hand made or made in cottage industry so they are unique or in limited quantities. Once they are sold out, it may take some time to get same or similar items back in stock. And sometimes, for some categories (like patchwork) the products are so unique that you just can not find the exact same item at this store, or for that matter, anywhere else. But we do bring the patchwork back from time to time. Prints are generally hard to bring back. Tie-dye could come back if there are many takers!
In many cases, you may be able to find another similar looking style that you can pick. If you like something, we'd suggest not to wait too long as it may sell out soon. We do keep getting new inventory or designs at frequent intervals. If you would like to sign up to be notified when new things arrive, please sign up with your email (we do not use your email ID for any other purpose whatsover). Please sign up on the left bottom of our home-page.
Due to small quantities and fast changing styles/designs, we do not have most styles pictured on someone wearing them on our website. However, you can find many of our styles pictured here:
https://www.instagram.com/thelittlebazaar/ (please check our 'Posts' and also the 'Tagged' tab)
https://www.tiktok.com/@tlbstyles
https://www.pinterest.com/thelittlebazaar/
https://www.facebook.com/thelittlebazaarstyles/
You can search on the phrase that could describe what you are looking for; or, if you know the item or style number (which is a four digit number on top of every item page), you can search based on that. We have also created speacial pages to help you look for what you need. Please check this page for search.
Absolutely. We do encourage to order online, but should you want to order on phone, please call on at the number of the Contact Page seven days a week from 09:00 AM to 5:00 PM PST and ask for The Little Bazaar.
You can forward your Shopping Basket to your email. Please provide your email at the bottom of Shopping Basket. You can send as many Baskets as you want. You will get an email with a link to your Basket. Please note that if you come back to your shopping basket from your email later, but one or more of styles have sold out, that style will no longer be in the Basket.
Our shopping cart is set to allow only one piece of a particular style. First, a few of our items are unique, and we may not have multiple quantities. While we do have multiple quantities of most items, we still encourage only one item of a particular style per order - so that you can look unique and differentiated when you wear them (because shopping with us is to celebrate your creativity of choice towards a unique personal style!) So the shopping cart will only accept one quantity of a particular item in the order. If you need more, like for a performance or for the family as gifts, etc. please contact us directly and we can send you a link to make the purchase. You can also place multiple orders.
Women's sizes are divided into various types, depending on height. For example, "Misses' sizes", "Miss Petite", "Women's sizes". As far as possible, we physically take measurements and provide that in the listing details. Please see the size chart to get an idea in terms of standard sizing. Unfortunately our online catalog is not structured according to sizes - this is due to the fact that most of the merchandize is hand-crafted, from cottage industry, and/or recycled fabric for patchwork; so its just not possible to produce specific or consistent sizes all the time.
Just send us an email, or call us. Not only for this, but for any other question you may have on any aspect.
Sure. We do see some of you call us, or write to us, just to check if something could work for you. We will be happy to provide you suggestions, and help you decide.

We take pictures and dimensions of the actual products in stock. However, note that the colors in pictures are dependent on lighting conditions, and other aspects. For example, some fabrics may reflect light, and hence appear brighter/vary-in-shade in pictures. Also, the colors you see depend on your computer/device monitor. Every tie-dye product can get a little unique due to the very nature of the tie-dye process - and may sometimes as well vary a little from what you see in pictures. Same for patchwork apparel - patches cannot be exactly same on each piece.

We also take actual dimensions of a sample of the lot; in a rare case there may be a variation of up to 1-2 inches for the fact that each piece is individually cut and stitched, and not mass produced by machines. Please bear with these variations.

Material/Fabric - Much like online purchase from anywhere else, its difficult to understand the fabric or material of construction until one can actually see, touch and feel it. We try our best to describe it. However there is just staggering type of fabric available, and it even changes from a style to another style, batch to batch, etc. No words can really describe what it is, especially coming from cottage/small industry where production volumes are very low, and type of fabric used depends on season, cotton cost, availability, etc.

The sequin work on cotton tie-dye skirts is a temporary embellishment. Its a cottage industry art, and is done by hands. The sequins are hand sewn in rather loosely, and you can expect to wear the skirt with sequins a couple of times, and then they would tend to fall; at which point, its a good idea to take out the sequins and wear the skirt as a simple tie-dye style.

On some other styles like when they are on on silk or rayon, the sequin work is a bit more well done, and will last longer. In some cases you will notice very even machine stitch on rayon, where they will last longer.

Caution: The sequins can be a little abrasive in some cases, and care should be exercised in wearing or handling them.

The best is for you can sign up for email updates (left-bottom of our home page) or on a popup on the site. We frequently (once in a couple of months) provide updates as new designs get added, or when any sold out inventory is available again. You can also follow us on Twitter, or connect as a friend on Facebook.
If you know the number, use the 'Find Item' search box on the top right of the Home Page. You can also go to the page with sitemap of old designs if you know the number, or remember a bit of title description. If the style is sold out but we have not taken it off because we can potentially get some additional quantity, you can see the sitemap pictures here - there is also a link there to see all pictures ever on sale at our store.

Once in a few months, or during a campaign, we email discount coupons/promotional codes to our customers/patrons. Sometimes they are available on internet forums, etc. Most of the codes have an expiration date. You could also sign up on the site to be included in weekly promotion coupon draws.

You could also Like our Facebook page as sometimes we publish discount coupons there. We encourage you to connect to us as a friend on Facebook for product and coupon code updates.

2021 Update: We now carry wholesale quantities of many products. Many of our products are so unique that there is only one of a kind made. On an item by item basis, we may be able to provide you larger quantities at discounted prices. As a first step, please email us the item numbers of our products that you may want, and we will get back to you in case we could work it out for you.
Majority of our products are made under our TLB or TheLittleBazaar.com label. Some of our carefully selected products are from other brands, where we don't have visibility, but we take assurance from them.
In majority of the cases, and certainly for our label, we work with small manufacturers from cottage or very small industry and maintain a direct relationship, including annual visits. We work with them like a family. It is very important for us that our products are made ethically with a reasonable level of fair trade practices. We make sure that they get a minimum of 20% more than the prevalent market rates (as reported in the local industry, gathered upon interviewing) - and we do to some extend with special bonus during the festival times like Diwali, Dashain, etc; we also make it a point to hold the facilities to a high level of safe working conditions. This helps the workers and suppliers, keeping our quality high, products dependable, and prices reasonably low for the kind of quality and designs we can provide. Specifically this helps keep our styles consistent from a production batch to a batch, majority of which have some element of hand done workmanship like tie dye, crochet, embroidery, etc. An overwhelming majority is hand-stitched or hand-knit.
Many of products are made from recycled or upcycled fabric, some from leftover fabric from garment industry and infact some kind of fabric is made from the leftover threads used in the regular yarn industry. This speaks to a high level of sustainability in our products. We encourage use of natural dyes, natural cotton, etc. which are common for the kinds of products. Most of our products are made of cotton and rayon. We shun polyester or other petroleum based fabrics. Almost all of our products are from India, Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia, and none is of the kind that comes usually from China. During Covid, we have worked through many challenges to keep production flowing and keep livelihoods going. In some cases this has meant providing accomodation to workers and their families within the premises and following all the Covid-Safe practices.
Some sellers on platforms (mostly seen on Temu) copy our pictures and use the pictures to digitally print them on synthetic/polyester fabric.
They then use our pictures to even sell them!
Our original clothes are sustainably handmade, and mostly made of natural fibers like cotton and rayon. See more here.
Questions while you are trying to place an Order?
No, they are not. We follow the standard practice of international shipping of internet based orders:

"Orders that are shipped to countries outside of the U.S. may be subject to import taxes, customs duties and fees levied by the destination country ("Import Fees"). The recipient of an international shipment may be subject to such Import Fees, which are levied once a shipment reaches your country. Additional charges for customs clearance must be borne by the recipient; we have no control over these charges and cannot predict what they may be. Customs policies vary widely from country to country; you should contact your local customs office for further information. When customs clearance procedures are required, it can cause delays beyond our original delivery estimates."

That said, for years we did not hear our customers reporting that any additional amount had to be paid during the delivery of the order, but this year (2023), we are beginning to see instances, especially in countries like Germany, Greece, UK, etc. So the possibility is there. Hence its important for our international (outside of US) customers to note this, and understand that paying the custom tax is their responsibility. It may not happen in all cases, but it can happen.See more about international shipping here.
You could try the following two things to see if that allows you to use your Credit Card to make a purchase:
1) Do not "Sign In" to Paypal to make the purchase: When you reach the payment page after clicking the "Buy Now" button, there is option down there that reads "Pay with a Debit or Credit Card". You can click there to make payment as a Paypal guest. You will be asked for Credit Card and shipping information. This is a simple, standalone payment, and does not effect your Paypal account, if you have one.
This may not work in all countries - if so, please also see 19.1 below. To be sure, you can also try using a different email address.
2) "Sign In" to Paypal: Use your Paypal balance or a Credit Card you have on file with them to pay for your purchase. Note that Paypal will use your shipping address on file, but will let you change it as well.
We can send you a link to pay via Stripe. This is a manual process. Please send us the 4 digit item ids, any size selections (if applicable) and your shipping address via email, and we will send you a link to make the payment within 24 hours.
There can be two situations:
1) You signed into your Paypal account to make the Payment: The shipping address is taken from the default shipping address on your Paypal account. You can modify this address before confirming the payment.
2) You do not have (or want to use) a Paypal account, and clicked on "Don't have a PayPal account?" option - You will be prompted to enter your shipping address (along with the payment information).
Our business is located in the state of California. Our Payment Processor Paypal charges average Sales Tax of 8.26% for our CA customers (2022) at the final stage before the Payment is made as per these guidelines (the Tax is not visible in the shopping cart). Sorry, we no longer pay sales tax on behalf of our California customers. If your tax jurisdiction has a different overall tax rate than the average, please contact us and we will be happy to work with you to adjust it.
Yes. Paypal lets you process your order and payment even if you don't have an account with them. You will be asked to provide your address and credit card information as a one time transaction. You do not need to open a Paypal Account.

We completely understand the buyer expectation with combined shipping and would be more than willing to pass on any shipping savings. We have this calculation that automatically determines combined shipping on check-out:

We take the shipping methods that are valid for all items in the cart. Take the calculated shipping of item with highest shipping, and add to that a percentage (50-90%) of the calculated shipping for all other items. In any case, combined shipping will always be less than sum of shipping for all items in the cart. If you have any questions or concerns on combined shipping of if special shipping requirements are required please feel free to send us an email.

Please select the International Shipping Option on the Checkout page. We apologize but we are unable to provide Free Shipping to our International customers. However, we will send you a discount code for 10% off your order (not including shipping) that you can use for your next order.

If your shipping address is International and you chose Free Shipping, we will send you an invoice for the actual Shipping amount. The order will ship out once the invoice is paid.

If you have doubts about USPS or Fedex delivery, you can contact us to add insurance to your shipment. Our normal shipments are not insured. Please see FAQ 29.1 below.

Questions after you placed your Order?
You can find your order status by using your 'EMAIL' (used while placing the Order) and the 'DATE' of the order. Click this link to check the order status, as well as track the shipment.
Please make sure you are using the email on your order (which is the email used while making the Payment, or the email of your PayPal account, if you were logged into Paypal while making the Payment). So very often, this email address could be different than the email address you normally use on your device.
Please note that we do not store your information, and therefore do not ask you to create an account.
You can cancel the order if it has not been shipped. Please contact us as soon as possible as we ship by noon Pacific Time every day. We will refund the order amount minus 3% which is the payment processing charge that is not refunded by the payment processor (PayPal).
If the order has been shipped, you may be able to talk to your USPS carrier and refuse it, such that it comes back to us without you having to pay the return shipping. We can then refund you the amount (minus original shipping). If you could not contact your carrier or if the order is shipped via Fedex, this option is not available and you should follow the normal Return process (see FAQ #31 below),
Often, we see that you may have used a different email address on the order, than the one you are checking. The email on the order is the email used during Paypal payment processing. It's possible that if you logged into Paypal, the account has a different, older email, than you usually use. We suggest you check that email id, and if you still do not see any email from us, please contact us.
We reserve the right to cancel any order for any reason.

If we have inventory issues (which is rare, but can happen), we will reach out to you with the alternatives first.
We could be taking off a few times a year, for few days at a time.
You will see this notified on our home page, and contact us page.
During this time, we are not able to ship. Not even if you order Priority, or even if you are willing to pay more! Sorry about that. We are a small business, and there is just no one there to ship!
Once we are back, we start shipping in the order the orders were received. We do prioritize shipping of orders that are paid Priority Mail.
It does take us some time to catch up with the orders. If we are out for 4 days, you can expect your order to be shipping out about 2-3 days after we return.
During this period, we are also not processing any returns and exchanges, and customer service emails are also delayed. Thank you for your understanding!
You will get an email with Tracking number as soon as the package is shipped. You can also track the shipment from the order status page. For USPS Domestic Shipments, we use USPS First Class (or Fedex Ground/Home Delivery) or USPS Priority Mail (or Fedex Express).
Please feel free to contact us if you have not received the shipment after ten days of placing the order.
United States Postal Service and/or Fedex ensures that the package is duly delivered at your address, especially when there is a Delivery Confirmation. In case of problems, these services are now also able to pinpoint the location co-ordinate and the time where the package was left.
We do verify the Shipping Address with the USPS/Fedex database to make sure that its a valid address, and can reach out to you in case the address needs to be confirmed. Please contact us if you would like to purchase additional insurance.
Not a problem. Please contact us and we can fix it if it's not already shipped. To ensure that it's a legitimate request, we ask that you send us an email from the email address on your order (which is what you have in your PayPal account, and could be different than your normal email id you use).

You may realize that the shipping address was incorrect after the package has been shipped, or do not even realize that the address was wrong (or outdated, old one you had in your Paypal profile). If the shipping status is 'Delivered', please reach out to folks living at the address. As much as we want to help you, if the shipment was delivered to the address on the order, we can't do much about it. We can't contact people at living at that address. Please also see point 29.1 below.

Please note that we may have shipped your packet using USPS, or Fedex. There is a chance that:
- USPS may send the packet back to us as undelivered without additional charges.
- FedEx would notify you via email, make multiple attempts, and then send back to us, with additional return charges

In both cases we will attempt to contact you via email and wait for 3 days. When we get notified of the new addess, we will be happy to ship the packet again after contacting you for additional shipping. If we don't hear back, we will refund back the amount, minus original shipping. In case of Fedex, we will also deduct the shipping charged by FedEx to send the return packet back to us.
- In case of Fedex you can also use Fedex Delivery Manager app to change the delivery address once it has been shipped. Any charges will be your responsibility. If you ask us to call Fedex and change the address, we will send you a link to pay $18 - $28 which is Fedex's charges for address change (as of 2023), provided they can still change the address. There is no such service/option in case of USPS.
In case you went through the Paypal order process and noticed that you were not asked for the shipping address, likely your shipping address from your Paypal account will be used. This could be your preference in the PayPal account.
If the address in your PayPal profile is not correct, please contact us and we can correct it (See #28 above).
Payment confirmation email will be sent the moment a payment is received by Paypal. You can see the items ordered in the email from Paypal or in your Paypal account. Once the order ships out, we will notify you of the shipping status at your same Paypal email ID. Please make sure you check your Paypal account email id, and not another one. You can also check the order status on the website.
If the tracking status says delivered, but you cannot find the item, please double check at your end, give it some time (1-2 days) or follow up with USPS (locator) or Fedex as the case may be. We use common carrier services, and like other postal or courier shipments, this is something to be resolved between the recipient and the shipping services. These days both USPS and Fedex are able to provide the exact time of delivery, and can sometimes provide the geo-point of delivery.
We are NOT responsible for any packages as long as we shipped to the address on your PayPal account (or an override provided by you via an email from the email address on the order), and the tracking status reported by USPS or Fedex is 'Delivered'. The delivery scan also provided exact time of delivery, and type of location.
By placing your order with us, you AGREE to this standard Industry practice.

(It is not that we don't care in such a situation, but there is a little we can do or know, as we are not hand delivering your package, and especially cannot know about the conditions on your end, like how safely are your packages are delivered in routine, who manages your apartment mail boxes, who else has access to the delivery area, is the area susceptible to postal thefts, etc. So please, we are a small business, and are in no position to help in case you have not received your package, but the delivery status is clearly stated as "Delivered". Please do not reach out to us with a request to reship, as this can be potentially misused by others, and will result in increased price of products for everyone. Thank you for understanding. Please also see this (26.3).)

You can also reach out to Paypal, if you wish so. But please know that Paypal will also not be able to do much if the shipping status is "Delivered".

You can also read "Where is my package" note from USPS and create a 'missing mail search request' with USPS here: https://www.usps.com/help/missing-mail.htm. And here for Fedex.
(Please see FAQ 25.1 above about how to add insurance to your package prior to shipment)
For International Shipments, please read towards the end of terms for International Shipping.
Questions after you have received your Shipment?
Please check your items and report any manufacturing defect within 2 days of receiving the package, and include any pictures that depict the defect. Please do not take any tags off and preserve the packaging (we will not be able to help out if the issue is not reported in 2 days).
Majority of our styles are handmade. There can be differences in patchwork, embroidery, color tone, tie-dye pattern, color of stripes/patches, order of stripes/patches, shine, etc., or even differences in size measurements with respect to size labels. Sometimes there can be size differences between two pieces of the same style as they are hand made. While these items can surely be returned, these differences do not qualify as a 'defect'.

Recycled fabric products - some of our patchwork products are made from recycled fabric. This means the fabric has already gone through a complete wear-cycle, and consequently does not have full strength, and could even have small defects (e.g. small holes, repairs, marks, etc). Since these sustainable clothing products are made with these expectations, these issues do not qualify as 'defects' and are rather a characteristic of these styles. Thank you for understanding, and if this is something that is not acceptable, you can surely go for patchwork styles that are not made from recycled fabric.

A note: The quality of our products is excellent for the kind of styles we sell, and we make an extraordinary effort to ensure that. However, if you have been wearing your item and it develops a snag sooner than what you would have expected - in general please note that a handmade garment, let's say patchwork, and that is one size, and is made of cotton (and often recycled) - is going to ask for some forgiveness and kindness (same for let's say if a button comes off a strap of a pair of overalls, or if the elastic at the ankle snaps if it gets entangled, etc). That is also a charm of wearing this kind of clothing (these snags can also often be repaired with middle school level skills). Organic cotton or patchwork sewn painstakingly with hand can happen to have a point of failure when under stress. It's not going to be a match for machine-made petroleum based clothing made of stronger one piece of fabric, that is also sized for you (and comes from across the Pacific for cheap). Similarly cotton, rayon, etc. - these natural fiber fabrics when coming from cottage industry are not perfectly smooth and flawless. Unfortunately we are not able to entertain requests for replacements or refunds in such cases (unless we raise our prices across the board). Thank you for understanding. Please also see our return policy.
General Questions
We don't ask you to register with us as a Customer so that your shopping with us doesn't have to mean yet another userid and password to remember, or to leave out there somewhere on the internet. For Payment, we rely on your use of Paypal, which also provides an option to pay via your Credit Card even if you are not registered with Paypal. There is no chance of your financial information getting compromised as it never even gets to us.
Because we don't ask users to login, any internet user browses through the website completely anonymously. As a result, we are not able to record any preferences or show specific products - according highest levels of privacy.
We could use your email id to send you a rare promotion email with or without a discount coupon, with a link to remove you from this list.
If you came to this site clicking a Google Ad, and made a purchase, we may be able to track the Ad click as part of Google Analytics Tools.
You can see our full Privacy Policy.
We use industry standard and highly popular Paypal for these. The shopping cart information is passed to Paypal, which asks you to log into your Paypal account, or asks for your address and credit card information on its secured servers to process the payment and confirm the order.
Your calls are routed to our office in Dublin, California. They are not routed to an offshore location.
Special offers may be subject to cancellation at any time. If a particular item that is ordered is no longer available for any reason, we reserve the right to offer an alternative but similar item, or immediately refund the payment. We reserve the right to annul any order and refund full amount. For any clarification on terms and condition, please contact us.
We do not allow use of pictures or content for commercial purposes. More details are available on the Copyright policy page.
We sell under the brand name of TLB. We either manufacture our products through our associates, or source them through small manufacturers or wholesellers.
Some of the manufacturers/importers we work with: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
This FAQ was last updated March 24, 2021.

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