Build-A-Bear Workshop Reviews 

I ordered the bear with accessories on 7/22/2024. They told me when I ordered it that I would have the bear, etc. on Aug. 1 or Aug. 2. My friend’s bday is on Aug. 2 so that would make it in time. I kept checking my order every day and it never said it was shipped. A full week later, on 7/29, the order STILL had NOT shipped. I finally got an email on 7/30 saying it had shipped but they lied. They only created the shipping label. FedEx didn’t get the actual package until 7/31. Of course I received no notifications about this from the company and had not received a response to the last two emails I sent them. On 7/31, thanks to me setting up a notification on FedEx, I received notice from FedEx that the package won’t be here until 8/6, which is four days AFTER my friend’s birthday. Build a bear does NOT care about their customers at all and their “100% satisfaction guarantee” is a total lie. Do not waste your money with this company, they do not deserve you to spend any of your hard earned income with them. They certainly won’t appreciate it if you do.

Good and bad, Easy to order online and super fast delivery, really quick. The personalised voice box however was worse than useless.

Following the very sudden death of a friend, it shattered mine and his wife's world. He was a musician who wrote a song with some very poignant lyrics about saying goodbye that I managed to find on his you tube channel. Absolutely perfect for his wife I thought. The bear was eye-wateringly expensive by the time it was dressed just like him, but it was all about the sentiment and not the price.

I was shocked to find you have to upload the message via a phone line. (is this 1983?) I was expecting to upload an MP3, and you don't find this out until after payment. The phone upload was hopeless and I re-recorded it about a dozen times before it was like 'that will have to do'. When the bear turned up the voice box was worse than useless. His voice was completely inaudible and the guitar sounded like a strangled ice cream van that dropped in and out. It was downright embarrassing. I re-opened the back and ripped out the voice box in the hope I could re-record but they now use a sealed unit that can't be altered.
It went straight in the bin and I ordered one online that lets you upload a 60 second MP3 via USB. The difference is night and day.

Build a bear need to move into the 21st Century for the voice box and allow you to upload a small file with your online order. Mobile phones have voice memos, laptops have mikes, almost everyone can record it. Still have the phone as a backup for those who can't. I went from super excited to guttingly disappointed in an instant.
You could even do a premium voice box option as an upgrade. I would have paid extra (in fact I have anyway!). Can I have my £7 back?

Site Glitch prevented me from ordering Garfield When they had him online.... I tried to place the order for over an hour and then I gave up... Went on the site today and was able to get a Simba Lion King 30 year doll... NO PROBLEMS... I do feel that online only can cheat consumers out of what furry friends you want.. When the site fails.. you should have the chance to get it in the store.... With Garfield... I feel cheated....

I cannot stress enough how amazing staff at this branch were to us. Hannah, Laura & Evie. They made the whole experience so special for our little girl. They really are a huge asset to this company and we will definitely be going back to see them again. Thank you ladies for making my daughter's first build a bear experience so special.

Telford staff is super friendly and helpful and helped us make some hilarious birthday gifts, will absolutely be coming back for more!

Bear was not to the quality expected. No returns label provided.
Customer service was terrible. Could not understand English, repeated myself 5 times. Couldn’t understand what was being said back to me.
Have to wait 3-5 days for a returns label to be emailed??

Considering I just ordered Charizard and Knuckles from them and Knuckles is still pending and Charizard shipped but not going to be here until next week even though it's supposed to be here either that May 2nd or May 4th pisses me off I'm not ordering from them ever again online it just seems to me like they're being lazy

If I could give zero stars I would! I walked into the store in Braehead shopping center looking for a bear for my Niece's Birthday (who was with me btw) but we didn't even manage to get more than a few feet into the shop. A young women employee sidetracked me the moment I walked in (I walked in ahead of my family) & asked me 'why I was there?' (To by a bear obviously) and then proceeded to very rudely tell me that I was not allowed to bring my drink into the shop (it was in a sealed cup). I am a 27 year old woman, however I'm fortunate enough to look much younger and I feel this had some bearing on how I was treated. I was more annoyed by this young womens mannerisms and found her approach very intimidating. It's fair to say I walked straight back out! If employees are that rude to grown adults then I can't imagine how they would have treated my two year old niece. Never again will this company get my business. The worst thing was that my Niece was so excited to get her Birthday Bear and didn't even get to look at a single bear.

Wow - the reviews tell you all you need to know. Will never again buy another bear from this place. Total scammers. Selected a bear priced at £20, bought a beating heart (£5), bought an outfit (£13) bought a box (£1). Should have cost me £39. Cost me £59 as the bear was mis priced. Too late to back out when the thing is stuffed and there is a queue of people waiting behind you at the til. They could have made a loyal customer out of me but chose to be greedy scum bags instead. I looked at their company accounts and scamming is probably a strategy as the numbers are dreadful and dropping each year. Hopefully it closes down soon.

Poor service, I’ve recently moved house & found a build a bear gift card I’d bought when unpacking. I went in yesterday to buy birthday presents & was told the gift card didn’t work & to call the company, got home emailed them & apparently the card I bought expired in February 2024. They were very quick/polite in their response to my email. But the company wouldn’t honour it so I now have a gift card that’s useless & I will not be buying anything from them again. Such a shame as we used to make regular trips there. I visited the Exeter store

Meg at your Birmingham store inside Selfridges was amazing today! My mother took in my giant snorlax for restuffing and Meg was only too happy to help, even commenting how she had never seen one before let alone that big. She even removed some flat stuffing and replaced with fresh stuffing from the machine to make him nice and plump again! Didn’t even mind mum taking a photo so she could message me pretending to be my Snorlax and call for help as he had “eaten too much”. Where’s a pokeflute when you need one? Regardless Meg was amazing and we shall be back (perhaps next time I will bring in my Zombear for her) another discontinued bear she may not have seen and he’s kinda flat too. Give her my best happy to have my Snorlax back again, will not put him in the washing machine again…oops

Very disappointed with the experience. Such a ripoff. Staff knew exactly how to hard sell using the children - very crafty. Some children were too young to understand the extras like scent, sound and £5 for heart?? Yet the staff kept promoting the accessories and clothes to the children. My older children couldn’t even find the price tag on the things. You get a shock when you’re at the counter and parents just pay to avoid disappointing the children. Not worth it unless the parents know the tactics and strictly inform the staff beforehand not to promote the extra accessories or just ask to show the children things that’s within a budget. Everything is so overpriced and the service is not very good either. Best ethical approach would be for the staff to discuss with parents beforehand especially if they walk in with a bunch of kids. Eye-watering approx £50+ per child - just over £300 for 6. My fault too, should have done my research.

Will never be going into another build a bear again. My experience was in Exeter.

build a bear was so good to me in the shop they loved having me there and soon as i enterd the shop they had come over to me and said hi can i help u with anything and like how can i help u today abut the shop and yeh

I ordered a gift online to be shipped to me, and I ordered the special blue gift box. The order came and the box was damaged. I contacted customer service about the issue. They said they would be happy to send me another replacement. It arrived a few days later and was damaged worse than the first one. It was folded along the sides of the box instead of the creases.

I then contacted them again with pictures and said that I wanted a refund and asked to go pick up a box at no cost for my inconvenience (the gift box is $3). The closest store to me is in a mall (which I detest going to) that is 20-25 minutes away. I told them all of this and they said that I could have one or the other but not both. And their apology was nothing but lip service.

I gave them every chance to make it right, and they refused.

To see just how bad the damage was, I've posted pictures of both boxes I was sent.

And this was their final response to me:

"We are always listening to our Guests and are happy to pass along your request to the appropriate department for consideration."

I was nothing but nice and complimentary throughout the process. They just don't care because they are a garbage company. They only care about their bottom line, not the customer. Again this was all over a $3 gift box.

Absolutely appalling customer service. I have 2 gift cards from build bear. Went to use them in store and it says one has been used and the other isnt activated.
Store were no help and said to contact customer service. Been going round in circles with customer service now for 3 days. They say the one card was used on a certain date, though i have the receipt to say it wasnt. The other card they keep saying i need to take the receipt into the store. As i dont know who got us this card as my kids had many cards for christmas i need the date to attempt to track doen a receipt. They finally gave me a date today - but that is the date i tried to use the card. Absolute joke. I am now out of pocket by £20. Ive asked for them to simply issue a voucher for the same value to use in store and i can scrap the cards but they wont.
We have been going to build a bear virtually every month and i have spent hundreds of pound with this company. They are money grabbing robbers and there customer service is horrendous!

Purchased 2 bears- Gandalf (along with a gift box) and a HP Trivia gift box bear. Chose the option to have bears dressed. Arrived in a cardboard box, which upon opening had a HP bear in a box, a loose scarf, brown bear and set of clothing just thrown in. No dressed bears and no gift box. The Gandalf outfit looked as though it had been through several washes as it was all bobbled and the beard and hair don't fit the bear.
I will go so far as to say the Gandalf bear looks as though it has come from a jumble sale despite costing £36.40 plus postage. At least the HP bear looks new I suppose.

WILL NEVER ORDER ONLINE FROM HERE AGAIN.

Really poor! You are pressured by staff to buy extras probably trained to sell in this way. We had a £30 budget and was well within this till a staff member went on to take my daughter to the outfits ask her if she likes mermaids then dress the bear in a mermaids outfit leaving me in a position that ended up costing £48! Total rip off and pushing all the extras on the child not acceptable at all. Do not recommend .

Ordered 2 bears, one each for my 2 grandsons. They arrived just stuffed in a box, no paper or not even in another box. The box looked like it had been through a beating and had cracks in it to the point you could see what was inside. Never again will I place an online order with them. This is totally unacceptable.

I wouldn’t buy anything online from here. Bought my son a bear and outfit for Christmas. It came missing the outfit. I talked to support and they said they would send another outfit. I got the email saying it was shipped. Two weeks later and the tracking never updated. I contacted support again and they tried saying they shipped it and they couldn’t do anything else. When I called their bluff and told them I have the tracking number they said they would figure it out and get back to me. That was four days ago. Guess I’ll just have to go to a store and spend even more money to get the outfit

Built and ordered on 12/4/23 and was delivered 12/13/23 missing the gift card that was also purchased, and they sent the wrong birth certificate. We named ours Penelope and the bday of 12/25/23, and we got Laquena 11/11/23.
I called to get it corrected and shipped to where there bear was sent, since I requested at the time of purchase to include the birth certificate but I made the mistake of believing they would send what I selected and purchased correctly, but was told they are sorry they can’t fix their mistake and mail the correct certificate, but I will need to go into the store.
The link they sent is not equivalent to the birth certificate that should have been sent with the bear, and it was still wrong.
If y’all don’t want the person you’re gifting to be disappointed, and you don’t want added stress of trying to fix their mistake and still get items delivered in time for Christmas, don’t gift them a build a bear.
Spend your money somewhere that values quality and their customers.
It’s cute and the idea is fun, but the way they don’t take accountability for mistakes, causes too much of a hassle to make it worth it.