I'm really sorry you had the same experience! I tried pretty hard to avoid dragging this artist, so I've checked in privately in all sorts of ways and no one has heard from him in years. They were lovely dolls I have no clue what happened. If there's anyone else who's still waiting, I've done a bunch of legwork and I'm afraid you won't see your money or your doll. I just don't know why, exactly. Bro just vanished. I managed to get in contact with him in 2019 via a webform, but that was the last contact, it didn't work a second time, and I evidently got further than others did after he deleted his Etsy store. It's extra weird because he sent me pics of a bunch of near-complete dolls.
Wow, you did a lot of work to reach him. I just opened up a dispute case with Paypal right away, but obviously, it didn't work because I've already gone past the 180-day grace period to raise the issue to Paypal. I've never had a company/artist disappear on me, so it did upset me quite a bit at the time, but I'm over it now.
@MJKKJM @Lighthouse Asylum I can't give advice regarding the dolls, HOWEVER I would strongly suggest contacting etsy support via web text support. You might be able to at least receive some compensation; I know of other people being scammed by a (albeit different) bjd artist with an etsy storefront, and they were able to receive refunds well after the six month timeframe. It won't be a "true" refund - it'll be a refund with etsy credit - but I'd strongly suggest pursuing it so it isn't a total loss. This is... exceedingly disappointing to hear about Aerial BJD though.
