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  1. #21

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    Quote Originally Posted by arctic_one View Post
    It has been resolved. John has agreed to refund the money. Thanks for all those that supported me!

    You didnt say it was .5 cuben, With that 16 oz should have been in reach. a .5 luna ought to weigh around 9 oz. if the .74 is 12oz

  2. #22
    Registered User Wise Old Owl's Avatar
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    You could have solved this yourself. I bet a few here PMed John and let him see your handy work. He hasn't had any other complaints - It suggests a confrontational attitude on your part - next time be more careful - thanks.
    Dogs are excellent judges of character, this fact goes a long way toward explaining why some people don't like being around them.

    Woo

  3. #23
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    When requesting custom work it really makes sense to draw up your design and scan it, pass that along to the person making it. Have them do a sketch as well, and have a look at that, get the specs down on paper and THEN have a phone conversation about it all.

    All this type of stuff leads to is one less guy doing custom work. Right now, Bear Paw is one of the only companies who will go custom work with short notice. So do youself a favor and make damn sure it's right before you go ahead.

  4. #24

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    You may want to scour the net of your inflammatory comments. Everywhere I looked I see your first post with this story. Even my blog. He worked with you. Make sure you let the people reading those comments know that.

  5. #25

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    As a general rule, when I see these type of threads, I always assume the company who is being badmouthed is in the right.

    Too many people are too quick to post these stupid threads instead of trying to work things out or admit, "Maybe I made a mistake or assumed wrongly". In some cases with multiple posts all over the internet, it looks like an attempt to blackmail the company; if you don't do what I want, I'll talk bad about you all over the place.

  6. #26

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    Quote Originally Posted by Miner View Post
    As a general rule, when I see these type of threads, I always assume the company who is being badmouthed is in the right.
    "Always assume?" That paints you into a tiny corner right there. Also, don't you believe in "word of mouth?" I guess not.

    Quote Originally Posted by Miner View Post
    Too many people are too quick to post these stupid threads instead of trying to work things out...
    What part of "He refuses to admit his mistake ..." don't you understand? "Too quick?" The OP did try to work things out. And now you violate the WB User Agreement by calling him or his thread "stupid?"

    Quote Originally Posted by Miner View Post
    ... it looks like an attempt to blackmail the company; if you don't do what I want, I'll talk bad about you all over the place.
    Looks to me as if you are the one doing the bad mouthing. The OP explained his problem reasonably, and from his version (which you don't think he's entitled to?!), it seems he had a fair gripe. Likewise, the vendor had a fair chance to post a reply. Perhaps, since you are the assuming type, you might assume his failure to do so as an admission of fault?

    Unlike you, I don't jump to conclusions on either side, before hearing both sides. Unlike you, I think word-of-mouth advertising (good OR bad) is valid. And unlike you, I believe that word-of-mouth, for better or worse, is a two-way street.

    RainMan

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    [I]ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are: ... Defile not therefore the land which ye shall inhabit....[/I]. Numbers 35

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  7. #27

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    Quote Originally Posted by wayoutthere View Post
    First let me say that these forums are not for people who have a vendetta against someone or a company. And since your joined date is today, it looks like you join whiteblaze just to discredit a company. That is completely unethical ....
    Are these forums for claiming someone has "a vendetta" and for calling someone "completely unethical?" To me, you just made a very personal attack on an individual, violating the WB User Agreement, based on pure conjecture. You didn't say say joining "just to discredit a company" WOULD BE unethical. You said the OP's conduct "IS completely unethical."

    Quote Originally Posted by wayoutthere View Post
    Pursue what you need to do outside of these forums. You are just ruining your own credibility.
    Perhaps you should heed your own warning about how and where to make your own allegations ... and realize that questionable personal attacks might just ruin your own credibility.

    Rain Man

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    [I]ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are: ... Defile not therefore the land which ye shall inhabit....[/I]. Numbers 35

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  8. #28
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    This is John at BearPaw Wilderness Designs. I was going to stay out of this conversations because I believe that it was between Arctic One and my company. However, she decided to bring it to the internet, which is something I don't agree with but she has that right. Unfortunately, it seems that there are strong opinions on both sides of the fence and now members are posting negative remarks about other members' opinions.

    Arctic One seems to be a passionate person who adamantly believes her recall of our telephone conversation. I don't agree with her side of the story, but she passionately and truly believes it. So I think she is sincere in here belief. That is why I am giving her a refund for a semi-custom job.

    I have had countless emails from people I know and don't know. Most have commented on how they have disdain for how a matter like this was brought to the forums. And most wanted to know my side of the story. So this is how I remember the situation.

    The customer and I emailed back and forth for a while about a lightweight BearDen or pyraTent in cuben. She finally called me right after Easter to discuss. Let you know I always take notes on conversations with potential customer and their requests. She told me she wanted a full perimeter netting and door and wanted to be able to open up the front completely on hot nights. I said either one of the tents would work but I thought the pyraTent was a better choice. She insisted on a weight and I said depending on the material probably around 16 oz. She said she was a concerned about bugs with perimeter netting and if I could do a full net floor with additional ties for a ground cloth. I said yes but not on the bearden tent since it was more complicated. I said that the pyraTent was a better choice. I did not give her a weight for the floor, but she insist I said 16 oz for the full tent. (The 16 oz was for a pyraTent in .51 oz cuben, perimeter netting and door.) There was no way that tent with floor was going to be 16 oz. The floor would add at least 6 to 8 more oz. Unfortunately that conversation is where we strongly disagree.

    We talked briefly about a luna 2 but I said I didn't like making it out of .51 oz cuben and would only do .74 oz cuben for her. She wanted the .51 oz cuben. So I said the pyraTent was her best choice.

    All of this information was noted in my call notebook.

    At the end of the telephone call, she said she wanted to place and order. (I can only assume she was thinking luna and I was thinking pyraTent.) However, she wanted the tent ship (within about 2 weeks) to a hotel that she was going to be at before going on a 1 week camping trip. I said I would send her an invoice through paypal. I sent the invoice right after the call. The invoice clearly stated pyraTent .51 cuben gray with net floor/door. She paid the invoice immediately.

    I made her the tent and shipped it to her at the hotel. The packing list also said pyraTent on it. She emailed me to tell me that she received the luna tent. I never noticed that she mentioned luna instead of pyraTent just because I get 50+ emails a day and I didn't even connect the issue. So I didn't comment on the luna.

    After she got back from her trip, she said the tent weighed 26 oz (I think that include all stakes, guylines and other things added to the tent). She wanted to know my return policy. About this time she finds out from me that the tent was a pyraTent and not a luna. I told her that my policy on semi-custom work (especially something that was used) had a no return policy.

    So that brings us up to all the internet mess.

    Now everyone has both sides of the story and can decide who or what was the problem.

    John at BearPaw Wilderness Designs

  9. #29

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    John, thanks for posting your side of the story. I had a feeling that was going to be the situation. Sounds like you got scammed out of a tent - sure hope you didn't do the refund until you got the tent back.
    Follow slogoen on Instagram.

  10. #30
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    Yes, she is sending the tent. I will probably put it up for sale on the forums at a reduced price. May have to cut the floor out though.

  11. #31
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    How's it feel to get to use a custom tent for free on a trip?

    For some reason I feel more strongly because the tent was made in the USA with cuben fiber fabric that's also made in the USA.

  12. #32

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    First of all, I'm glad everything was resolved. However, I'm sorry it was done on the internet in public rather than in private where it should have been done. Because these negative threads aren't ever deleted and that isn't fair to John who worked with the OP and seems to have eaten the entire cost of his work. Which is why I hate these threads. If I ever need some custom work, I know where to go.


    Ok, Rainman. Lets put this in context a little.

    From everything the OP said to the failed attempts to post the emails of the ordering discussion which show a mid April date, shows that they could have received the product very recently and thus should have still been having this discussion directly with the vendor. A few days after having a problem is far too soon to being dragging this all out in a public forum. Rather than spending some more effort in trying to work out something agreeable over time after emotions have calmed alittle, instead they immediately join this and other internet forums and blogs and their first and only posts are a negative report about a respected vendor in the community during the time they are still working on the dispute. And this is with a vendor that has received many good reviews with several satisfied customers from this very community forum. Clearly, they joined here not to bring us a warning out of the goodness of their hearts, but to use it as a means to bring pressure on the vendor to get their way.

    If you put the weight of the 2 sides on a scale, it’s clear who is going to be favored by me and many others. A stranger who is only known for showing up to complain during their dispute whom we will likely never see again or a respected individual with many satisfied customers in this very community. It’s the same as when you go to traffic court and the judge favors the testimony of the cop over you unless you can bring additional evidence to add weight to your side which the OP did not.

    This isn't the first time that we have seen this here at Whiteblaze as we have several threads over the years like this. Some are very unreasonable as the cottage company was never even contacted and others did not allow enough time to work things out before going public. I remember one thread where the guy was attacking Ron at 6Moons for spamming his email on the internet when it was clearly his mistake and he already had the power to change his username from his email to something else. Poor Ron didn’t even know about the complaint yet as he hadn’t checked his email due to trying to get some orders out to some people who needed them. And in the end, we often see why the vendor has such an excellent reputation in the first place as they often bend over backwards even when they are in the right.

    However, even when a satisfactory ending is had by the OP, these negative threads titles live on in these forums and across the internet unjustly in many cases possibly casusing the vendor to possibily lose business through no real fault of their own. We aren’t talking about large companies like North Face and others but small companies that rely on word of mouth for their business and can’t afford to take too many loses like this. If nothing else,the rest of us may end up paying for it when the vendor is forced to raise prices.

    If a couple of weeks had passed without a resolution and the OP was a prior member of this community (ie. they post things other then their complaint), then mentioning a bad experience might be appropriate depending on how it was done. But these threads happening during the dispute process offends me due to the damage to reputation it does; often times unecessarily or unjustly. I for one don’t appreciate this forum and others being used in such an underhanded way. And that is how I see it.

  13. #33
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rain Man View Post
    Are these forums for claiming someone has "a vendetta" and for calling someone "completely unethical?" To me, you just made a very personal attack on an individual, violating the WB User Agreement, based on pure conjecture. You didn't say say joining "just to discredit a company" WOULD BE unethical. You said the OP's conduct "IS completely unethical."



    Perhaps you should heed your own warning about how and where to make your own allegations ... and realize that questionable personal attacks might just ruin your own credibility.

    Rain Man

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    Geez. I seem to remember some thinly veiled political reference to Mitt Romney and the auto industry...
    Maybe that was someone else. But it was a violation of the WB user agreement, in my mind.

    BearPaw took care of a customer. I am willing to bet that the generated goodwill from this experience will lead to some business for him from the type of people that desire custom products. I am also willing to bet he will put into place some sort of "this is what I want, signed..." program in place for new customers.

    Best to BearPaw. Next time I take a dip in Horsetooth, I'll think of him.

  14. #34
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    Quote Originally Posted by mudhead View Post

    Best to BearPaw. Next time I take a dip in Horsetooth, I'll think of him.
    Just watch out for the water skiers......

  15. #35
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    More likely the ride up the hill would take care of it.

  16. #36
    Registered User Samson's Avatar
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    Well, now I know I will be getting my next tent from BearPaw. I want to keep people like John in business.
    I hold my wife's purse at the mall to stay close to my testes.

  17. #37

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    I had never heard of these tents before reading this thread. Just spent about 20 minutes on John's site and when it's time for a new tent I'm getting one!

  18. #38
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    Quote Originally Posted by mudhead View Post
    More likely the ride up the hill would take care of it.
    Mudhead, I ride those hills every weekend. They give you a work out....

  19. #39

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    I think the real lesson here is about being a pragmatic businessperson. Seems in the end Bearpaw ended up doing the refund in order to protect the reputation of his company...which was the smart move. From a strictly legal and fairness standpoint he was totally in the right and the customer had no right to a refund. Bottom line is he sent an invoice with what he thought the customer wanted and she paid it, and he made the tent described in the invoice.

    The customer disagrees about the phone conversation...we don't know, maybe there was a misunderstanding.

    However, the lesson here is that legal or not, right or wrong, if you have an unsatisfied customer they can make a lot of noise and you will lose business.

    Bearpaw's return policy is realistic, and such a policy should be stated for all custom work so that the customer knows what the policy is. This would likely head off anybody who might attempt a return of a custom product...many will think "gee, I agreed to the return policy, guess I'll just have to suck it up" and they will move on with their lives and not complain about the company. But at the end of the day, if the customer still complains and asks for a refund, a smart businessperson will just give them the refund without question. Reason being the customer will know it was their fault and know that you gave them their money back anyway, and will walk away singing your praises...or at minimum not drive business away from you.

    There will always be a few customers who knowing full well its their own fault will scream to high heaven and the end result is that the company loses business.

    If Bearpaw loses one sale over this it would likely have paid what it cost him to just do the refund in the first place, have a happy customer and no public airing of complaints. If you're going to end up caving and giving the refund later anyway, why not just do it with a smile the first time around and save yourself a bunch of grief?

  20. #40
    Registered User Wise Old Owl's Avatar
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    Glad all is resolved.
    Dogs are excellent judges of character, this fact goes a long way toward explaining why some people don't like being around them.

    Woo

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