[NA] Student backpack -- durable good or expendable commodity?

wrbix said:
Yeah.....not at all surprised. The ne’r-do-wells of the world that bought bedraggled LL Bean stuff on eBay or at Goodwill stores to turn in for brand new have ruined the legacy for the rest of us true LL Bean devotees
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What’s bad about that? That the warranty offered wasn’t fiscally sustainable, isn’t their fault. Bean still got their money selling those just like the others.
 
denverpilot said:
What’s bad about that? That the warranty offered wasn’t fiscally sustainable, isn’t their fault. Bean still got their money selling those just like the others.
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Huh?
What’s bad about it is the people who obtained at little or no cost totally trashed items that they hadn’t even originally purchased and “returned” them to get new items at no charge - clearly gaming the system and having no regard for Bean’s best intentions. Another example of the lowering of morality in America. IMHO.
Don’t get me wrong, as I said, I’m not surprised - no one ever went broke underestimating the taste and morality of the American public.....at least of late.
 
wrbix said:
Huh?
What’s bad about it is the people who obtained at little or no cost totally trashed items that they hadn’t even originally purchased and “returned” them to get new items at no charge - clearly gaming the system and having no regard for Bean’s best intentions. Another example of the lowering of morality in America. IMHO.
Don’t get me wrong, as I said, I’m not surprised - no one ever went broke underestimating the taste and morality of the American public.....at least of late.
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Sounds like jealousy to me. Bean made the offer. Trashed, used, who the owner now is, none of that matters. Same price was originally paid for the items. Same deal on all items.

Not a damn thing immoral about it, either. Some rich guy wants to throw away his warranty and someone else wants to use it, that isn’t immoral in the slightest. Bean didn’t have to make the warranty open ended.

The deal from Bean was the deal. Now they’ve changed the deal. That’s fine.

Has more to do with their inability to compete at the price point the original deal would require than any whining about people taking advantage of their unsustainable deal.

Look at it this way. If rich weenies hadn’t thrown out the things at Goodwill and instead took advantage of the replacement offer, Bean was still in the exact same fiscal problem. The deal was the root cause of the fiscal flaw.

Bean says you now need proof of purchase. Think they’ll check names? They want people to sign up online during checkout.

How about a paper receipt with no name on it? You don’t need my info in a database Bean.

Original purchaser gets tired of something and sells it along with that nice paper receipt with no name they got with it. Don’t sign up online.

Screw them if they can’t make the offer they intended to make. English isn’t that hard. Saying “original purchaser with proof of purchase” isn’t that hard. Lots of places do it.

That wasn’t their old deal and there is absolutely nothing “immoral” about anyone who felt like taking them up on it, doing so.
 
o...kay, then. Know where good intentions and faith in the general goodwill of people stand in your belief system - apparently well below legal contractural obligations.
 
wrbix said:
o...kay, then. Know where good intentions and faith in the general goodwill of people stand in your belief system - apparently well below legal contractural obligations.
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General goodwill of people? What’s that got to do with this? Bean makes an offer and people took them up on it.

No different than buying old Craftsman tools long ago and taking them in for replacement when they busted at Sears. Lots of people who didn’t buy those tools got them at garage and estate sales.

The best deals on Craftsman were always when the wife put them on the curb in the rich neighborhoods because hubby banged the secretary. No kidding. Thousands of dollars of tools for a couple hundred bucks.

Hubby had never used the things anyway, the BMW was taken to the dealership for service.

Bean didn’t want to make their old offer anymore. End of story. Their “goodwill” is lower than it was, I suppose, but I don’t judge them. It’s their business to run and either survive or not.

They must have calculated that they couldn’t survive if they raised their prices to keep their deal going.

That or the CEO needs a new boat. I didn’t check. Feel free. I don’t get jealous of such things.
 
wrbix must think claiming something under the bumper-to-bumper warranty on a car is immoral if he wasn’t the one who originally purchased it new. If it’s under warranty, it’s under warranty. LL Bean can’t complain about the wording of its own warranty.


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The analogy of bumper to bumper pales if you'd claim warranty on a 300,000 mile vehicle's rocker panels rust that'd been driven over salted roads all it's life, and demand a new car. Nothing lasts forever and no one should expect a retailer or manufacturer to replace free of charge - at least no one with at least a minimally functioning moral compass; written warranties notwithstanding.
 
It's the old conundrum of what's legal (as in delineated in a warranty) vs what's right (as in reasonable).
I fully agree the customer has the legal right under the old warranty to exchange trash for new product, but that's morally suspect, at best, IMHO.

....and where does "jealousy" come into any of this?
 
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I have a 20 year old North Face bag that I still use for trips, walked with that bag full of crap for ten years an hour and a half a day through everything Ohio could throw at me. My pack now was expensive, but it does what I want and is comfy to boot. Cheap packs are cheap for a reason.
 
wrbix said:
The analogy of bumper to bumper pales if you'd claim warranty on a 300,000 mile vehicle's rocker panels rust that'd been driven over salted roads all it's life, and demand a new car. Nothing lasts forever and no one should expect a retailer or manufacturer to replace free of charge - at least no one with at least a minimally functioning moral compass; written warranties notwithstanding.
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If the manufacturer wrote the Bumper-2-Bumper warranty so that it encompassed a 300K-mile car, it's covered. There is NOTHING IMMORAL about it. You can't get mad when people exercise the right to have their product covered by LL Bean within the terms of their warranty. When you try to apply arbitrary terms on the warranty under the guise of "morality", you end up with a million different versions of what should be allowed. One person's reasonable is another person's hard-stop. LL Bean realized that, and adjusted the warranty verbiage accordingly.
 
SoonerAviator said:
If the manufacturer wrote the Bumper-2-Bumper warranty so that it encompassed a 300K-mile car, it's covered. There is NOTHING IMMORAL about it. You can't get mad when people exercise the right to have their product covered by LL Bean within the terms of their warranty. When you try to apply arbitrary terms on the warranty under the guise of "morality", you end up with a million different versions of what should be allowed. One person's reasonable is another person's hard-stop. LL Bean realized that, and adjusted the warranty verbiage accordingly.
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Agree, as far as legality and retailer’s responsibility......but won’t you agree that it’s pretty sleazy of “customers” to take advantage by getting new merchandise at no cost? That was my initial claim here.
.....and the concept of “their merchandise” is a big part of the issue here - some of these “customers” find discarded, worn out, or heavily discounted (think Goodwill store) LL Bean items that someone else had purchased and return them for new merchandise.
 
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wrbix said:
Agree, as far as legality and retailer’s responsibility......but won’t you agree that it’s pretty sleazy of “customers” to take advantage by getting new merchandise at no cost? That was my initial claim here.
.....and the concept of “their merchandise” is a big part of the issue here - some of these “customers” find discarded, worn out, or heavily discounted (think Goodwill store) LL Bean items that someone else had purchased and return them for new merchandise.
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No, it's not sleazy of someone to take advantage of any warranty that applies. If the secondary purchaser submits the item for warranty claim, or the original customer has a worn out backpack and claims warranty on it, it is the same. The fact that they are the original purchaser is irrelevant and has no bearing on morality in this instance. Also, the cost that the second person paid for it is irrelevant, because the item was purchased at FULL PRICE at some point in its past, which means LL Bean was compensated in full upon initial sale. If the backpack (or whatever item) was purchased a dozen times afterwards in a secondary market is of no relevance.

Again, I'll use the used car reference: Say a car is bought new from the dealership,abused, then sold 3 times down the road. The fourth owner knows there's a suspension issue when he buys the car, but also knows it's still within the OEM warranty period. As long as the repair is covered under the warranty terms, there's nothing immoral about it. How many owners there were, or how much those owners paid for the car is irrelevant.

Don't get me wrong, I see where you are coming from, and I accept your opinion. I just don't see it the same way. I'd consider it immoral if there was some type of fraud involved (like rolling back the odometer, or intentionally damaging a vehicle component in the used car example).
 
We will have to agree to disagree ..... I would not have considered returning my decades old barn jacket whose zipper finally wore out with its many fluid and blood stains and barbed wire snags and tears to LL Bean just because I could. To each his own.
 
wrbix said:
Agree, as far as legality and retailer’s responsibility......but won’t you agree that it’s pretty sleazy of “customers” to take advantage by getting new merchandise at no cost? That was my initial claim here.
.....and the concept of “their merchandise” is a big part of the issue here - some of these “customers” find discarded, worn out, or heavily discounted (think Goodwill store) LL Bean items that someone else had purchased and return them for new merchandise.
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No. Bean warranties the items, period. Full stop. No mention of ownership. Ever. Not even now. They only say you need proof of purchase.

wrbix said:
We will have to agree to disagree ..... I would not have considered returning my decades old barn jacket whose zipper finally wore out with its many fluid and blood stains and barbed wire snags and tears to LL Bean just because I could. To each his own.
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No. Well have to agree that you’re wrong. There’s no definition of the word “immoral” anywhere that applies in any way whatsoever.

Nobody “took advantage of” anybody. Bean made an offer, the offer stands, Bean did not limit the offer to original purchaser no matter how much you wish they did. That’s fiction you made up.
 
I had to get a replacement backpack when mine got 7.62x39 holes in it. The ridge I was behind wasn't big enough for both of us and it took the brunt of it. A short time later a guy with a .50 cal drove up and made all my problems go away.

As for civilian use, I have a pack made by Igloo that I carry all my survival gear in wherever I go. I just drop a cold drink and a frozen water bottle in the insulated pack, all my gear is int he outer pockets. I have had to sew it up a couple of times though, I use 50 lb test fishing line for all my sewing.

Perhaps you need to teach your son to sew.
 
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