[TheForge] [OT] Re: Cobbler tool for blacksmiths

[Mike Spencer]

Saint Phlip wrote:

> Keep in mind who you're talking to, Bruce, Between you, you and Mike
> are the high points of my entertainment on this List.

Y'all keep feeding my ego and I'm going to have to build a stretcher
for my hat, too.   'Course, maybe I could sell one to Bruce and cover
my research costs. :-)

Not to mention that Bruce & I don't even come close to Frosty's knack
for generating scarey cliff-hangers.  We're all hoping he's given that
up but it's a hard act to follow.

> They might just dig into their storehouse, and send them the
> remnants of their stock (no company EVER sells everything they made)
> just to shut him up ;-)

At the risk of getting myself invited to move down the street from
TheForge to EccentricRuralCouture, VintageFootwear or the like: It's
an odd story.

The desired boots were a Canadian-made product.  Round of applause.
Then they off-shored production to China after which the fit was just
a tad less good and the laces turned to pure crap. (I replaced them
with braided twine from a commercial fishing supplier.)  But still the
best boot going, IMHO.

Then they stopped retail sales altogether but continued production for
a single corporate customer -- a powerco or telco, maybe? -- who
bought carload (?) lots for their employees.  My Boot Guy knew somebody
who knew somebody who diverted a pair from that stream.  Then, before
that pair wore completely out, a few reappeared on the retail pipeline
and I got one more pair.  I'm guessing that this last was a matter of
them flushing out their warehouse stock when their single corporate
customer cancelled the contract, because now the mfgr claims there's
absolutlely none remaining anywhere in their system.

So now I'm hoping to find (a) a retailer that has dusty stock or has
been shuttered with stock in place or (b) some contact at that (former)
corporate customer who can find a pair or two overlooked somewhere in
*their* back warehouse.

> ...I might send that description of the "repair" process of their
> faulty boots to the company, and ask them to please start
> manufacturing the proper boots again,

I've already asked them to resume production of their "best product".
They declined.  I've subsequently sent them words, neither blasphemous
nor scatological, but rude enough that I'm quite sure they don't want
to hear from me again. :-)


ObSmithing: Ooop. Spent today straightening some bent stuff and
cleaning up some messes. And then a spring snow storm began, now about
3" deep out there.  Huddling by the fire, no exciting metalwork to
report.  I'll try to do better next time, okay?

-- 
Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada       .~. 
                                                           /V\ 
mspencer at tallships.ca                                     /( )\
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/                        ^^-^^