My daughter rang me up to tell me that the MECompany "Rock Solid Guarantee" has been somewhat revised.
A quick check of
https://www.mec.ca/en/explore/returns-and-guarantee at web.archive.org confirms this.
The 18Oct2016 version is short and sweet:
RockSolidGuarantee2016
OUR ROCKSOLID GUARANTEE
We guarantee the quality of our products. If the quality of an item hasn’t met your expectations, you can bring it back. We also guarantee the product selection advice we give. If something you purchased based on this advice turns out to be unsuitable, you can bring it back for an exchange, refund, repair, or credit.
HOW LONG CAN I EXPECT MY STUFF TO LAST?
Members come here for quality and value, but even quality items have a practical lifespan. They will eventually wear out and can be damaged by accident, neglect or misuse, so those things aren’t covered, but can be repaired for a reasonable fee.
We view the spirit of this guarantee in the same way we view the spirit of this co-op: provide good gear, give good advice and deal fairly with one another.
I compared it to the 13May2020 version here:
Old Rock Solid Guarantee
and the current 16Jan2022 version here:
Todays Rock Solid Guarantee
Successive edits have become more wordy and in my opinion, less "Rock Solid".
And the trains don't run on time any more. :-(
Much as I am not a fan of Mountain Equipment Company and don't expect ever to shop there again (see my rants upthread), I have some understanding of why they're making the guarantee increasingly restricted. And yes, the latest incarnation is vague and weasel-worded enough that it can mean as much or as little as MEC decides it means in any given case. Not reassuring.
However, as a then-writer in the Communications and Marketing Department at Mountain Equipment Co-op (as it then was), I co-wrote the original Rock Solid Guarantee, based on direction from the Board and management. It worked well in a retail environment in which there was (mostly) good faith between buyer and seller.
That environment has ceased to exist. The current perception of many consumers is that pretty much all retailers are out to scam them, so they'd better scam the store first. Or at best, theft by fraud from a multi-million retailer isn't really stealing, anymore than shoplifting from them is.
The generosity of the original Rock Solid Guarantee was increasingly abused over the years. In the course of our online research (searching our name to test the online zeitgeist about us, as every large entity does), we found lots of outdoor rec and international traveller's forums recommending this "one weird trick" for free gear for your big camping trip/expeditions:
- Join MEC
- Buy all the high-end gear you want
- Take your trip
- Return it all for a full refund
- Profit!
The most egregious example I can recall was a group from South Africa who bought everything for a multi-week mountaineering trip in Alaska, then unblushingly returned the lot for a bunch of bogus reasons, including that the tent floors hadn't been crampon-proof.
It's certainly not just MEC that's had to tighten return policies. Even LL Bean has had change the former satisfaction guarantee on their famous Maine Hunting Boots: too many folks thrashing the footwear to within an inch of its life, then returning the shoes for a brand new pair, and repeating the cycle ad infinitum.
It's definitely sad that the misconduct of a minority means the rest of us can't have nice things like a simple, broad-coverage guarantee, but there is a case to be made that rationally restrictive return polices actually benefit the rest of us. The cost of warranty abuse, like the cost of shoplifting, is baked into the price of everything we buy from a store. Nordstrom used circulate a story about how one of their sales associates had accepted a return on a set of snow tires, something Nordstrom had never sold. They seemed to think it sent a great message about how wildly exceptional their customer service was. To me the message was "If you shop with us, you'll be subsidizing scammers."