Sad times - MEC (Halifax) has not only gone downhill but have fallen right off the cliff. A once trusted local brand I could buy from with pride, to a company I will not spend another dollar at.I bought a Hillsound BTR Stool ~30 days ago and used it for the first time last weekend. I sat up and down a grand total of about 10 times before the metal leg stub sheared out of it's plastic casing and popped off. For context, I take care of my camping gear very well and am 170lbs. I thought oh well, it's MEC, they will def give me a refund for selling me such a garbage product.Fast forward to today at Halifax MEC where I arrive at the desk and tell the cashier what happened. After his first sentence I could tell this was going to be a fun experience. He primed me for disappointment (his training no doubt) with: "I am going to bring it to the manager to see what we can and 'can't do". A far cry from the days of Co-op quality guarantee.The manager took the broken chair and returned again shortly with it reassembled and said (paraphrasing): "Here you go I have repaired your product - it looks like it just slipped out of it's casing"...but here's the thing - I did the same thing when it broke and tried sitting on it but it broke immediately again. So I called bull**** and showed her how little force it took to break it once again. After this she changed her strategy - now she changed the tone of the conversation and started to blame me for inflicting wear & tear on the product over a span of 6 hours of use. Lol. I once again call BS and her response: "Sorry there is no warranty on this product and we don't cover wear and tear". Furthermore they flirted with calling me a liar and pointed to technical details of how the product was damaged. Of course it was damaged, because 1) it deformed enough already to pop out of it's casing, and 2) I tried to repair it (the same way she did). As a long-time MEC & Patagonia supporter I admit that I have been spoiled regarding product return policies - and if this had been 'reasonable wear and tear' I'd just buy another one. But 1 day of use is not exactly reasonable wear and tear...In the end she disgruntledly gave me a store credit (I wanted my money back but had no fight left in me), and explained (tldr):TLDR: IF SOMETHING YOU BUY BREAKS FROM MEC DON'T TRY TO FIX IT OR THEY WILL BLAME THEIR TRASH PRODUCT QUALITY ON YOU.
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Since 1971, MEC has sold exceptional products at fair prices, and people who shop here get one of the best guarantees around.
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