Friday, September 21, 2007
I'm sorry... grovel, grovel
BBC News: Man, what did China threaten Mattel with? I'll accept a certain amount of blame by Mattel for specifying the junk they accepted, but to tell the Chinese we're so sorry your crap is crap is beyond me.
I'm sure somewhere there is something that the Chinese can make well. In all honesty, if it's something made in the last few centuries I haven't run across it yet. The law of averages will make an occasional item in a product run good no matter how shoddily it's made. Sooner or later enough mistakes will acrue on one item to where it exceeds the rather crappy specs that, yes, the US buyers make.
I don't completely blame the Chinese mind you. If we didn't buy so much of there crap, they wouldn't make it. As long as stores like Harbor Freight and WalMart offer crap that people will joyfully line up and buy, the Chinese - and any other country - will make it to sell to us.
If the public would go to WalMart and say, "I don't care that your crap is %10 lower in price than the crap across the street, I'm not buying it anymore," then actually go across the street and pay more, then lead laden teething rings and wrenches that last half-a-job would be a thing of the past.
I have power and hand tools that were made in the USofA that date back 20-30 years and are still working just fine. I also have a significant amount of tools - with the same labels (listening Craftsman and Stanley?) - that I've bought over that last few years and are sitting broke in a box of crap on a shelf. And I don't even want to explore the no-name stuff I've been foolish enough to buy and discard almost immediately over the last few years. Like the 7 piece drill set I bought for $15 and have since replaced with a $45 set that works oh, so much better.
So we, and yes I include myself, have to quit accepting the crap and garbage that stores are offering today. Is saving %25 on a product worth it if that product only lasts half as long? We need to get a little pride in what we'll accept and realize it worth the time to wait and save for something better. So, Mattel, quite apologizing for the American acceptance of crap. After all, if we didn't buy the crap, you guys wouldn't sell the crap, and China wouldn't produce the crap.
