It was in June of this year that I received a notice from the second vendor regarding the large tray bag. She asked that I check the silver and notify her of the silver tray's condition. I took it out of storage, removed it from the bag and was amazed to find that the silver not only tarnished badly after less than two months, but that there was also a while chalky film covering most of the sterling tray. I called her immediately and reported what I had found. She explained that she had received the same replies from a couple of her customers. It was then I found out that Hagerty has suspended its USA production of the bags and has out-sourced them to China. What a surprise! The bags may look the same, but the quality of material and whatever tarnish retarding properties that may have been added to the material was very much lacking. It may, more importantly, not at all be safe for the silver (sterling or plate). She replaced the bag with one made in the USA. I had an unused boxed bag from the other set and checked the box for manufacture's origin. It was Made in China.
I immediately looked at all the silver in the other seven smaller bags and the same condition found on the tray was also on all the pieces comprising the large sterling tea set. Now I was horrified. I called the first vendor, explained the situation, but they were not able to replace the bags as the 90-day return period had expired. I was given the phone number to Hagerty to find a solution.
Unfortunately calling Hagerty is of no use to anyone. You will get the famous "menu" to select the person you want to contact. Only problem is that you aren't given any indication who or what this person is or does. I selected at random 3 different persons and left voice messages. There was never any response. After two weeks I sent an e-mail asking what solution could be arranged for replacement of these inferior bags. No response. The next week, I sent a not-so-nice e-mail outlining my very great displeasure with their product, but more importantly, their total lack of customer service. I even mentioned that I would write this review thinking they might not want unfavorable mention of this incident made public to such a large audience as is found on Amazon.com. My personal customer service intentions are always carried through to never less than satisfactory expectations. Hence, this review.
If you order these bags, I would be very careful to do so without first checking with the supplier/vendor about where the Hagerty bags are manufactured. On a side note consider this, too. I received the large replacement tray bag (Made in USA) and after a "down to the metal" polish, I put it into the bag. I checked the tray just a few days ago and noticed it was beginning to tarnish. So, what gives with the USA bags? Like the Georgia reviewer, I have used the same Hagerty bags for nearly 50 years without any issue. Now, these new bags don't seem to be any better, or more effective, than wrapping the silver in newspaper. I would avoid Hagerty altogether and make my own bags from yardage from Pacific Silver Cloth ... as I am now doing.
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I bought several of these silversmith's cloth bags and found that they do not keep my sterling silver flatware nearly as tarnish free as my older bags that came with my silver. My older feltt bags came with the silver 35 yrsago and have kept the silver tarnish free. These newer Hagerty silversmith cloths do not.
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