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Predator Platform broke on me last night

If you guys would spend as much time hunting as you do bashing Tethrd there wouldn't be any deer left. Its embarrassing. if I have a problem with something I go to the source of the problem I don't come to an independent website and bitch a fit about it. For those that are complaining about sending in your gen 1 but it would leave you with out a platform is ridiculous, or if your still using it, its like a bad joke if you were truly concerned about it you dang sure wouldn't be hunting off it. you need to seriously take a look and figure out if your truly concerned about your safety or just have a good opportunity to complain.
I miss the days of pre tethrd where we all gathered and made some neat DIY. Greg, Ernie, Huck, Flingin and the rest of the guys came here daily and hung out, They cant even come here and just be one of the guys without having to be Tethrd and answer customer complaints.

For the record I'm not any prostaff and don't own any thing Tethrd, I'm just saying it really gets old.
 
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BayouBeauxhunter,

See page 4 of your reference:

Representations about entire product lines

Manufacturers and marketers should not indicate, either expressly or implicitly, that a whole product line is of U.S. origin ("Our products are made in USA") when only some products in the product line are made in the U.S. according to the "all or virtually all" standard.

At the bottom of every single company website page is the Made in USA symbol bracketing the "Tethrd - Get Connected" slogan.

What does "all or virtually all" mean?

"All or virtually all" means that all significant parts and processing that go into the product must be of U.S. origin. That is, the product should contain no — or negligible — foreign content.

Seems like the accessories would contradict the whole product line being "Made in USA" claim as the processing is done overseas.

See page 5 of your reference:

What factors does the Commission consider to determine whether a product is "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.?

The product’s final assembly or processing must take place in the U.S. …

The HYS Strap packaging says "Made in China".


I find it difficult to believe that they couldn't find a US based manufacturer to sew straps and instead had them shipped thousands of miles from overseas. My take is that they went overseas for profit reasons, which is fine, just don't use the excuse that they couldn't find anybody else in the US.
 
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Navigator said:
My take is that they went overseas for profit reasons, which is fine, just don't use the excuse that they couldn't find anybody else in the US.
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First off let me say I'm not disagreeing with your idea that it could have been for purely profit reasons. I also want to say I'm not defending the out-sourcing of goods and services from American companys.

But, I also want to point out that it could have been done for product cost reasons. Assuming they apply the same markup, utilizing an overseas supplier vs a domestic one could be the difference between a $20 price point on the overseas manufactured HYS Strap or a $60 price point on a domestically manufactured one. For products such as these the labor costs are really the driving cost, material costs are pretty insignificant

Now I will admit, the $20 price point will allow them to sell more HYS Straps and therefore increase their income but realistically, what's the value proposition of a HYS Strap at a price point much greater than that? If they want to sell them they have to find a way to get the cost to a level that allows the value price point.

Unfortunately that may preclude using domestic suppliers. Unfortunately while we all want USA manufactured content we also want that low price point. Currently there's not a viable solution to achieve both.

Now as to the "Made in the USA" advertising . . . That's a whole other discussion.
 
Navigator said:
BayouBeauxhunter,

See page 4 of your reference:

Representations about entire product lines

Manufacturers and marketers should not indicate, either expressly or implicitly, that a whole product line is of U.S. origin ("Our products are made in USA") when only some products in the product line are made in the U.S. according to the "all or virtually all" standard.

At the bottom of every single company website page is the Made in USA symbol bracketing the "Tethrd - Get Connected" slogan.

What does "all or virtually all" mean?

"All or virtually all" means that all significant parts and processing that go into the product must be of U.S. origin. That is, the product should contain no — or negligible — foreign content.

Seems like the accessories would contradict the whole product line being "Made in USA" claim as the processing is done overseas.

I find it difficult to believe that they couldn't find a US based manufacturer to sew straps and instead had them shipped thousands of miles from overseas. My take is that they went overseas for profit reasons, which is fine, just don't use the excuse that they couldn't find anybody else in the US.
Click to expand...

Finding something hard to believe and knowing the facts are two different things. I don’t know the facts, but find it easy to believe knowing the severe backorder of sys haulers that occurred earlier in the year. I have no doubt that profit also played a part in their decision, and I’m not sure how anyone could fault them on that. I’m sure they could find a sew house in the US that would have no problem raping them, but if they can’t get the product out at a reasonable price, then that is a no start for any company. With regard to the “all or virtually all” how do you know the material isn’t American made and all that is happening in China is them sewing it? That scenario seems to meet the criteria for made in USA as defined by the FTC. I don’t really care enough to find out but if you feel betrayed that’s ok too.
 
Navigator said:
BayouBeauxhunter,

See page 4 of your reference:

Representations about entire product lines

Manufacturers and marketers should not indicate, either expressly or implicitly, that a whole product line is of U.S. origin ("Our products are made in USA") when only some products in the product line are made in the U.S. according to the "all or virtually all" standard.

At the bottom of every single company website page is the Made in USA symbol bracketing the "Tethrd - Get Connected" slogan.

What does "all or virtually all" mean?

"All or virtually all" means that all significant parts and processing that go into the product must be of U.S. origin. That is, the product should contain no — or negligible — foreign content.

Seems like the accessories would contradict the whole product line being "Made in USA" claim as the processing is done overseas.

See page 5 of your reference:

What factors does the Commission consider to determine whether a product is "all or virtually all" made in the U.S.?

The product’s final assembly or processing must take place in the U.S. …

The HYS Strap packaging says "Made in China".


I find it difficult to believe that they couldn't find a US based manufacturer to sew straps and instead had them shipped thousands of miles from overseas. My take is that they went overseas for profit reasons, which is fine, just don't use the excuse that they couldn't find anybody else in the US.
Click to expand...

My understanding is that they needed their US sew shops to concentrate on sewing saddles, which obviously makes sense. They had the same shops sewing saddles and accessories, obviously the saddles are the most important, so they made a choice to limit the lead time on everything. Im sure this was done because customers were bitching and whining about orders they knew were months out when they ordered.
 
Bayoubeauxhunter,

You seemed to miss the reference on page 5 regarding "all or virtually all" which states that the product’s final assembly or processing must take place in the U.S. For the HYS strap, it does not because the packaging says Made in China.
 
Navigator said:
Bayoubeauxhunter,

You seemed to miss the reference on page 5 regarding "all or virtually all" which states that the product’s final assembly or processing must take place in the U.S. For the HYS strap, it does not because the packaging says Made in China.
Click to expand...

I’m not going to keep arguing about something as ridiculous as this, but who puts on the t-hook on the HYS strap? If Tethrd does it, then isn’t the final assembly in the US? Who packages everything and ships it out? If the saddle, platform, material for all products, packaging and assembling, is all done in the USA and the only thing happening in China is them injecting some thread into a few accessories, then it seems like virtually all of the entire product line fits the criteria. Like I told VT bow, if you feel that strong about it file a complaint with FTC or take it up with Tethrd. Otherwise you just seem to want to make noise.
 
Scary. Glad to hear that you’re okay buddy!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Allegheny Tom said:
I love mine, but I will be sending both of my gen 1 back.
It would be nice if they would work a deal where they send the replacement out and after we get it, THEN we return the gen 1.
Tethrd's track record on supplying gear is woefully slow. I would hate to be without mine for an entire season. I assume there will be a wave of returns that they need to replace.
Might have to just keep my fingers crossed that a failure doesn't occur.
Click to expand...
They won't take it back until it breaks, already tried.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk
 
I bought some steps, new run production. Issue was discovered, producer of said steps stepped up (pun intended) and payed for shipment back and returned steps once issue fixed. I have made multiple purchases from said producer since then.
Moral of the story, treat your customers right and they will come back and back again.
Yes, I would pay more for something made here. I think of it as keeping food in our mouths. Quality has gone up in China, I wonder what happened to the ones that made mistakes, their families? There's alot more to "overseas" production then meets the eye....
 
It’s 2019. You’re the first player to offer a full system in a market that is ripe. All of your product is ordered via the web. You have your customers’ phone and emails. You have a product that does not meet expectations. You make a change to said product. Said product is related to a person’s safety at height. At the time the failure was discovered, and gen2 was decided upon, there at most were hundreds, maybe thousands of platforms in the wild.

The cost of the gen1 mold and gen2 mold are sunk costs.

At the inflection point of deciding to build a gen2, the decision was made to only let people know about the issue with gen1 here, and on social media. The cost of crafting an email letting every single customer know about the issue would have been a few hours of a principle’s time.

The cost to offer a replacement to every single gen1 owner if they decided that is what they wanted, would have been in the neighborhood of 10k if I’m not off on how many were out. That’s probably high.

The cost of a mandatory recall would’ve been significantly higher, but still probably less than 50k.

A calculated business decision was made to simply float the issue on social media.

In my opinion that was a poor business decision. Nipping this in the bud when you have majority market share, and the cost to do so is so low, makes complete sense. The upside of ‘ignoring’ it, whether it was financially or emotionally driven, seems limited. The risks are extreme, and existential to the business.

The upside of mandatory recall, voluntary swap out, or at worst total effort to inform all customers of the issues at play, is enormous. I’ve given up on thinking you can keep lazy or ignorant people from killing themselves. But the perception that you can’t be trusted or put profit before people’s lives, when you’re in a business that sells gear that holds people’s lives in the balance, is incredibly costly.

These types of decisions sink small businesses every day. I can totally see why the decision was made to handle the situation that way. Myself, and quite a few other folks were urging a more cautious, risk averse approach to this issue. For me personally, it was because I wanted to see someone drive market innovation so I get cool gear to hunt with. And to a slightly lesser extent, I love business and like to see the right moves made.

The fact that it continues to pop up simply reinforces all that I’ve said. It’s still not too late to clean it up a little. But the damage to perception and brand likely exceeds the up front cost of resolving it the right way. And if someone actually does die or get seriously hurt because of this failure mode, the cost will most definitely close the doors.

There are a ton of other things at play in this conversation. But sticking to the topic at hand, it’s a real bummer it was handled the way it was. I hope for all involved - the business, the consumers, and our little community, nothing major comes of it.
 
I'm new to this whole thing and been reading a lot... I bought the new Aerohunter Flex (supposed to get here next week) Bought a linesman and tether from Tethrd (spreading the wealth around ya know)

I've been climbing with my new Muddy Pro Sticks (nervous about those as well ugh)

I'm guessing their spliced eye ropes are fine?
 
scott77 said:
I'm new to this whole thing and been reading a lot... I bought the new Aerohunter Flex (supposed to get here next week) Bought a linesman and tether from Tethrd (spreading the wealth around ya know)

I've been climbing with my new Muddy Pro Sticks (nervous about those as well ugh)

I'm guessing their spliced eye ropes are fine?
Click to expand...
I love their ropes. Lightweight and very strong. Honestly, the Predator seems to be the only thing that has broken from Tethrd, unless I’m missing something. The ropes are factory spliced in the USA, shouldn’t have nearly as many issues with quality control as with G1 Predator. I have no regrets about buying my tether or my G2 Predator. There is a lot of valid concern on this thread, but you should be very happy with their ropes.
 
Ontariofarmer said:
I am reluctant to criticize Greg and Ernie because I like them. It is clear that they replace broken ones only. Also if I had to send back my gen 1 I would have no platform to hunt from this fall as well which is another issue

Shipping from Canada is another issue


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro
Click to expand...
I with you on that one. If mine breaks then I send it back.
 
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