My experience with Chess Bazaar

It's on it's way to me right now.I expect it any day......Thanks!

Got the Edinburg set today,in Bud RW.....I was shocked at the quality of fit and finish.No marks of any kind and simply gorgeous......At $115 shipped(signature required....nice touch) it is a STEAL!

Great to hear that. I'm also expecting another set from Royalchessmall shortly, so far they haven't diasppointed.

Royalchessmall might be a good mfgr to keep an eye on,based on the extremely high overall quality of this new Edinburgh set that I just got......I am still amazed at the price/quality value of the set.

i was surprised to pick up my knight today and it came apart.  This is not a big deal to fix, but 2 things to note:

1.  There is no evidence of any glue residue that I can see.  

2.  The dowel in the base is much smaller diameter than the hole in the body.  I would have guessed a tight friction fit for the dowel would be the way they would do it.  Not only would it be more secure, it would ensure that body is centered on the base.  

C'mon,it's no biggie.A little carefully placed glue and done.....I've had this happen on a few C.B. sets.

I agree no biggie.  I already put a few drops of glue and wrapped it with a rubber band before I left for work.  It will be good to go when I get home.

5 miniute cure JB weld will do the job and you can play right away.

I used this:

"Forked".....I will admit it's not fun to get something that is not perfect.I'm glad that your piece is easily fixed......Good luck-

Not good that this had happened to both of you. Not a one off situation.

if this is the worst thing that ever happens to someone?  count ur blessings... u lead a sheltered life

I know I'm CB bashing a bit here, but I can't stop myself, it's just too much fun. Every time somebody buys a set off of them, an angel dies of aids.

If I paid good money for a set I wouldn't want knight torsoes coming loose. Just doesn't give you a nice fuzzy feeling inside, sheltered life or not (wtf sheltered life? Do we need to talk about Africa next?). It was the same story with the stain of red CB pieces rubbing off, regardless of how many members on these forums would advise simply to seal the sets yourself. I remember a couple of members on here even defended CB saying stuff like "Well, it's not like you're going to play with wet hands or sth." Which is as ridiculous as canned bread in itself.

I know CB has made strides in the right direction in terms of quality in recent years. In fact, the 1849 they have looks almost as good as the design from OS they ripped off. However, to me, CB's evolution over the years is actually part of a bigger issue, as they remain a slightly odorous, underhand company that simply doesn't know its own identity. Is it bang for your buck or is it not so cheap and better quality? If it were up to me I would pick a better intermediary company or deal with the indian carvers directly. They have various sites up and running I believe.

My hope is that if we all just agree to stay away from them, they will soon stop filling ether with badly designed sets, ridiculous, ostentatious knights and unsealed stains. 

Do you kiss your kids with that mouth?

I do get carried away with things where CB is concerned. Disclaimer: Probably no angels were harmed in the sales of CB or the writing of my comments. I just really don't approve of their business practices and I'm running out of nice ways to say that. I'll be quiet now.

Well, I'm happy to report that beyond very minor flaws on some of the rooks (not all of the tops were perfectly trimmed), I've had no quality problems with my six (so far) CB sets whatsoever. All figures of equal corresponding height, and of the two "dyed" half sets (the antiqued boxwood on the Latvian set and the crimson (black) part of the Knubbel set) - the color definitely doesn't come off. And I tried.

No rattling weights, no knights that come apart (I pulled and pulled), no chips except one on a knight of an economy Zagreb set. After all, it's handcraft. These things do happen. I'll certainly rather tolerate very minor flaws on these than pay three times the price for a HoS or Regency Chess Company sets, which may or may not originate from the very same artisans.

There's just two things that bother me about CB:

1. The super-aggressive marketing (the constant newsletter mails, the fact that when you have a set in the shopping basket while being logged in, they will remind you by email several times that you could/should buy it)

2. The sale-upon-a-sale-upon-a-sale-upon-sale tactic: There's ALWAYS a sale, whether it's Father's Day, or the 4th of July, or a Kim Karsahian's puppy had a cub-sale. Which means their recommended retail prices are effectively just a hoax. But of course, very many companies do it the same way. There's a furniture shop in my town that has had a "clearance sale" - for the past 15 years.

On the upside though, they do publish all customer reviews on their homepage unedited. When I wrote there (what I wrote here) that their antiqued boxwood part of the Latvian set looks nothing like antiqued boxwood but was in fact orange, they published it. 

All in all, if I compare it with what's available in my country as an alternative, i.e. the popular Philos sets, which also come from India originally, there's still a world of difference in terms of both quality and choice. 

Anyway, going through my sets I noticed that I was missing a "straight" Staunton set in my favourite wood combination (boxwood+bud rosewood) - of course that needed to be addressed immediately (#21stcenturyproblems). So I bought this "Sleek Staunton" set from Royalchessmall,. I chose this particular set because I like the lean, elongated king, queen and bishop, in combination with a feisty knight and a solid, but not obese rook.

Again it's a very nice set for a modest amount (I had a complaint about one bishop, let's see how that pans out. Nicely weighted, too: King=85g, Queen=75g, Knight=68g, Bishop=65g.

I didn't think that posting my very minor event (wouldn't even call it an issue) with my knight would lead to an excuse to bash CB.  I will reiterate that my set is beautiful, finish is very smooth,, color is fantastic and uniform, wood grain beautiful, detail work on the knights, rook crenelations, bishop miters all excellent and done with care, weight is perfect, etc.

True some people have had some noteworthy issues with CB, but obviously many others have not.  And I would caution anyone who reads about a CB problem to look at the date of the post, because I have noticed that those complaints were much more common in the past than they are now.    

BTW my knight has jumped back into action in my latest daily game.  

So one can't complain about possibly shoddy workmanship unless it's the worst thing that has ever happened to this person?

LOL at you.