There’s some discussion in the “current state of the hobby” post about Squadron, but I thought a stand alone comment might be better than just chiming in to a thread that has several points in the mix. I recently bought a kit and a True Details canopy. Shipping was prompt, but the canopy was not protected and was crushed by the packing paper. I called, expecting to have to ship it back or go thru a return procedure of some sort, but was pleasantly surprised by a representative who was apologetic, concerned about how fast I needed a replacement, and told me just to keep the damaged canopy and he would have a new one shipped right away.
The new part arrived well packed. Squadron seems to be struggling to find a better way to market itself, sort of similar to a rebuilding year in sports teams, but I appreciate the level of service I received. I’ll continue to be a satisfied customer while they figure it out. Hope they bring back the free monthly sales flyer!
Good story with a good ending.But it just helps you appreciate how rare good service is when we have to praise a company for screwing up, and then quickly correcting their mistake.I mean good service is packing correctly in the first place,so there is no problem to begin with.
That is good news. There do seem to be a number of companies that have this level of service, I have had similar experiences with a couple in eastern Europe. But it would ne nice if these were not exceptions.
The guy packing SHOULD have paid more attention to the fragile contents but some responsibility needs to fall on the manufacturer for sending out products that they know will be shipped like that and not coming up with better packaging on their end. They are still packaging like it’s going on a shelf when most of their products these days are sold online. They need to do a bit better considering how fragile, tiny and hard to get some of this stuff is. You’d be hard pressed to find a single item in a Walmart that you couldn’t chuck in a box with minimal dunnage and it not make it around the world intact.
Eggs maybe.
Imagine a 1/32 Tamiya Corsair shipped in a plastic bag stapled to a piece of cardboard the way most resin bits arrive. That’d be a mess.
Squadron has always been like that. When I was stationed in Texas in the early 90s, I ordered one of the Squadron Signal “in action” and the last two digits of the book I ordered were transposed so I received the wrong one (their error, not mine). They told me to keep the wrong one and sent the right one.
At the beginning of the 2000s, I got a Roden JS-3 Stalin kit. Some of the road wheels were not fully molded so I filled out the green MMD post cards included inside the kit. I received a new road wheel sprue in the mail.
There have been others, but those are the two that jump to my mind.
The flyer was originally 50¢ an issue or $5 for the annual catalog which included an entire year of the flyer. The flyer was often included when you placed an order. After the annual catalog was discontinued, the flyers were free. They just tried restarting the subscription service for the flyer. I did not resubscribe since the internet is a more efficient way to search for better deals.
Squadron is pretty good with their customer service. I just bought a Kitty Hawk F-94 and the pe fret was missing. Gave them a ring and the lady said a replacement fret was going in the mail to me ASAP.
I’ve ordered from several places online and I can say without have my nose grow that I have NEVER had a bad transaction with Squadron. I would highly recommend them to anyone.
I’ve ordered from several places online and I can say without having my nose grow that I have NEVER had a bad transaction with Squadron. I would highly recommend them to anyone.
Dittos to the above from StrayCat. I’ve ordered many times from Squadron, and the only time that I received something incorrectly (due to a transposed digit on a stock number), I made a call, and they got me the correct part within two days, and paid everything for me shipping the incorrect part back. They are a top-notch company in my book.