Wednesday, August 3, 2016

Black Market





Barnmate showed me her recent purchase yesterday and it left me a little confused. It was supposedly a second run model of a Prestige. It looked..off. She only paid $450 for it but it didn't fit her horse. For kicks and giggles I tried it on Ries as someone suggested a Prestige might work well for him. I even sat in it on a saddle stand.

But I couldn't get over the feeling that something wasn't quite right about it. I inspected it and remembered my training from the tack shop I worked at to determine the quality. The stitching seemed decent, but there were little cuts of quality. There were areas where the leather wasn't trimmed and just some small half-asses mistakes. 

And the leather. It was described as "calf skin". The top side felt soft-ish but the underside felt like plastic and it didn't take to oiling. Barnmate also said when she cleaned it some of the dye came off on her sponge. Seemed fishy. I consulted with my tack extraordinaires L from Viva Carlos and Carey from Me Jump Pretty One Day and got their opinions. Carey is double checking with the tack buyer at her store but I think it's a fair assumption to say its a knockoff.

It was semi comfortable to sit in, but the panels seemed foam and not wool. the stitching details of the fluer de lis is just not quite as articulate as the stock photo, and lets be real, it looks kinda cheap and ugly. Not to mention the black cantle instead of cream? 

Have you come across any questionable knock-offs?  I saw some knock-off PS of Sweden bridles..wonder how they fare...


12 comments:

  1. I strangely don't see many knock off's except Paige's saddle which is a true second run, very nice saddle she got for very cheap, I just don't care for the color.

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  2. Man... that thing looks terrible in the photo! Not even close to the real Prestige. Looks like a very typical $200 Indian made piece of crap, except with a Fleur de Lis on it...

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  3. I haven't ever seen something like this. I know that one of the lower quality brands makes models they compare to French saddle styles but I haven't seen actual knock offs. Kinda weird. Definitely doesn't look good quality. I would be wanting my money back!

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  4. It reminds me of some of the Toulouse saddles that will come in on consignment. Some of them aren't *bad*, per se, but you can tell they're totally knocking off a higher-end brand.

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  5. That ain't no Prestige, that's for sure!

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  6. Just looking it it looks off! Def not real!

    Also, hi, new follower!

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  7. Oh man that thing looks like a knock off. I've never seen something like that.

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  8. That thing sure looks off. I also saw the knock off PS bridles. I keep hoping someone buys one and reviews them just to see what they are like.

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  9. Wow that's weird. I didn't even know knock-off tack existed! I would definitely be the person who falls for the knock off.

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  10. Wow, that's crazy... and also ugly. And I LOOOOVEEEE my Prestige

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  11. I'm curious what became of this saddle. I'm considering buying what I think is a knockoff Prestige-- it's practically free and being sold as "no name" by someone I think fell for the same eBay scam. It looks a lot less ugly than your barnmate's saddle but I'm assuming the build quality is similar. I can't find anything else about knockoffs, so I'm curious what happened with your friend's saddle. Thx

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