House of Staunton: quality problems

All Things Chess
1

I was reading in the past where the quality of the chess sets had gone down a LOT since Frank sold the company.

Anybody know if they fixed their quality problems?

Its been some time (couple years maybe) since I looked into it . Just for information, the chess set the person posted about cost several hundred dollars. Think there was a problem with chipped/broken pieces and definitely the padding on the bottom of the chess pieces were coming off, even when the person first got the chess set. -I don’t think I read it on the USCF forum though, but some other forum.

Browsing Google, there appears to be another unhappy customer from around that time (2010), where the customer bought an ivory set. I couldn’t find the original post of the lower cost chess set that I mentioned read about in the same time period.

http://www.chessforums.org/general-chess-discussion/6228-house-staunton-troubles.html

2

I didn’t know that Camaratta sold the company. They’re still coming out with new designs, so I assumed Frank was still at the helm. Was the sale written up anywhere?

3

I guess he retired actually, I found that post finally:

http://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-equipment/house-of-staunton-review

Frank’s retirement is mentioned under the article, posted by Seanstars, but other posters have even more enlightening information, like the guy who posted about how bad the 40th anniversary Fischer-Spassky collectors set was. (specifically that a lot of the leather bottoms were coming off, and some pieces didn’t sit flat on the board.)

EDIT: I could’ve sworn I read that a couple years ago, but must of read it last year around the holidays… when I’m in the mood to shop for stuff like that. The original post was apparently 8 months ago. Or maybe the entire thread was regurgitated from an old post on a different website.

4

I have purchased and currently own a good number of House of Staunton Chess sets, boards and bags.

I first began working with Frank Camaratta in 1998. I would talk with Frank on the phone and he would tell me of sets he was coming out with. I would buy them, sometimes sight unseen. The quality of the sets and boards and their bags has always been very high.

Yes, Frank did sell the company quite a few years ago to Shawn Sullivan. For a bit of time before the sale, Shawn was the manager of the place for Frank.

The thing is that they have the equipment made overseas, except for a few occasions of boards, but I do think a good number of the boards are also made overseas.

The sets are made in India. I recall when Shawn first took over, him and/or Frank finding different manufacturers for the sets. At about that time I coincidentally sold off most of my better sets and boards to make my “collection” something I would use for play a lot more. I also gave a set to my brother in law. What I found when I later bought some sets to replace the ones I found I really missed was that the quality of the newer manufactured sets was quite a bit better than the originals. For instance the Liberty Series set that I originally bought was one of the first 2 or 3 that Frank had made in Rosewood. The newer set had the pieces be a lot more robust and of a nicer quality manufacture.

The same was true for some of the boards. For instance they sell a board called the Superior Traditional with the playing surface recessed in the frame. I had problems with the surface of a couple of squares showing flaws in the original board and Frank had me send it back with the replacement being a lot thinner wood and not as nice of a build. Well Shawn found a different manufacturer for the board when he took over, in England I believe, and a guy I know bought one and it is of the better quality thickness and build of the first ones.

So, I think that Shawn has had good quality sets and boards in his tenure of owning the company.

I read the linked chess.com forum and yes, it does appear they had some problems with either the manufacture or packaging of the sets. However, I have never had a problem with the House of Staunton not standing behind their product.

In the case of the guy buying the Grandmaster Series set and the $40 board, I can see his problem. First off the $40 board is most likely the one made in Poland or some other Eastern European country. Those boards are the ones commonly known as the Bundesliga boards, because they are used in that European league. I own 3 of those boards, two folding and one regular. For $40 there is no way the board could be solid wood. Of course it is veneer. For this guy to expect solid wood at that price is kind of ridiculous. Sure he mentioned that he understood it was veneer for the price but was still not satisfied with it because it was not solid wood. I am sure HOS would gladly replace the veneer board that had a chip on the corner with no problem.

The set he bought is one of the least costing sets they sell. When I sold off my more expensive sets, I gradually replaced them with the lesser costing sets and I have to say those sets are great for playing with and really do compete with their sets costing 3 times or more in play. Of course the fine detail of the sets is not what the more expensive sets have, but you do get what you pay for. I currently have only one of their sets in their higher price range and that is a 4" Morphy Series set in Blood Rosewood. That’s my really nice set and they list that for over $800. All my other sets of theirs retail for less than $150. That notwithstanding, the Proline Series set really rivals their Marshall Series set and 3 times the cost. Their Classic Series set at 3.75" rivals their Player Series and Professional Series sets at about 2 times and more the cost. Their Zagreb '59 Series set is nice and fun and their Championship Series set, which is one of their cheapest, is a duplicate of the DGT Board standard set and looks and plays just fine for just a little over $50.

It sounds as if the set that guy got had a batch problem with the glue on it and not being cleaned or finished that well. I bet if he would have talked with them in a more working kind of way, he would have been satisfied. Instead he asked for a refund. I know that whenever I call them with any kind of a problem they are good.

5

I like to mention, I have bought stuff from HoS in the past. A ~$90 chess set and the folding wooden tournament board and the large (but not extra large) tournament bag from around 2007 or 2008.

I did not have any problems with the board or the pieces. Although I didn’t specifically expect it to be veneer, I didn’t expect it to be solid wood either, but its still in excellent shape. Sadly due to working 3rd shift now, It barely sees the light of day.

I still think that link (from Chess.com) had been regurgitated from someplace earlier… note that all but a single post is “8 months ago”, and the last post on the 2nd page is “3 months ago”. So I’ll presume that quality issues have been resolved to be at least comparable with normal expectations. Plus there’s always the point that the internet tends to allow a few quality issues be magnified by the fact that “once on the internet, always on the internet”. So a few quality issues from years ago still bubbles up on the internet long after the issues (hopefully) have been fixed.

6

Is it absolutely necessary that there be padding? tyia

7

If you are thinking about buying a nice wooden chess set. Examine it yourself before you buy.

8

Well it really is not padding on the bottom of the pieces. That is usually felt, billiard cloth or leather. That is put on the bottom of the pieces to protect the board from scratching and scuffing in play. They can be called pads but it is not padding.

Now if you are talking about shipping the set or board then padding is used to protect the things in shipment.

9

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/semantics

10

What portion of the final retail price of a quality HOS set goes to the Indian manufacturer/craftsman?

Couple years ago, I bought a set on eBay which looks like a HOS set, except the knights don’t match any HOS set I’ve seen. Very high quality, heavily weighted wood, 4.4" king, etc., at what seems less than 1/5 the price of comparable HOS models. My speculation: suppose the Indian company/companies manufacturing the HOS sets decided they wanted some of that high markup. How to do it without legal problems? Just use the HOS designs but tweak the knights, maybe combine the rooks from one set, bishops from another, etc. Might be very hard to prove any contract violation or design infringement.

11

Sadly, the reason Frank started House of Staunton was to bring higher quality chess sets than the ones that were coming from *India and other places. Mostly that amounts to better detail in the knights, although I’m sure there are some nuances to some of the other pieces, or more depending on how lavish the chess set is. But for standard Staunton style sets, aside from the knights, there is also the crown details on the queen and king that can offset the price of a chess set. That being said, if HoS is still having quality issues… it would rather water down their brand label.

*Of course most of the HoS chess sets are made in India and maybe some other places, but obviously Frank expected a higher degree of quality from the artisans he was using.

In any event that doesn’t mean other companies can’t find good artisans in India, and sell decent quality, but less expensive sets. Especially, say on Amazon, where it takes little startup money to get a digital storefront going.

The best thing HoS has going for it is its branding, and if they’re not protecting that label… lets just say America and the world at large isn’t very forgiving when it comes to success or failure.
Doesn’t matter if your a mom & bakery in some dot on the map town in America’s heartland, or a multinational company… if you start making poor quality merchandise… there’s always some other competitor or entrepreneur waiting in the wings to take over your market share.

12

Personally, I’ve not seen the drop in quality, but I won’t dispute anybody else’s experience. One big advantage for me has been the ability to order replacement pieces. I had to replace a pawn in a chess set and only had to pay HoS a nominal fee instead of losing the worth of the entire set – which I might have been stuck with if I dealt with somebody that didn’t maintain an inventory of replacement pieces.

13

I have a few comments on all this:

  1. I used to talk with Frank quite a bit from 1998 - 2002 or so about chess sets and all. He actually designed the weighting and balance of the pieces. Frank is a rocket scientist, actually engineer and he wanted the sets to play well and hold up without the weights falling out or cracking the wood of the pieces. This made pretty much each and every HOS designed set exceptional to play with. The only one that was not his design was the Royale series and that one certainly doesn’t feel and play as well as the others. When people play with a HOS set they notice how nice the pieces are balanced in the hand and how well the set “plays”.

  2. Frank also had a big thing with patent or copyright or exclusive design rights from his makers. And yes, they were all in India for the pieces. There was even a time that Frank sued and won when some competitor used his designs for sets as direct copies.

  3. For a lot of the sets Frank duplicated the designs of original sets. The Collector Series, Marshall Series, Liberty Series are each duplicates of sets that existed in the 1800’s, 1900, and the 1930’s respectively. I believe most of his sets were copied from the original designs except for a few that he designed himself.

  4. With the above, I would be wary of buying copies. I have seen a couple of them and they don’t play or look that nice.

  5. Back the the beginning, Frank did start the company to have decent sets made for play in the USA, and elsewhere. You must agree that since Frank started the company in the 1990’s and created all these nice sets, the competitors have been forced to bring their level of quality up. For instance, Frank was the first to include extra queens in each set for queening. Now it is kind of a standard thing and you see a lot of other companies offering extra queens, included. The quality of the sets have also improved across the spectrum.

  6. Frank has sold and is not an integral part of the business at this time. I believe he has still designed some sets, though. I agree that the current owner does need to maintain the quality of workmanship in his products as well as the quality customer service that Frank instituted.