Has anyone purchased their chessmen directly or via Amazon? Their quality looks good and I suspect that they may manufacture some of the sets offered by House of Staunton. Any experience info is appreciated. stauntoncastle.com
At Amazon I would never purchase from a seller with less than a 95% positive rating. These folks are at 80%. But they are in India, so that may be the reason for the poor performance.
That said, House of Staunton sets are made in Amerstar, probably by these folks. Then the middleman marks them up. So you are most likely getting a House of Staunton set for a very nice price.
At Amazon, if you don’t get what you paid for you can get Amazon to refund your money if the seller doesn’t cooperate. So you have no fear of losing your money.
If you like a House of Staunton or Jaques of London chess set, just shop the dealers in India (Checkmate, Chess and Games, Jindal Crafts, Aristocraft Exports, etc) . You will find them all there at a quarter of the price! That is what I do.
Looks like a fairly new company, they only have 10 ratings from the last 12 months, so their rating is nearly useless. I’d say the person that owns Staunton Castle is still learning the ropes of selling on Amazon, and probably is a younger entrepreneur still getting his or her sea legs so to speak. I don’t say avoid sellers like that, but be prepared to have to go the extra mile to get satisfied if your order isn’t up to your expectation.
According to their web site, the company was set up in Amritsar in 1977. The Canadian company was set up recently to sell their products direct to consumers under what is, I assume, their own label.
In that sense they are like House of Chess in Queens, NYC, which used to call itself House of Staunton until House of Staunton in TN took legal action to make them change their name. House of Chess makes a generally good product. Some of their chessmen are knockoffs of sets House of Staunton sells. They have a set called Imperial which is very similar to HoS’s Windsor at half the price. Their Monarch set is excellent in rosewood. I’ve bought four sets from them over the years, have been pleased with their products and have received excellent service (from India) when there was a set shipped to me from Queens without the extra Queens.
The fact that Amazon will stand behind the sale is an inducement to try them this new place. Perhaps when my tax return comes in about two weeks…
That’s encouraging.
I still think they’re at least new to the Amazon eco-system. I’ve bought stuff from companies new to the Amazon world, and I have had to be a bit more patient to get satisfaction if there was a problem with an order, but I haven’t had any bad experiences.