[notadoc]

> I'm not sure whether it's a case of more people arguably abusing the spirit if not the letter of the policy as part of a modern take everything you can mindset.

That's probably a part of it, a long running joke in the skier community was that "REI is an acronym for Return Every Item."

That plus blatantly notably lower quality Chinese production probably put an end to it.

[wcarron]

Weird. I've noticed a strong increase in the quality of their products over the past few years. I have a REI magma down bag from them and it's awesome. Their performance wear has taken a step up, too. I seriously considered a rain shell from them, but ended up buying a Mammut on sale.

[ghaff]

One of the only real quality disappointments I've had with REI was fairly recently when about a 3 year old lightly-used camp sleeping pad started slow leaks from all over the pad. Obviously whatever material they used to keep the air on the inside had just broken down. I probably should have at least tried to return it but I couldn't be bothered. Looking online, I was far from the only person with this problem.