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- Verified Buyer
Do not get suckered into the high pricing and "Made in the USA" expectation for a quality product. This shelf arrived with some of the worst design, manufacturing, defects, and Quality Control I've ever come across.Pros:Appearance/style I was wanting for our bathroom remodel.Cons:Color - Ordered "Oil Rubbed Bronze", product is a simple single stage dark brown.Material: "All-thread" rod and comically thin brass tubes sandwiched together with a couple of nuts and bushings (honestly shocking that this wasn’t some kind of weekend DIY project made from scrap material by a college student).Fit & Finish: Read below if you got this far and are still considering this abomination of a product.Is it possible that Allied Brass is a good company, I just happened to get their one poorly designed product (that also happened to get past QC)? Nope. To perfectly match my Allied Brass bathroom shelf, I had also purchased one of their wall mounted towel racks. Figuring “Lightning couldn’t strike twice”, I pulled the towel rack out of the box and found the exact same trash design, material, assembly, blemishes, and lacking QC.Overall build - As soon as I pulled the shelf out of the box, I immediately knew I had made the wrong choice. The wall plates had dents and not a single part of the shelf was square. I initially thought the shelf was damaged in shipping, but the closer I inspected it, I began to realize the problem was in the manufacturing. During the initial inspection, I realized that some of the brass tubing was not fully seated in their trim bushings. This should have been caught by QC, but I’m now doubting Allied Brass has a QC team. Being handy, and in a moment of weakness that ended up costing me a couple of hours tinkering, I figured I could simply loosen the jam nut, re-seat the tubes, and everything would return to its proper square state. Nope. With the jam nut loose, it became clear that the whole design is based off "all-thread" rod and comically thin brass tubes sandwiched together with a couple of nuts and bushings (honestly shocking that this wasn’t some kind of weekend DIY project made with scrap material). The deeper I dove, the more issues I found. Before I knew it, I had the whole shelf disassembled in front of me. I carefully measured each tube/threaded rod and made several adjustments to correct the variations in tube length, lack of thread engagement, etc. While glancing over the parts, I noticed that the glass didn’t even look square…it wasn’t. I can’t even begin to fathom what kind of equipment (or lack thereof) could have been used to make these products. I had allowed myself to get this deep into fixing a shelf that should have been install ready, so I made some final adjustments and made the shelf as square as possible (tough when dealing with the glass issue).Don’t make the same mistake I did… My curiosity/"fix-it" mentality got the best of me and voided any return potential. There are countless other products that offer better build quality at a fraction of the price...OR...countless other brands that offer substantially better materials/manufacturing at the same price... Simply skip any products offered by Allied Brass, they're a blackeye to the "Made in the USA" prominence (would not be shocked if it turns out these products are being thrown together in a 3rd world sweatshop).
