hey everyone.
so i wanted to take a moment to recap, mostly for Stevie, my initial experience with FSS/iGrow, as he obviously missed it while he was doing his "research". simply take a moment to click the link in my signature, and you will be whisked back in time to mid-April of this year, and you can read how it all went down. i will go further to provide additional details at this time.
So, I'm a medical Cannabis patient for 2 years now. When I got my recommendation I had no resources to grow my own, so I assigned a friend that was already growing. The friendship fell apart due to his greed and I started making plans to take over as my own grower. At that time, to cover his shortcomings on providing meds, my wife and I had gotten a membership at a local cannabis club. One day, I asked the club owner at if her husband (a grow shop owner) had heard of EFDL lights, and might be able to sort out a deal for me on them. She had an answer back for me the next day or so that he had heard of that technology, and had a 200w and a 400w from some company or another that he had been given. We went to the shop and met up with him directly, and he explained that someone had come into the shop with the 2 lights, claiming that they were the next big thing, and that people would soon be beating down his doors to get these things. He said that the guy left the lights there for him to do "what he wanted with", and that he would be in touch in a couple weeks to see how things were going. Couple weeks turned into half a year and he never heard from or saw this person again. Thing is he grows outside, and doesn't have room to grow indoors, so the lights were just sitting in his garage, taking up space. He said that I was the first person in that time to ask about them, and he was very eager to be rid of them. He worked me up a deal on a package that consisted of a used 5 x 10 grow tent, the 2 lights, a No Holes Bar (all used, what can I say? I'm frugal), and he threw in some nutes. I paid cash but can't recall if i got a receipt. Fast forward to when the 400w died... I called the guy up to let him know and he said that he had no means of contacting the guy that dropped the lights off with him; the guy had never called or came back in since, and that he had been unable to locate the card that he was pretty sure the guy had given him. He suggested that I call the number on the ballasts, as he was very uninterested in having the lights back at is place while stuff got sorted out. Additionally, he was under the impression that he was free to do with them what was being done with them. I had (obviously) asked several times "Oh my god man, are you sure? free? really?", as my chief concern was that he would ask for them back at a point in time that would be inopportune for me. "Nope, they're yours." was all he said back. That's why, when the 400w failed on me, he had no recourse to offer me. That's why I called FSS (their number was on the ballast) and the tech support guy told me that it was their 400w enclosed high bay inducted fluorescent (essentially a warehouse light). We talked about what kind of environment it was being used in and i explained the indoor garden (didn't get cannabis specific, just talked about indoor horticulture in general) and I explained my take on them so far. It came down to the guy saying i could ship the ballast to them on my coin for a diagnostic, then buy whatever was broken, and pay to get it shipped back. There were a couple times he put me on hold to check on the detail to a question, and not once did he make like anything was out of the ordinary. I was under the impression that the failed 400w was identical to to all of the other ones like it that they make, and they were amused that I was lighting plants with it rather than a warehouse or garage, and that also, nothing was out of the ordinary with the fact that I had it. They were willing to service it, but not under warranty, despite it's stamped date of manufacture putting it at 11 months old.
In case you missed it, there was no NDA, nor was there discussion of one.
additionally, here are some of the emails that occurred as a result of several phone conversations with people at Everlast/Full Spectrum Solutions. some details are redacted to protect the identity of the rep I was communicating with, myself, and the store owner, as this is a wide-open public forum. if this makes you or Carey upset, Stevie, let him know that I'd be more than happy to work with him to get to the bottom of this via direct communication; he can message me via YouTube.
From: Sxxxx (REDACTED)[mailto:
(REDACTED)]
Sent: Sunday, April 22, 2012 8:01 PM
To: (REDACTED)
Subject: Re: Warranty Form
Hello Bxxxx,
Thank you for sending me the warranty form. I have since been in contact with the retailer that provided me the light (actually a pair, the 200w and the 400w enclosed high bay inducted fluorescent, but it's the 400w that has ceased to function) on a trial basis (as I previously mentioned on the phone, I am an indoor horticultural lighting consultant. I was planning on running a comparison between your company's lamps and several other popular lighting solutions.), and he is unable to locate anything that would qualify as a paper trail... He is even unable to find the business card that he was given at the same time. In any case, he is unable/unwilling to assist me in this warranty process. The upsetting thing is that I am at the point of being almost two months deep in preparations for this experiment, with a lot of people constantly asking for my updates on it. And one of the primary lamps of customer interest has abruptly failed at the 1 year mark (with only 2 months of use on it). Please advise on how we can proceed in this matter.
Sincerely,
xxxxxxxxx
On Wed, Apr 18, 2012 at 1:24 PM, Bxxxx Sxxxxxx <
(REDACTED)@fullspectrumsolutions.com> wrote:
Hello Sxxxx,
Thank you for the reply. If you would like to let me know the retailers name and address I can try to cross reference it with ship to addresses in my database to see if we shipped direct to them. The purchase would have been through an electrical distributor such as Gexpro, WESCO, Graybar, CED, Granger, Platt, or North Coast Electrical Supply to name a few. I look forward to your reply. Have a great day.
Thank You,
From: Sxxxx (REDACTED)[mailto:(REDACTED)]
Sent: Sunday, April 22, 2012 8:01 PM
To: (REDACTED)
Subject: Re: Warranty Form
Good Morning Bxxxx,
In regards to the lamps in question, I received them from
(REDACTED). From David, the owner of the store. Their address is
(REDACTED). I contacted David in regard to this matter this past Saturday. He informed me that he is unable to locate any paperwork that he was given with the lamps. He does not even recall the name of the person who dropped the lamps off at his store...
I had originally contacted him in regards to EFDL lamps from a different manufacturer. He explained to me at that time that he had a couple such lamps at his house; that a rep had dropped them off at his shop saying that he could check them out, and that "people would be beating down his door for these lamps", but that he was requested to not actually display them in his store for a few months, until he was told it was OK to do so. According to him, I was the first person to even ask him about this technology in 6-7 months. Because he needed the space that they were taking up at his house, and the fact that he hadn't heard anything back from that rep, he opted to take my information (for future contact purposes, if needed) and he gave the lamps to me on a temporary basis. That was in February of this year. The lamp has a date of manufacture (indicated on the badge/label on the ballast) of April 2011.
That's pretty much all of the info regarding how I came to be in possession of these lamps, of which one (so far) has stopped working. Please let me know how we may proceed.
Thanks and have a great day!
| Sxxxx(REDACTED) <(REDACTED)> |
| Apr 24
| |
|
| | | |
Hello Bxxxx,
Thank you for your reply. I understand that you are just doing your job and following the protocol that your employer dictates that you adhere to. However, due to the fact that this is not my lamp, and that I was in the process of testing it competitively against other lighting technologies in order to form an opinion to then suggest (or not) these lamps to my customers and clientele, I think I have all the information I need regarding Full Spectrum Solutions and their products in order to move forward in my daily business. It's curious that the fact that I actually have one of your lamps, and it identifies its age to be exactly 1 year old, that your company is unable to stand behind it's product based on the detail of a receipt. It confuses me what good a 10 year warranty is when the manufacturer will abandon responsibility for poor craftsmanship or cheap components because the owner of your failed product doesn't have the receipt. I have your lamp, what does that count for?
In any case, I have been in contact with a different manufacturer of EFDL lighting (another company that has 2 lamps in my test, and makes them here in the USA rather than selling rebranded Chinese imports) in regards to your lamp's short lifespan. They are stunned at your lamps early demise and advised me that if your company was unwilling to take stand behind the failed lamp, that they will. Their offer stands for me to ship your failed fixture to them so they can find out why it failed. And then they will replace the failed fixture with a new one of theirs - mine to keep and shipped for free. That's a win for me, but I am trying to do a product/technology comparison here; lets remember that I'm an indoor lighting consultant, not a collector of exotic lighting fixtures... I guess that the experiment ends now in regards to Full Spectrum Solutions with the conclusion that FSS lamps are unreliable and a waste of money, that the company has zero faith in the product they sell and zero sense of customer service; opting to use a product failure as an opportunity to drive additional sales. My review of the hardware from the other EFDL manufacturer will be based on their 200w running against yours (which was no comparison the moment I turned the lamps on, their lamp was at least 30% brighter than yours, from strike onward. It also doesn't have issues with dimming when a steady breeze is on it). My review of Full Spectrum lighting and business practices should be obvious from the tenor of my email.
Again, nothing personal here
(REDACTED). I really appreciate how you did everything in your power to make this situation right for the customer. Well, in this case the Consultant. I believe that everything happens for a reason, and so the reason that I take from this occasion is that at least I saved all of my clientele from having a similar issue with your company. I will do my part to save FSS the effort of addressing future returns and/or warranty service of your company's lamps. I will do that by advising people against purchasing them.
Regards,
so there we have it. the facts behind the zealot, as it were.
i need to get running for now, but i'll be back later tonight or tomorrow with a video update of the FSS/iGrow/Everlast 200w vs the Inda/Gro Pro-200-PAR, and y'all can see for yourselves what that looks like, and why the FSS is currently collecting dust in the dining room. i just need to figure out where i want to set the lamps up for the video.
in the mean time, here's a pic of the 2 FSS lamps when i got them home; i was (at that time) a happy man.
also, here's a series of pics, taken when i originally got my first IG Pro-200-PAR and was shocked by the difference between it and the FSS200w that i had previously been happy with, that shows what to look forward to later:
i know it's difficult to make it out completely in the pics above, and so that is the reason for the upcoming video - just need to iron out details and set up the other light.
oh, and Stevie... i'm still very eager to see your garden with your "several" iGrows. i looked in your thread, and aside from seeing evidence that you can neither take quality pictures, nor can you post them on a forum. what i did see were close-ups of bud grown under god-knows-what. pics or it didn't happen, bro. and that's not the first time such a request has been made in these threads.
