Prior to placing my order I spoke to Michael Pratt, Operations Manager, of the manufacturer, USADisplay.net. He said that they do thousands of orders per day with only 3 employees.
- If you Google Earth the manufacturing address on their website, you will see it is a home (aka Administrative Office).
- The items I purchased were a Glass Dome with a rotating wood base along with 4 brass metalcoin holders and 8 Triangular Miniature Easels. The easels were manufactured by Jule-Art.com who sells directly to the public for less than 50 cents each while USAdisplay.net charges $3.95 Each + 15% Petroleum Surcharge for the identical product. How do I know? Because the product I received from USADisplay.net had the Jule-Art logo.
- After receiving the purchase, Michael Pratt confirmed that they do not manufacture the glass dome on site (contrary to what I was led to believe on earlier calls). I suspect that this product also came from Jule-Art.com and cost around $33. I did confirm verbally with Jule-Art.com that they do supply USADisplay.net.
- The 4 Brass Metal Coin Holders cost $12.92 Each. I found a site Coinsandpins.com, which sells very similar products from $1.74 to $2.25 each. I also found a site, Promotionalproductsinc.com, which sells what I believe is the same product for $2 Each.
- Read the Order Policy and Fine Print: All shipping costs are automatically corrected for incorrect entry amounts. For example if you place an order for an item under $30, you will pay $12.75 S/H PLUS $15 Surcharge PLUS 5% Processing Fee.
- WhenI spoke to USADisplay.net they indicated that they normally charge a 5% surcharge for orders under $300 because they normally dont deal with such small volume (which he did waive in my case). I DO NOT KNOW OF ANOTHER COMPANY THAT CHARGES A 5% surcharge for orders under $300.
- WhileI cant speak to the other products they sell, in my case I believe the only manufacturing done for the items I purchased was attaching a sticker to the wooden base and screwing on a Lazy Susan to make it a rotating base.
- In total I paid $274 including shipping. It is my belief that I could buy the glass dome w/ wooden base and acrylic coin stands from Jule-Art.com for around $37 + S/H. In addition I found similar metal coin stands for approx $2 each which comes up to $8 + S/H. Finally I have to add in the riser and Lazy Susan. I will guess $20 + S/H. On the high side I estimate that I could buy the similar setup for$90 total vs the $274 which USADisplay charges.
- RETURN POLICY: All returns must be received by USADisplay.net within 10 days from the date you received merchandise BUT you have to have an RMA before you send the item back to them. In my case I received the product on a Friday and didnt receive the RMA until the following Wednesday which only left me 5 days to have the product delivered to them.
- RESTOCKING FEE: USADisplay.net charges a 30%restocking fee less packing, processing and postage charge. Using their formula for my $274 order, they would keep $101 and return only $173. This wasnt even a custom made product.
- CONCLUSION: I believe that this company dominates the web search engine sites which direct you to them. If you search for anything related to displays, my experience is that they are the first result to show on Google. This marketing placement allows them to dominate the search results to the detriment of consumers like myself. I suspect that the company primarily assembles and packages items and markets itself as a huge manufacturer to consumers like myself when in fact it is a little 3 person operation running primarily out of a house. It is my impression that their policies are designed to take advantage of the consumer, and I in fact feel taken advantage of. If you spend some time and search the internet, I believe you can save about 75% for a very similar setup. I cannot recommend this company.