With the old returns policy, people were buying boots, wearing them out on the Appalachian Trail, and then returning them. Or buying a whole touring bike (REI sold their own fairly respectable model called the Novara), riding coast-to-coast, and then returning it. Once the internet era arrived and customers learned just what behavior they could get away with, the community was saying it was only a matter of time before REI would tighten their returns policy.
I’m a long time REI customer/member, maybe 20 years, and I was pretty happy about the move to a shorter return period. I always considered it my responsibility as a good citizen to be as honest and forthright as possible in return transactions. If something didn’t work out I didn’t feel bad returning it within reason, but if I had used it too long (like 2-3 years or put serious wear on it) I would not return it out of principle. I didn’t want to take advantage of such a good policy, and I knew they’d have my back if I ever did have a long term return.
But then I had a person who worked there in my friend group at one point and they told me the same stories you did. Just people absolutely abusing the heck out of it, taking maximum advantage for personal gain. Doing things like buying kids shoes then returning them when the kid outgrew them.
This behavior is highly unethical in my opinion, even though it was technically legal and within policy. So I was happy when they made the change to 1 year returns. I had rarely, rarely had long term returns like that and took them very seriously. In one case, for example, I had a tent for the summer that I never got around to using. Used it about 1.5 years later for the first time and quickly realized it didn’t work for my needs so reluctantly returned it after one use.
According to an article around the time of the policy change, people were even buying cliff bars and returning the wrappers for a refund, saying "I wasn't satisfied." It wasn't just young or broke people either, the CEO said they were looking at demographics and it was all over the place, just an all around increase in abusive returns. As usual, the internet and social media is a likely culprit.
I don’t know how frequently those things happened.
But I had the zipper break on my duffel bag after about 5 years and they told me they wouldn’t help. This wasn’t a crazy drop or mishandled, it was just some defect that caused the zipper to pop off one side when it shouldn’t.
I’m never buying anything from their line again. Had I gotten a Patagonia duffel, they would fix a zipper decades later.
I blew out a shoulder strap in a Patagonia bag because I loaded it down with _way_ too much gear. A store of theirs sent it in to repair, and the repair person told me to pick a size of the new model because they couldn't repair the damage I caused. All shipping was covered by Patagonia.
Patagonia is drastically more expensive than REI gear, but included in the higher quality is a better return/repair policy and ethical manufacturing standards. REI is competing on price, not those standards.
