FIVESTAR LEATHER G1 JACKET

[dinomartino1]

BUYER BEWARE:

1.5 inch separation dead centre in the mouton of my 5* G-1.
They took two pieces of mouton and sewed it together with pink thread then stuck it on the jacket. The pink stitching is quite literally coming apart and the mouton is quite literally splitting in two.

Shawn justified this problem by saying that: "the collar you are looking for is our old stock which we don't currently used and have fresh."
So, because the collar I asked for is old stock, it is justified that I should have such issues?

I've tried very hard to justify Five star. I'm fed up.
There's no excuse for your poor quality jackets.
I'm done with Five Star. Adios, Shawn.

Firstly I do not own any Fivestar jackets.
When you contacted Fivestar for the jacket to be have a new collar fitted at their expense or a refund you were refused?
You received the jacket in Nov? so this no longer applies.
"Money Back Guarantee
We provide 100% Money back Guarantee within 30 days of buying"

 

[MaydayWei]

Firstly I do not own any Fivestar jackets.
When you contacted Fivestar for the jacket to be have a new collar fitted at their expense or a refund you were refused?
You received the jacket in Nov? so this no longer applies.
"Money Back Guarantee
We provide 100% Money back Guarantee within 30 days of buying"

Long story short:
First jacket (received in November) replaced for the second jacket (February) due to a Leather issue.The collar issue is with the second jacket.
I contacted Shawn, and he attempted to justify the issue by saying that my color of collar (dark brown) is not stocked by them anymore; that, therefore, it somehow justifies making my collar out of 2 pieces instead of one.
He did not offer a refund or a new collar fitted at his expense, nor do I want to push him for it.
Just a bad situation for all involved. No winners here.

 

[dinomartino1]

Long story short:
First jacket (received in November) replaced for the second jacket (February) due to a Leather issue.The collar issue is with the second jacket.
I contacted Shawn, and he attempted to justify the issue by saying that my color of collar (dark brown) is not stocked by them anymore; that, therefore, it somehow justifies making my collar out of 2 pieces instead of one.
He did not offer a refund or a new collar fitted at his expense, nor do I want to push him for it.
Just a bad situation for all involved. No winners here.

Well that certainly clarifies things.

 

[Smithy]

I have been super impressed over the three years Shawn has been on here with the progress he has made with his jackets. They've come on in leaps and bounds.

Saying that, what you can see with MaydayWei's jacket just isn't justifiable, no matter which way you cut it. It's just not right. Thomas as we know has had a great run with what he's ordered from 5 Star but that doesn't make right what another member has received. Having a collar sewn together from obviously offcuts with neon pink thread would I imagine piss the hell out of anyone here. I'd be livid.

TBH I'm a bit shocked that Shawn gave the response to MaydayWei that he did. He's always been so very quick to try and rectify problems with his jackets.

Never nice to see a member feel like he's been stiffed or taken for a ride with what he's purchased.

 

[Shawn Ali]

BUYER BEWARE:

1.5 inch separation dead centre in the mouton of my 5* G-1.
They took two pieces of mouton and sewed it together with pink thread then stuck it on the jacket. The pink stitching is quite literally coming apart and the mouton is quite literally splitting in two.

Shawn justified this problem by saying that: "the collar you are looking for is our old stock which we don't currently used and have fresh."
So, because the collar I asked for is old stock, it is justified that I should have such issues?

I've tried very hard to justify Five star. I'm fed up.
There's no excuse for your poor quality jackets.
I'm done with Five Star. Adios, Shawn.

Dear Respected members and friends

Usually I do not reply the private conversation of any customer directly in public forums but as this is Specifically FiveStar Leathers dedicated thread so I would like to explain the matter with all of the contributors and friends

We received the Inquiry from Mr. Wei saying that

"Regarding the leather and materials.
I really like the specifications on the jacket you made for Mr.Cocker on the Vintage Leather Jacket forum. Please see pictures below." Dated 18- October 2020

Below was the image reference

Regarding the Mouton Fur My reply to his questions was below

"
From the pictures below I think he chose:
Fur Collar: Reddish brown (?)
Yes this is Dark Reddish Brown old stock fur collar. Now new stock has arrived you can see and choose from the attached picture."

I clearly Mentioned Mr Wei That this is our Old stock we are no more using, and send the image of Fresh Stock as below, and informed to choose from Fresh Mouton Fur Colors

After all of my clarifications and guidance of best materials I received the reply from Mr. Wei with the image reference as below


"Dear Shawn,

2 things: Mouton, and measurements.
Again, thank you for being so patient with me. It is greatly appreciated.

A. MOUTON COLLAR

Oh, I see. Thank you for showing me the new colours.
Nonetheless, I want the same Dark Brown mouton collar that Mr. Cedric (Cocker) used for his jacket."

So I was bound even after Informing Mr. Wei that we updated the quality and please choose from Fresh Available fur collar which don't have any joints Mr Wei Choose that old collar which we no longer use because they were sometimes have joints as he experienced in this jacket, but we have to fulfill our customer needs first, but everything was clearly explained, and we make 1 Jacket of Mr Wei after communicating Longer 30 emails, even already provided a replacement of the same jacket and after receiving this email of the jacket which we sold in October 2020 our reply was as below


"That was totally explained as those collars were made with 1 or sometimes more than 1 joints like you experienced so we stopped their usage and upgraded the quality, but due to your
requests and confirmations we use that collar in your jacket.

However now we are also developing that similar color in fresh Mouton Fur, which will arrive in our factory within 1 month, if you wish we will change that for you, or send you 1 jackets
Fur you can change this if you have anyone available there as well.

Only Shipping charges applies, Mouton replacement will be free."

In this email we totally offer Mr. Wei a Free Collar replacement either from us, or any nearest tailor totally free, and only asks to pay the shipping.

We are still stand on our best customer services and 100% customers satisfaction words with Pride, If you need solutions you can reply back my email and matter will be fixed as explained.

And on our Customers demand Our Updated Collar of the similar shade in Joint less form is in production, we received its sample skins and with 3 weeks we will have its regular supply as well.

Below are the images

Thanks to all for your Trust and Support.

You can expect the best Customer Services from us.

Best Regards

Shawn

 

[MaydayWei]

Dear Respected members and friends

Usually I do not reply the private conversation of any customer directly in public forums but as this is Specifically FiveStar Leathers dedicated thread so I would like to explain the matter with all of the contributors and friends

We received the Inquiry from Mr. Wei saying that

"Regarding the leather and materials.
I really like the specifications on the jacket you made for Mr.Cocker on the Vintage Leather Jacket forum. Please see pictures below." Dated 18- October 2020

Below was the image reference
View attachment 63224

Regarding the Mouton Fur My reply to his questions was below

"
From the pictures below I think he chose:
Fur Collar: Reddish brown (?)
Yes this is Dark Reddish Brown old stock fur collar. Now new stock has arrived you can see and choose from the attached picture."

I clearly Mentioned Mr Wei That this is our Old stock we are no more using, and send the image of Fresh Stock as below, and informed to choose from Fresh Mouton Fur Colors
View attachment 63225


After all of my clarifications and guidance of best materials I received the reply from Mr. Wei with the image reference as below


"Dear Shawn,

2 things: Mouton, and measurements.
Again, thank you for being so patient with me. It is greatly appreciated.

A. MOUTON COLLAR

Oh, I see. Thank you for showing me the new colours.
Nonetheless, I want the same Dark Brown mouton collar that Mr. Cedric (Cocker) used for his jacket."

View attachment 63226

So I was bound even after Informing Mr. Wei that we updated the quality and please choose from Fresh Available fur collar which don't have any joints Mr Wei Choose that old collar which we no longer use because they were sometimes have joints as he experienced in this jacket, but we have to fulfill our customer needs first, but everything was clearly explained, and we make 1 Jacket of Mr Wei after communicating Longer 30 emails, even already provided a replacement of the same jacket and after receiving this email of the jacket which we sold in October 2020 our reply was as below


"That was totally explained as those collars were made with 1 or sometimes more than 1 joints like you experienced so we stopped their usage and upgraded the quality, but due to your
requests and confirmations we use that collar in your jacket.

However now we are also developing that similar color in fresh Mouton Fur, which will arrive in our factory within 1 month, if you wish we will change that for you, or send you 1 jackets
Fur you can change this if you have anyone available there as well.

Only Shipping charges applies, Mouton replacement will be free."

In this email we totally offer Mr. Wei a Free Collar replacement either from us, or any nearest tailor totally free, and only asks to pay the shipping.

We are still stand on our best customer services and 100% customers satisfaction words with Pride, If you need solutions you can reply back my email and matter will be fixed as explained.

And on our Customers demand Our Updated Collar of the similar shade in Joint less form is in production, we received its sample skins and with 3 weeks we will have its regular supply as well.

Below are the images

View attachment 63227
View attachment 63228

Thanks to all for your Trust and Support.

You can expect the best Customer Services from us.

Best Regards

Shawn

@Shawn Ali
I will not argue with you.
I have seen member vs. manufacturer threads before and it never ends well.
But seeing as you are attempting to undermine my personal integrity (publicly, mind you), I must respond.

I was the first person on this forum to document and publicize 5 Star's quality issues.
This does not mean that 5 star jackets did not have quality issues before, it is just that nobody bothered to bring it up. When I brought it up, it appeared that many others also had the same issues.

However, whenever someone would bring up an issue you will 'explain' to them that this is normal, this is a 'special leather', this is an 'old mouton'. Excuses, excuses, excuses.
Armed with a plethora of excuses to justify jackets with a shocking and creative variety of quality issues.

I alone suffered from 4:
1) 'Faux-aging' leather
2) Collar being undone
3) Poor quality zipper
4) Collar splitting into 2

Every single time I brought up an issue, you attempted to 'explain it away' with an excuse.
No sir, there is no excuse for the quality control issues of your jackets.
Fess up and take responsibility for the fact that 5 Star jackets suffer from glaring and shocking quality issues.

No amount of replacement jackets or collars will pacify me.
You have chosen to assault and attack my personal integrity publicly, to wit, I take great offence.
I have openly and publicly brought up 5 Star's issues in good faith, as I would any other manufacturer who exhibited the same kind of glaring issues.

This forum is a free space, and I will continue to openly and fairly give my honest thoughts on any and all jackets, including 5 Star's.

PICTURES:

 

[Brylcreemer]

@Shawn Ali
I will not argue with you.
I have seen member vs. manufacturer threads before and it never ends well.
But seeing as you are attempting to undermine my personal integrity (publicly, mind you), I must respond.

I was the first person on this forum to document and publicize 5 Star's quality issues.
This does not mean that 5 star jackets did not have quality issues before, it is just that nobody bothered to bring it up. When I brought it up, it appeared that many others also had the same issues.

However, whenever someone would bring up and issue you will 'explain' to them that this is normal, this is a 'special leather', this is an 'old mouton'. Excuses, excuses, excuses.
Armed with a plethora of excuses to justify jackets with a shocking and creative variety of quality issues.

I alone suffered from 4:
1) 'Faux-aging' leather
2) Collar being undone
3) Poor quality zipper
4) Collar slitting into 2

Every single time I brought up an issue, you attempted to 'explain it away' with an excuse.
No sir, there is no excuse for the quality control issues of your jackets.
Fess up and take responsibility for the fact that 5 Star jackets suffer from glaring and shocking quality issues.

No amount of replacement jackets or collars will pacify me.
You have chosen to assault and attack my personal integrity publicly, to wit, I take great offence.
I have openly and public brought up 5 Star's issues in good faith, as I would any other manufacturer who exhibited the same kind of glaring issues.

This forum is a free space, and I will continue to openly and fairly give my honest thoughts on any and all jackets, including 5 Star's.

PICTURES:

View attachment 63240
View attachment 63241

Fair enough. All of the above, together, paints a very frustrating, poor image; ultimately, Sean can't really lay claim to making 'high quality' jackets if this is what he sends out. I don't think anyone can really argue with that.

I had the same issue as picture 1: Sean made my jacket with a defective leather, which peeled and revealed the same orange rust look as above. Sean didn't apologise or offer to refund me, but told me that this was a 'special' leather which distresses faster (which obviously I didn't ask for), and he offered 1/2 price off a new jacket.

This essentially left me $160 out of pocket for a jacket that I won't be able to wear (as it looks ridiculous and will look increasingly ridiculous with more and more orange rust). I decided to take him up on a 50% off remake, though, and the second jacket that he sent was much better. There's some shoddy stitching along the zipper, and one of the collar buttons was accidentally sewn from over the mouton rather than underneath it, which looks messy and means the button was dangling off and had to be resewn, but it's good value all things considered.

I feel like there are two camps with 5*: those who think it's infallible and that Sean is a super trustworthy guy, and those who think that it's a shoddy operation and that Sean is some kind of scammer. The truth probably somewhere in the middle... Sean's definitely underhanded (the whole origin of them making Militaria - re. AVI - feels unethical), but he's just a bit of a hustler, and ultimately offers a decent value service. I like it for what it is and wouldn't hesitate too much to order again, but it's definitely not a professional operation; that said, if you want a professional operation, go and pay x4 as much for an Eastman etc.

 

[leper-colony]

I guess you can choose to live in this moment or move on.

 

[Thomas Koehle]

@Thomas Koehle
I'll be honest, I'm not convinced that my assumption about how much you wear each individual jacket (of your 15) is unwarranted. I stand by that.
That said, and in light of the above, I offer my honest apologies.
I did not intend to stoke your fire.
Peace be with you.

Apologies accepted!

Apologies also from my side - i'm not interested to break into a dispute over a hobby rather than to enjoy it.

 

[MaydayWei]

Apologies accepted!

Apologies also from my side - i'm not interested to break into a dispute over a hobby rather than to enjoy it.

You're absolutely right, my friend.
Thank you for accepting my words.
Have a good day.

 

[Shawn Ali]

@Shawn Ali
I will not argue with you.
I have seen member vs. manufacturer threads before and it never ends well.
But seeing as you are attempting to undermine my personal integrity (publicly, mind you), I must respond.

I was the first person on this forum to document and publicize 5 Star's quality issues.
This does not mean that 5 star jackets did not have quality issues before, it is just that nobody bothered to bring it up. When I brought it up, it appeared that many others also had the same issues.

However, whenever someone would bring up an issue you will 'explain' to them that this is normal, this is a 'special leather', this is an 'old mouton'. Excuses, excuses, excuses.
Armed with a plethora of excuses to justify jackets with a shocking and creative variety of quality issues.

I alone suffered from 4:
1) 'Faux-aging' leather
2) Collar being undone
3) Poor quality zipper
4) Collar splitting into 2

Every single time I brought up an issue, you attempted to 'explain it away' with an excuse.
No sir, there is no excuse for the quality control issues of your jackets.
Fess up and take responsibility for the fact that 5 Star jackets suffer from glaring and shocking quality issues.

No amount of replacement jackets or collars will pacify me.
You have chosen to assault and attack my personal integrity publicly, to wit, I take great offence.
I have openly and publicly brought up 5 Star's issues in good faith, as I would any other manufacturer who exhibited the same kind of glaring issues.

This forum is a free space, and I will continue to openly and fairly give my honest thoughts on any and all jackets, including 5 Star's.

PICTURES:

View attachment 63240
View attachment 63241

Dear Wei

Thanks for your detailed concerns, Nothing personal Sir, that was our moral responsibility to explain all the matter and we are more keen to overcome the problems and always accepted the manufacturing quality improvement suggestions and always try to overcome these, that's how we are regularly improving our quality standards.

So I really apologies if we are not meeting your quality standards and we will try our best to improve them in the future.

If you need a new mouton Fur we will send you, if you want to replace that from us we can also do so, only shipping charges will apply replacement will be free.

Best Regards

Shawn

 

[Smithy]

Well done Shawn, very well done!

 

[Cogerrunt]

Paul Newman G1. Any idea who manufactured this jacket?

 

[ausreenactor]

Dear Wei

Thanks for your detailed concerns, Nothing personal Sir, that was our moral responsibility to explain all the matter and we are more keen to overcome the problems and always accepted the manufacturing quality improvement suggestions and always try to overcome these, that's how we are regularly improving our quality standards.

So I really apologies if we are not meeting your quality standards and we will try our best to improve them in the future.

If you need a new mouton Fur we will send you, if you want to replace that from us we can also do so, only shipping charges will apply replacement will be free.

Best Regards

Shawn

Can't ask for more than that!

 

[Grant]

Can't ask for more than that!

Umm... for starters, try making a better quality jacket.

 

[WingAndaPrayer]

I’m surprised at all the quality defects people are having with there FiveStar jackets. I have 6 (with a 7th in the works)and the only problems I’ve had was size issues that was promptly rectified. Never an issue of shoddy stitching,leather quality or anything like that. It’s unfortunate so many of you guys had issues, I feel lucky that all my jackets have been solid.

 

[ausreenactor]

Umm... for starters, try making a better quality jacket.

True...

But then the price goes up...

Quality control looks to be the issue... Shawn is R&D now I think.....marketing and obviously Damage Control now too.

 

[Thomas Koehle]

I’m surprised at all the quality defects people are having with there FiveStar jackets. I have 6 (with a 7th in the works)and the only problems I’ve had was size issues that was promptly rectified. Never an issue of shoddy stitching,leather quality or anything like that. It’s unfortunate so many of you guys had issues, I feel lucky that all my jackets have been solid.

Seems we got a similar “problem”:

i own a bunch of 5Star jackets but didn’t find a flaw so far …

Again: there is still that gap between a Eastman or Aero (I personally like AERO more) and a 5Star but you find also a huge gap in pricing. I think I’m pretty picky with my expectations - worked in quality in automotive since more than 20 years for a luxury brand and we have standards for our leather products aso but didn’t find any job-stoppers with 5Star yet.

My first 2 jackets where a catastrophe size wise but that was simply coz I thought I’m smarter than @Shawn and didn’t listen to his advice.

They where much too small so I sold them coz it wasn’t imho the manufacturer’s fail but my own …

 

[WingAndaPrayer]

Seems we got a similar “problem”:

i own a bunch of 5Star jackets but didn’t find a flaw so far …

Again: there is still that gap between a Eastman or Aero (I personally like AERO more) and a 5Star but you find also a huge gap in pricing. I think I’m pretty picky with my expectations - worked in quality in automotive since more than 20 years for a luxury brand and we have standards for our leather products aso but didn’t find any job-stoppers with 5Star yet.

My first 2 jackets where a catastrophe size wise but that was simply coz I thought I’m smarter than @Shawn and didn’t listen to his advice.

They where much too small so I sold them coz it wasn’t imho the manufacturer’s fail but my own …

I had the similar experience. My first B-10, ANJ3 and Dubow A2 measurements were off but the second ones were all spot on. And I didn’t pay a penny for the second B10 and was offered the other ones at less then half price. Considering the measurements were off because I did them wrong, I thought that was a good deal. For example, When my custom jacket from US authentic was off I was told I can have a re do at full price.
The only top tier A2 I owned was an aero and I was not happy with its quality at all. But I also bought it during the “bad times”.
Personally FiveStar is the right amount of accuracy vs price that I’m willing to pay. They use original jackets as a pattern, just like the top tier guys, they use the proper snaps, labels, liners etc. it seems from what I’ve read here is that they just need better leather and more attention to quality control. As far as leather quality goes I think what they use is in line with original jackets when we consider the quality of those were all over the map too. How many original jackets have we seen with the same issues of wonky stitching, buttons/snaps a little off etc.? Personally I think FiveStar is closer to an original then the top tier makers. That’s my opinion anyway.

 

[PilatusPilot]

Does anyone know if there's going to be any new contracts that Shawn will do for the g1 jacket? Other than the 422 and the 55j14 repros? There has been a lot of love given to the a2, but I've been wondering if the same will go for the g1.