Shoe Fly

Don't look for me on the red carpet at any of those Grammys or Mammys or Tonys or whatever other awards shows you might see. You know the deal, quarter-celebrities stand around asking half-celebrities, "Who are you wearing?" as the Hollywood glitterati bound out of limos and head into the shindig.

First of all, they should ask "WHOM are you wearing," and second of all, the only two "fashion designers" I need are Mr. L.L. Bean and Mr. Eddie Bauer.

L.L. Bean has had a long history, selling Bean Boots for foul weather, jeans, barn jackets, and a million other items we need. They have always prided themselves on being an honest firm, selling top quality merchandise at fair prices. And they have always had an unlimited return policy, a lifetime guarantee.

Theoretically, this means that if you buy a barn jacket from Bean, and five years later a button falls off and the corduroy on the collar is pulling away from the canvas, they would fix it or give you another jacket.

Fair enough. But there is always some schmuck willing to take advantage of someone else's fairness, and the company has been forced to curtail that fairness.  They say they have updated their return policy to give customers one year to return purchases, with a receipt. 

"Increasingly, a small, but growing number of customers has been interpreting our guarantee well beyond its original intent. Some view it as a lifetime product replacement program, expecting refunds for heavily worn products used over many years. Others seek refunds for products that have been purchased through third parties, such as at yard sales," the company wrote in a letter to customers.

They did go on to say that if a product is defective, they will "work with customers to reach a fair solution."

Just like the people who think they are entitled to take home cutlery and the salt, pepper, sugar and syrup dispensers from the diner, Bean customers who think they are entitled to free lifetime supplies of shoes in return for buying one pair of shoes have managed to mess things up for everyone else.

"Our guarantee is not a liability, but rather a customer service asset — an unacknowledged agreement between us and the customer, that always puts the customer first and relies on the goodwill of our customers to honor the original intent of the guarantee," spokesperson Mac McKeever told Business Insider.

L.L. Bean was an outdoorsman from Maine who developed that prototype boot  - a hunting shoe with leather uppers and rubber bottoms - and built a nationwide business from that starting point. He invented the shoe in 1911, and some clown probably bought one of the first pairs and still wants them replaced every year because he wore them.