I realized I hadn’t posted the outcome of my inquiry of my umbrella’s “lifetime warranty”.

I posted previously that the poeple who make the umbrella obviously weren’t located anywhere with some pretty crazy wind. But as it turns out, the company is in NEW JERSEY! Not 20 minutes away. I called them up and told them what happened to my umbrella and the girl on the phone was very nice and said “Sure, we’ll send you a new umbrella. Just mail us that one, and enclose a check for $4.50 for return shipping.”

First off, I was floored they were in the area. They should have known better than call something “windproof”. But the thing that irked me was the “Yeah, we’ll give you another $15 umbrella if you spend $9 getting it back to us and paying for us to fullfill our own warranty”. I guess they don’t expect people to go through with the hassel.

But I have a better plan. Once I found out their location, I asked if I could just drive it by, and she said “Sure.”. So, I think I am just going to take a morning and drive down to their offices and pick up a new umbrella. Even if I do end up mailing it and paying their stupid shipping fee, I’m going to get my new umbrella, just on principle.

UPDATE 1/14/2009:

I’ve received a few comments about this and I wanted to provide the info I have now.

If your umbrella has the Futai name on it somewhere, Futai USA made your umbrella. They will honor the warranty replacing it with one of their Leighton umbrellas as they no longer manufacture the London Fog umbrellas. Their number is 1-800-858-2535.

If it is not made by Futai, then I’m not sure were you send it as I can’t find who makes the umbrellas now. Also, I no longer have my London Fog umbrella as I lost it when I left it on a train.