Peterson Price Increase

Peterson has ratcheted up prices in the last few years. No doubt they will test the upper limits. I think they'd better get the quality more in the impeccable category before they start pricing like Dunhill. I have six or eight Petes, all nicely crafted, but I haven't bought one in several years. They've alienated some of the experienced pipe experts, like foggymountain, who used to sell Petersons in a pipe shop, and owned a number, and in recent years won't buy them at all.

I have never owned a Peterson but after reading many complaints here and other places I don't see why anyone would take a chance.

I don't see why anyone would take a chance.

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Many of us have a dozen or more and love them, never a problem.

I agree with MSO. Peterson is close to the outside edge of their market and that's a hefty hike in pricing. Their better grades are already in the $300 range and some higher. There is probably some room in the lower grades but it's unlikely the higher priced lines can command 50% more than they are already getting. I like my Petes but not at $600. I'd bet I'm not alone on that one.

Besides being probably the worst company in terms of quality control, now they want to jack prices. If they had any brains they would lower prices or keep them the same. It will be interesting to see if they price themselves out of business.

Not surprising news and we'll see how it settles out. Actually the euro is still very low to the $US so that's not part of the equation. I saw the plugs from James Fox take a huge increase the first of the year too.

Price increase isn't surprising now considering the big upswing the industry is experiencing. I just hope they don't trod too far from the quality affordable every man's brand that they've been for the last 151yrs.

It was a few years ago when I went to my local b/m to buy a Peterson. He is an authorized dealer and had quite a few in stock. I went through pipe after pipe and kept seeing defect after defect. Stems were not flush to the shanks, drilling was way off either too high or to the side. Very few had a pipe cleaner go through easily. I was pretty pissed as I did want to buy one. I did find some that looked ok, but was so pissed at the number of bad pipes, that I didn't want to give Peterson my business.
I asked the owner why these defective pipes were still in his rack and why he didn't send them back to Peterson his answer was if he sent every Pete with a defect back to the factory, he would probably be cut off from being a dealer. I asked how he could in good conscience sell these defective pipes and he said most of his buyers had no clue as to what they were looking at. I held my tongue as I was incredulous with his answer and I wanted to tell him how wrong he was. I left without buying a pipe and vowed to never buy a pipe from him no matter how much I might like one.
If this is what every Pete dealer( I assume it is the same for all) has to go through to keep the line in stock, then I feel badly for all of them. If anyone has a good relationship with their b/m, and could ask these questions, I would love to hear their responses. Now I am still looking for a Pete, but only a pre republic.

I have 2 Pete's and I like them both..., but I do not like the dip staining that they do to their pipes. The 2014 Father's Day XL02 that I bought at my local B&M had some of the stain bleed off of it and onto my hand while I was smoking it. Fortunately this only happened 1 time... so far. I did buy 1 more Pete (Dracula XL02) later on that has been a very good smoker, but if the prices are going up on Pete's, then my money would probably be better spent on a Savinelli of the same or better quality.

I have 2 Pete's and I like them both..., but I do not like the dip staining that they do to their pipes. The 2014 Father's Day XL02 that I bought at my local B&M had some of the stain bleed off of it and onto my hand while I was smoking it.

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I don't think that has anything to do with Peterson's staining. I had a Brindisi do the same thing to me and it was because I got the pipe too hot. Plus, Peterson stated publicly in... I believe it was around 2012 that they were phasing out the dip staining technique.

I have 10 petes out of 30 pipes. I buy them because it's a pretty pipe at a fair price. I settle for the off drilling and mortise being a third short from the end of the tenon cause it's ... again. .. sharp AND afordable. Take affordable away and I will buy sharp and well built from the other guy at the same new peterson price.

Vaughn dropping prices. Chacom dropping prices, Savenelly dropping prices, big Ben dropping prices.
Peterson reportedly raising them. :crazy:

Peterson has some quality control issues. They don't make their own stummels so they don't control that process and they don't have a "seconds" brand to dump to. To make matters worse I venture to say the vast majority of their sales are in the low end market ($100-135, actual retail) and that doesn't support burning a lot of bowls that shouldn't make the cut. I guess I don't have a big issue with a cheap pipe not being of excellent quality. What I do take exception to is that philosophy creeping into their "High End" lines and that appears to be happening. Their reputation in the marketplace has suffered in recent years. It will be interesting to see if a substantial price increase causes people to decide "They just aren't worth that kind of money" and I think that's a real possibility.

This means estate Petersons will sell for higher now too.

lordofthepiperings, it's good news that they may have stopped the dip staining. You may also be right about the pipe getting hot, sometimes I tend to get a little carried away if I'm smoking while concentrating on something else. However, none of my other pipes ever did this and I tend to smoke them all about the same. Like I said it only happed that 1 time, but the pipe was overall a little lighter in color afterwards, which makes sense of course.

Although I'm sorry that some have had some rotten luck with Peterson, mine are all quite nice, and I'm sure the quality issues are mainly with the lower grade Petes. That being said, with Peterson's pricing, you can get a spectacular pipe in the 180 to 300 dollar range. That is much of the appeal to myself. If they raise the prices by that much, then that would greatly inhibit my ability to purchase many of their pipes. I really like the silver spigots, not the red spray or green spray spigots but the better quality pieces in the 200 to 300 dollar range. I am not often able to spend that kind of money, but plan on getting a few more when and as I can. 50% is a big increase, and I'm not certain I would want to spend that sort of increase on many of the pipes I really like by them.
That all being said, some of their lower cost pipes, such as the St. Patrick's Day or Christmas pipes etc. Might be worth spending 150 as opposed to 100 dollars on, IF they get the quality issues I hear about nipped in the bud. Again my lower cost Petes are fine. Maybe I've been lucky. But I'm not sure I'll take that gamble on those kind of pipes if I don't hear of less quality issues.

To the point. They are trying to get closer to artisan prices for factory work.
They will loose their market if they do.

Savinelli/Rossi priced them out of the high low-end market.