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Only $10 for all 2024 SX, MX, and SMX series (regularly $30).
Enter the market and sell them for $40!lol
Just curious. I switched from Alpinestars when I started hearing quality concerns online and found out they moved production from Italy to Croatia. I never had any issues with Astars boots but mine were made in Italy by hairy nutted Italians. I figured for the price of them they should be. My SG12’s have held up great, the memory foam in the ankle wore out before the soles.
The Shop
Croatia is just a "stones throw" from Italy, across the Adriatic Sea.
You're right, they don't hold up like they used to, but I'm not sure that has anything to do with them now being made by Croatian hands. More likely lesser quality materials in a bid to cut costs (as the move to Croatia probably was).
At any rate I switched to Gaerne and this thread got me thinking, I’ve never seen anyone post about having any issues with Gaerne boots or interactions with customer service. It seems their product is so good they don’t even need a customer service department. But maybe I missed something.
Have 50 hrs now, and the ankle support is just not there anymore so I just purchased another pair
this week.
Love the boots, but it is disappointing they can't stitch them together without issues anymore.
Would switch to SG12's but they just don't fit my foot and Sidi's flex too much.
I like a ski boot feel.
Here, if you have a premature issue, you're on your own it seems.
I know a guy who's the Gaerne distributor in my area. When we meet at the track, he's always shitting on my tech 10's and telling me I should buy some sg12's, as they are so much better...
Then early this year at Honda's HSR track, he comes up short and cases..snaps his ankle in his sg12's.. I was very tempted to say "shoulda been in tech 10's bud", but would've been inappropriate.
He's still not back on the bike, he's mid 50's and healing is slow.
The moral of that story is, there's no magic boot, and I choose protection over longevity.
In these cases you should always contact the dealer you bought the product from first. They should then contact the place they bought it from, usually the importer, who then can either give a new product straight away if it's a clear case or check with the company making the product whether it will be replaced or not.
So in this case you've done the right thing by going back to place you bought the product from, but they haven't done their job by sending you away.
Pit Row
BP
The "high-end" Alpinestars boots are put together (sewn and glued) here by Boxmark (the company is actually one of the largest leather manufacturers and processors for the automotive industry - they do a ton of stuff for Audi/VW/Porsche/BMW/Mercedes-AMG and others).
They started only as a leather supplier for Alpinestars back in the early days - but got involved in the final assembly of products since the early 2000's (they did the Tech 6 from day one, the Tech 8 have been made here since 2004/05 - same goes for the Tech 10, also a majority of road boots is produced/put together here).
There have been periods in the meantime where Alpinestars simultaneously produced some of those boots in-house (in Italy) - but the majority has been done by Boxmark.
The leather parts of the boots are actually the only parts that are truly "made in Croatia" by Boxmark, while the PU,plastic and other parts are being supplied by Alpinestars and various suppliers.
IMO production in East Europe, Romania, Croatia, Slovenia etc. is generally the same quality as Italy, which is to say excellent. Still, quality issues based on the design or the spec'ing can arise. Example, the T10 went through several iterations for the sole compound.
BP
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