JB Case Blog » 2009

Fit and Finish

Posted in The Journey on December 24th, 2009 by John Barton

Fit and Finish. – 12-16-2009, 06:31 AM

I want to know is what level of quality you find acceptable?

Do you care about the following things? I do and I see that a lot of my competitors don’t and I want to know if I am just being way to meticulous about this.

Maybe it’s pure insecurity on my part. But when I see someone praising a case maker as the greatest cue case maker on Earth then I am compelled to go out and get one of their cases to see what they are doing so I can learn from it.

Today I received one of these cases and to say that I am disappointed is an understatement.

No, I will not name who the maker is. But I guarantee that if I ever let a case out of the shop that is made like this then I would be roundly spanked by the AZ community.

So, the following things mean something to me when I make a cue case. Are these things that you feel should be there or am I really just to anal about this?

1. Finish Protection – the damn case should not use fabric that is hard to the touch with ridges and bumps that you can feel. If you wouldn’t deliberately polish your cue with it then it doesn’t belong in a cue case.

2. Impact/Crushing Protection – If the case looks like a tube case then it should act like one. Not be a soft case in disguise. I am speaking specifically of using poster tubes made of thin plastic. If you LOOK at the case it seems solid but in fact these thin tubes can be crushed easily with little effort. Case Makers how about some FULL DISCLOSURE to your customers. Explain to them that if they want LIGHT WEIGHT then it comes with very little protection against impact and crushing. I am so tired of seeing cases that LOOK as if they are very protective in this area and in fact they are about as weak as a soft case.

3. Ease of Use – Why is it acceptable to have cases where you have to tip the case to get the cues out? This is ridiculous in my opinion. Just today on this case I received I was shocked to see that the person who sent it to me had left a shaft inside. It looks like a Prewitt shaft with very nice ivory ringwork on it. I had to tip the case to get the shaft out. I put the shaft back in it and was talking to my father about the lack of quality on this case and I inadvertently tipped the case and the shaft shot out and hit the tile floor. Luckily it didn’t chip the collar on the shaft.

4. Interior/Exterior Fit – When the leather fits the interior loosely it just feels like crap to me. Not to mention that it’s makes all the stress points weaker, like the handles and strap holders and lid and clasp fittings. Do you as a consumer expect to have a loose fitting case when you buy a tube case? This case I got today feels like a cheap leather bag put over some tubes. Frankly if I had ordered it and received it new in this condition then I would have put it back in the box and sent it back in five minutes. So I ask you all is this something you even care about? Because many of you have publicly stated that this case maker’s cases are the “best you have ever owned”. So if that’s true then either you don’t have much experience with well made leather goods or you truly jsut don’t care about the fit as much as I do.

5. Weak Stress Points – When I owned Instroke I made a huge mistake when we went to mass production. I made the stress points too weak and paid for it dearly as I put out hundreds of cases where the handles broke, latches broke, etc… I eventually managed to figure out how to reinforce them to the point where I felt confident that they would be extremely durable. So it bothers the hell out of me when someone’s case is touted as “the best” when I know I can tear it up with little effort.

6. Workmanship – Do you care about the details or is it the overall “picture” that is more important? I ask because this case I got today has metal sticking out on the strap holders, tool marks from the sewing machine foot impressed into the leather, tape showing at the top of the tubes, stitching is loose and uneven, there are nail heads sticking out and the case is just overall sloppily made. Again this maker is touted by some folks on this board as the greatest case maker on Earth. And no I am not going to name names and yes I am inviting severe comparison to our work. If you all allow me to do work like this then I will cut my prices in half and put out three times as many cases. I honestly can’t do work like this.

So do you all care about the details or not?

At what price point does it matter?

I PROMISE YOU that if I were to make a case like the one I am holding in my hands right now and tried to charge what this maker does then I would be strung up, tarred and feathered by this community.

So why do you then accept this level of case from others?

I sure as hell expected a lot more than this piece of crap I am holding in my hands. If this is the level of quality that so many of you feel is “the best” then I am certainly in the wrong business.

So let’s hear it.

How many of you are willing to just discuss pure QUALITY and not flame me for speaking my mind on the subject? How many of you can get over your cult of personality and look at your cue case as an object to be truly examined as to it’s factual fit and finish and not based on the “reputation” of the maker? How many of you can do that and admit to yourselves that you should have gotten a better product for the money you spent?

I am an asshole about this subject. Truly I am. But I am really freaking tired of seeing pieces of crap cases put out there and touted as the best there is by people who either don’t know any better or who do know better and choose to perpetuate the myth so that they don’t feel bad for getting a piece of crap when they thought they were going to get something good.

Have I delivered cases which fell short of my lofty ideals on the subject. You bet I have. I have replaced several cases for people on this forum, I have repaired several more where things were either done wrong or some part failed. I have put out a few cases which I felt could have been done better. I have also made cases and not sent them out electing to remake them because they didn’t turn out good enough. We had a black and white one that I made three times.

I am proud to say that I have never sent a case that is as bad as the one I am holding in my hands right now to any customer anywhere. I have never and will never knowingly send a case that is this crappy to anyone. I will get out of the business first because I just can’t make a case this bad.

So, let’s see if you can discuss QUALITY and what it means to you without the flaming. But if you want to flame me then go ahead. I guarantee you that I am not going to back down on this one.

So I challenge you all to tell me what makes a good case.

Inside and out. What do you care about?

You know what I care about and what I say I try to deliver.

It’s a sad world where people can charge so much and deliver so little and get away with it.

Are my standards too high?

Posted in The Journey on December 24th, 2009 by John Barton

Yesterday I saw a Justis West case in the “wild”. This post I am naming names because I have to for this all to make sense. I was out playing pool and my opponent had a Justis West case and I asked him if I could look at it. Justis West is the brand name of the cases that Jack Justis has licensed to a Chinese case making company to make duplicates of his cases. Jack traveled to China and gave them some instruction and the proclaimed that the cases were identical to his own. This statement has been backed up by several others in the USA who have compared original Justis cases with the Justis West made ones. So on the strength of that statement I have to believe that the case I saw was as Jack builds them.

I have seven people working for me building cases. We are lucky if we can put out 3-4 a week. Jack reportedly puts out around 4 per week by himself. Maybe he is just that much more efficient or maybe he cuts corners on important aspects to focus on the look more.

When my foreman looked at that Justis West case last night he said, “John, if you allow us to build a case like this we can put out 20 a week”.

The thing is that we do so much to our cases to make them solid in construction and fit and finish and it really hurts to see people going nuts over cases built like this Justis West and by extension the Justis cases. Jack builds some truly nice looking cases no doubt about that. He uses some of the most exotic skins and he collaborates with Ron Ross for the carving to come up with some stunning Ross-Justis cases. There is no question that Jack Justis deservedly sits on top of every collector’s list as one of the cases to own.

My rant today focuses on the construction and fit and finish of the case and brings up the question of whether my standards are too high? If the most knowledgeable people in pool will accept loose fitting lids, interiors that don’t match up, weak rivets and parts, and interior cavities that allow the cues to knock around and fall out then why should I bother to do more than that?

This particular Justis West had a cap that was being held together by wire ties because the rivets had popped out which held the strap secured to the body. And according to the owner of it the case was less than one month old. – And to further add insult to injury here he didn’t know where to get it fixed because he was lied to and told it was made by Jack in the USA. (in fact it’s made in a factory in China) The guy thought he would have to either send it to the USA or find someone here qualified to do it. In China there aren’t any luggage repair shops and shoe repair shops don’t do rivets.

I know I get on this rant a lot lately. But it just upsets me that a case can go on the market which is clearly not a really protective case and one which is really no better than a $50 case in construction and the price is more than $400. Not only that if one were to buy the same case from Jack, and Jack says that his own and the Justis West line are structurally the same, then it would run around $600 or more.

For $375 we build a case that my people work hard, really hard, to make it solid and durable and super protective. My customers are made to wait quite a while for their cases and I wonder if we aren’t doing too much?

The reason I named names here is because at one time Jack labeled me a design thief because I said in anger to a prospective customer that I would import some of the embroidered copies of Jack’s cases that have been on the market for years. Ironically these cases were then and are still being produced by the very same manufacturer who is currently making the Justis West cases. I know I should have just sent the customer to Jack’s dealer who has been importing and selling them in the USA for many years.

But I never did import them. Instead I told Jack that if I did ever want to copy his design then I would do a better job of it. Which we have done in a way with the J.Flowers series. While the J,Flowers series is not a direct copy of a Justis it is done in the same style because both Justis and the J.Flowers series are derived from the basic style that Jay Flowers created. Jack would like to say that we copied him all the way. In fact the only thing I took from him is to attach the lid on one side with a hinge. But we made it detachable with a snap and Jack makes his permanent with a rivet. Otherwise everything that is on a J.Flowers series case is something that is not taken from Jack but is instead my own interpretation of Jay Flowers’ design done with my own construction techniques.

See me previous post for the history concerning all this.

My only point here is that sometimes I feel as though I am doing too much, being too demanding, too pushy about the little details. We have a long backorder list and I could fill them easily if I built cases like Justis does.

I am sure that my standards are too high, but you won’t find me compromising them in order to pump out cases.

A few weeks ago I was at a show called the International Cue Collectors Show. Someone handed me a stunningly pretty Justis case with carving by Ron Ross. As I picked it up the case shifted in my hand because the exterior and the interior were loose. I mean the exterior was larger than the interior like a loose shirt, not a snug fit. This case was probably a $1500 case at least. To me it was as if I were looking a cue with sloppy inlays. Great looking case, very poor execution. My cases might not have the same clean look as a Justis but they can stand close inspection by anyone. Which is why we publish detailed close ups and not pretty artsy photos of our work.

Our customers do the artsy photos if they feel the case we send them deserves it.

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Cue Case Interior – Single Tube vs. Multiple Tubes – Discussion and History

Posted in The Journey on December 24th, 2009 by John Barton

Recently another case maker posted this on an internet forum in regards to the Single Tube interior that he makes.Â I am not naming the maker but I want to address his claims as pertains to the art of cue case making since they disparage many other case makers who are currently making cases and also contain false attributes about the Multiple Tube interior.

This is what he said.

“All cases listed are (other style interior). Sorry, I no longer offer the tube style cases.
We found out a long ago that the (other style[) interiors not only knock about 2 pounds of weight off the case but is a better design in that it holds the shape of the case in check. Not like the old tube cases where everything was held together with masking tape. As the case aged, the masking tape usually broke apart allowing the tubes to shift around and change the shape of the case. The first sign of this happening is crunched up leather near the bottom of the case. It would be like taking a step backwards going to the individual tube design.

Contrary to some, the (other style) interior even offers more than suffecient protection for your finest cues. Just ask any of the pro players using our cases. Ever notice how many casemakers have followed suit with lighter cases today"[/I]

I would like to address the points raised here simply to make sure that consumers are not confused as to the content.

First, when the case maker refers to the tube style then he is referring to the type of interior that is made using individual tubes and the “other style interior” refers to a single large tube with a fabric liner.Â For the purpose of this discussion we will call this one the Single Tube Interior and the orginal tube style the Multiple Tube Interior.

This case maker refuses to do the Multi Tube Interior because he contends that it is a “step backward” and inferior to the Single Tube design.

1. Weight. – perhaps this particular case maker was able to shave off two pounds but I have found that the weight difference between the Single Tube and the Multi Tube interiors to be neglible and a pound at best.

2. Construction – this case maker says that the case using the Single Tube holds the shape of the case better than the Multiple Tube interior because as he puts it, “Not like the old tube cases where everything was held together with masking tape. As the case aged, the masking tape usually broke apart allowing the tubes to shift around and change the shape of the case. The first sign of this happening is crunched up leather near the bottom of the case. It would be like taking a step backwards going to the individual tube design.”

This case maker is correct that the masking tape he used on the construction of his Multiple Tube interiors was wholly inadequate to the task of holding the tubes together.Â Additionally this case maker did not do anything to insure that the tubes could not move.

Instroke and Whitten and JB Cases also use the Multiple Tube interior and they do it in such a way that the unit cannot move EVER.Â And it the case retains it’s shape.Â These case makers have perfected the Multiple Tube interior where the other one never tried to do more than the Jay Flowers case he copied his interior from.Â Jay Flowers did it with masking tape and so this case maker followed suit without trying to improve on the construction in any way. What Whitten, Instroke and JB Cases do when doing the Multiple Tube interior is in NO WAY inferior to the Single Tube interior that this case maker currently uses and it is VASTLY superior to the Multiple Tube interior that the same case maker previously used.

3. Protection – This case maker says that the Single Tube interior he currently uses provides “sufficient protection”.Â I agree in the same sense that anything is better than nothing.Â It’s a hard shell and the cue parts are divided by thin fabric.Â However other case makers also offer Single Tube interiors and they care enough about the cue to provide more than just sufficient protection, they provide superior protection when they put extra layers of padding around and in between the cue parts.Â The fact is that the Multi Tube interior that he used to use did in fact provide better protection than the interior he currently uses despite his claims to the contrary.

4. History – this case maker has made repeated claims that seem to say he invented the light weight Single Tube – fabric divided interior.Â However the evidence is quite clear that Harvey Martin was doing this type of interior in the 50′s.Â Gina, Fellini, Centennial, Ann Gore, It’s George, Kelli, and Ron Thomas all used this interior before this case maker did, and a better one at that, since the 60/70′s through today.Â The exact interior that this case maker is using was introduced in the style of cases that he makes (not in his cases) in the late 90′s and was in wide use up until he adopted it in 2006.Â He did not invent it nor even improve it.Â I just want to clear this up so that the consumer is not fooled by such statements.

This case maker says that others have copied him who choose to use a Single Tube interior.Â This is complete nonsense as it’s been in use since the 40′s.Â This person does not even have his tubes made especially for him, the tubes are exactly the same as are used in the low end cases made by the factory that he buys the pre-made interiors from.

Now, there is nothing wrong with choosing the labor and cost saving method of purchasing pre-made interiors.Â But there is definitely something wrong with claiming to have invented them and claiming that such a solution is better than the Multiple Tube interiors that other case makers are currently using.

As a consumer you should be aware that there are many choices for cases out there.Â Please don’t be swayed by false claims of invention and protection.Â A professional pool player will use just about anything that they are given for free.Â I have been around this industry a long time and given away a lot of cases to professional players.Â Their use of any particular case is really worth nothing as an endorsement, and especially if it was given to them for free.Â Do your own homework and you will see which case makers are looking out for your cue first and how the case looks after that.

I will address this topic further in a video when I return to my shop as I feel it’s important to separate hype from reality and the best way to do that is to show it.Â For now this post serves to inform you, the customer, about what exactly the interiors are and the comparison between them.

Folks, I don’t care what case you buy.Â I hope though that the case maker cares enough about your cue to provide a padded interior no matter what type of interior it is and I hope that you care enough to do some research and demand that the case you purchase provides more than just a sufficient level of protection.Â You spent a lot on your cue, the cue maker spent a lot of time making it.Â It deserves more than the bare minimum of protection.

Choose wisely.

John Barton, Case Maker.