Fire Mountain Gems

I've been a shopper with Firemountain for 6 years now and I have noticed a few issues with my past 2-3 orders that take the rating of this reasonably good company down.

My chief problems are:
1. What you see pictured does not match what you ordered - significant differences between photos and what I have received. This has happened on 4 separate occasions.

2. Customer support. I have contacted customer support regarding items I have previously ordered that they no longer stock and when I asked where I could source the items now (since the manufacturer does continue to make them), I have received no response at all.

3. Items I order that are listed as in stock are shipped after the initial shipment and have taken as long as 3 weeks to reach me. This has happened at least 3-4 times in the past year.

I love the selection, but I feel the customer service and quality is lacking. While I may order from them again, I am currently looking into more reliable suppliers to replace this company.

This is a great company some reviews say they don't like having to buy 100 of the same items to get the big discounts YOU DON'T HAVE TOO BUY 100 ITEMS Of THE SAME THING it can be 100 different items you don't have to buy even 2 of the same thing it's 100 of any items and their customer service is great very helpful and yes sometimes there might be a boo boo in your order but just let them know and they are glad to help you and fix the problem I'm so glad I found them they have always been exceptional in customer service when ever there has been a boo boo ok try them you will love them too

FMG has some awesome prices, I will definitely give them that. I made my first order and before I received it I ended up making another order (I'm impulsive, what can I say?). I was disappointed in some of my first order. Some of the beads are very poorly made. Some of the fake pearls I got were discolored so I had to toss them. They also had like extra plastic(or whatever it's made out of?) balled on the sides of them like the molds (or whatever the manufacturer uses to make them) were dirty or something. The crystal beads I bought were good. I bought some very cheap "fashion beads" that I knew weren't going to be awesome that are usable for practice. They were mostly made in China which isn't a huge deal to me but they were definitely not quality products. All of the cabochons were nice and very usable thankfully because that is what my second order was mostly comprised of. All in all, they are great for cheap beads so I may order in the future but I will be more selective for sure.

They sent me a catalog with prices and apparently all the prices were a lie. I tried to order beads and things and suddenly the prices were 50% higher. Excuse me? They said the catalog was for reference only and the prices were all wrong. How is that ok?

You have to buy 50 items to get halfway decent prices on things. Find things that cost fifty cents or less to make up the quantity if you have to. It is usually cheaper to get tons of junk you don't want to get the quantity up and the prices down.

But don't do business with them. No one should be allowed to trick people and be mean to them. It is just plain mean to get small home jewelers to rely on prices, tell others the prices of your jewelry based on those prices and then have to go back and tell everyone that you lied to them about the prices you quoted because the supplier lied to you. Or you can be a standup person, and stick with the prices you quoted and then have to absorb all that loss yourself. That is wrong! And a company that puts its customers in that position, ON PUPOSE, KNOWINGLY, is a company that we should all boycott.

Shame on them. Shame.

I would have added a star if they were willing to carry a color bead that I need. I asked and they said they can not get that for me. I do not know why... I got the color from another bead supplier, so FMG should be able to get it. I would gave ordered thousands of the beads each year. So the only beads I purchased from FMG were 8mm white glass pearls.

So I placed my first order of 8mm white glass pearls and received it within 7 days. The quality was not as good as I had hoped. I threw away about 4-6 beads per strand of about 57 beads... but I did not complain because the strand was only suppose to have 50 beads. So the defective beads did not effect my overall total. Some of the beads had scratches, poor color coating and incorrect sizes... some beads were only 6mm instead of 8mm. Not happy to see that they were from China and had a heavy chemical smell. The price is about the same price as from my local craft store. But I can purchase large quantities from FMG. Much easier than searching every craft store in my area.

This company which suddenly turned into a criminal enterprise has RETROACTIVELY modified its return policy as of Dec 2016. That means anyone who made purchases more than 90 days prior to the change has lost their right to return - or that's what the company wants you to believe. I contacted my attorney about it who suggested I first make a complaint via the State of Oregon. All states have consumer protection statutes that prohibit deceptive business practices. What this company has done is downright disgusting and totally dishonest. When we made purchases via their site, we relied on their return policy. WE ENTERED INTO A CONTRACT WITH THE COMPANY based on that return policy. The company CANNOT unilaterally modify that policy. Everyone MUST contact the Oregon Dept of Justice, Consumer Protection. File an online complaint with all the necessary details and it will be investigated as a deceitful, deceptive practice and should allow folks to make the returns. My attorney also said this could amount to a rather huge class action case. DO NOT let them get away with it. When too many people start complaining, the Oregon Attorney General might step in and take care of these criminals. I am old and have seen a lot of despicable behavior by businesses, but to revise a return policy retroactively after countless people made purchases BASED ON their liberal return policy is just off the charts unacceptable. I have a copy of the original return policy if you want to include it with your complaint. Write to me at czkenney at gmail if you want a copy. This is a disposable address & will be closed at some point.

I have been buying from Fire Mountain Gems for over 25 yrs. As of today, I will no longer support them. They had a wonderful return and exchange policy. Until now. "3" weeks ago I called them and requested copies of my invoices from 2016 in order to make a return. I recieved the invoices last week. I packed the return, according to how Fire Mountain requests it to be done. I mailed it priority mail. Today I get a message from returns that they were going to mail my package back to me because apparently their return policy changed "3" weeks ago. I was not informed of any new policies regarding my return when I requested the invoices from 2016, "3" weeks ago. So, I believe I was not informed "3" weeks ago about the policy being changed, because it had not actually been changed yet. So when I called to discuss my dissapointment and anger with Fire Mountain Gems supervisor, I was told the owner made the change and there was absolutely nothing that could be done. But if I wanted to, I could send a letter to the owner. But there was no number I could call to speak directly to the owner or leave a message. Although after speaking with another person, she offered to write down my complaint and pass it on to the owner's assistant. Not certain that will happen or that it will make a bit of difference. So, now I am stuck with a lot of expensive Swarovski beads that I can not use and my personal jewelry business will suffer as a direct result. Apparently 25+ yrs of my loyal support and many thousands of dollars spent over those yrs, account for nothing. So if a letter is what they want, I will write several in the form of online business reviews. I do not recommend this company, they were not honest with me, they cost me money and left me with a problem resulting in a direct loss of money for my jewelry business. They are expensive, and Swarovski beads can be purchased much cheaper online through other companies. The only reason I bought from them, was because I have been a loyal customer for so long. Not any more. I stopped buying strands of gem stones, pearls and sterling silver years ago because of the poor quality and over pricing.

I have been purchasing from Fire Mountain for several years now there's one particular style of chain that is my go-to chain the last four rolls of chain that I've purchased from them which is supposed to be sterling silver is completely yellow and you cannot get it clean even with the sterling silver paste and a toothbrush I am in the process to see if they are going to correct this I have no idea how many pieces are out there that have this defective chain I have to replace all my existing merchandise with new chain that I know that is the quality that I put out and I am disabled and I make this jewelry to raise money for my medical treatment for my extremely rare disease I am livid! They will be hearing from me tomorrow morning again if they do not refund my money I will dispute the charges I will report them to the BBB I will do whatever I can to make sure that they take advantage of no one else in this way so not only has it cost me potentially thousands of dollars I can also get it bad reputation for putting out stuff that is not the quality that I say it is I am devastated