Eric Smidt, Harbor Freight Tools Founder <hft@em.harborfreight.com>
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Tue, Jul 7 at 8:05 AM View Online Harbor Freight Tools | 26541 Agoura Road | Calabasas, CA 91302 | 1-800-444-3353 | Unsubscribe
To the Harbor Freight Community:

I'm writing to apologize. I often reach out to tell you about Harbor Freight's commitment to quality and all the investments we've made to deliver quality tools at the lowest prices. Your trust matters deeply to me and I'm proud of how far we've come. So when we have a product recall, it hurts.

A few months ago, we recalled our Pittsburgh 3 ton and 6 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56371, 61196 and 61197) due to a manufacturer's defect. We asked customers to return them and receive a gift card that could be used to purchase replacement jack stands. I felt terrible about that recall because you should never have a concern about the safety of any of our products.

Today, I feel even worse. I'm disappointed and embarrassed because we've identified a welding defect in a small number of the Pittsburgh 3 ton steel jack stands (SKU 56373) that replaced the recalled jack stands. We're now adding these jack stands to our recall. Unfortunately, this defect wasn't discovered during the initial recall investigation. If you own these jack stands or any of the jack stands in our original recall, whether or not you have had an issue with them, please stop using them immediately and bring them back to your local Harbor Freight Store for a full cash refund or store credit (see details here).

We have investigated all of our other Pittsburgh 3 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56371, 56372 and 57308) as well as the Pittsburgh 6 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56368, 56369 and 56370) and Pittsburgh 12 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56374 and 56375) and did not find the defect. Although none of these other jack stands are being recalled, if you own any of them and have any concern whatsoever, please bring them back and we'll give you a full cash refund or store credit for those as well.

I want to apologize to all of our customers. While we've dramatically grown our team of engineers and inspectors, and intensified our tests and inspections, I assure you that the lessons learned from this will drive further improvement.

As the owner and founder of Harbor Freight, I want you to know that we stand behind every product we sell and that safety will always be our top priority.

Sincerely,

Eric Smidt
Owner and Founder
Harbor Freight Tools

 

That was encouraging to read. I've bought some HF stuff for basically occasional use.....like their engine hoist at $179 as compared to Snap-On at $1020. Suprised that the owner has a name like Eric Smidt.......I thought the owner would be Chinese.

 

We have investigated all of our other Pittsburgh 3 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56371, 56372 and 57308) as well as the Pittsburgh 6 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56368, 56369 and 56370) and Pittsburgh 12 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56374 and 56375) and did not find the defect. Although none of these other jack stands are being recalled, if you own any of them and have any concern whatsoever, please bring them back and we'll give you a full cash refund or store credit for those as well.

This I am glad to see - I foolishly bought about 4 of their 3 ton jack stands over the past 2 years but the serial nums weren't the ones being recalled even though they were from the same manufacturer. I will take them up on the offer, as I expect many others will...

 

One of the items I would not get from HF. When the consequence is death or severe injury I will pay more for a mainstream product. Its nice that Harbor Freight stands behind their products, but on a high risk safety product like a Jack Stand I would hope they get out in front of things and make sure the suppliers are building it right. This is not an item to cheap out on.

 

Well, I exchanged my recalled 3 ton set the other month for the replacements. Now it looks like I need to take those back.

 

I exchanged both of my pairs for less life threatening tools.

 

Never spent a dime at HF, never will.