Private Eye
 

One of the little tools I take with me when I go shopping for sales is a magnifying glass. I keep it in my little test bag for sewing. Doesn't have to be very big. Mine is only about 2" across. I use this when I shop for any metal products i.e. needles, blades. Here in the gulf coast we have a lot of humidity. I was in one of the big box stores and brought a needle case with needles to the attention of one of the clerks. It had a couple rusty needles in it and it hadn't been opened. I looked further and a few of the other packages had rusty needles also and were from the same company. She put the needles back on the shelf and said that was why they were on sale. Now I don't know about you but I'm pretty sure there is not a seamstress/quilter out there who will buy rusty needles because they are on sale. These needles were for machines. I brought it to the attention of the manager at that time who said they were probably swapped out. I sent an email to the company and the next week there was an new manager and completely new staff. The store looked totally different and I saw no rusty items. But magnifying glasses are good to have along with a test cloth (I prefer denim).

Wow, if they reacted like that at the corporate level my guess is you were the last in a list of complaints. The responses of the employee and manager were very revealing. Hope the store is experiencing renewed confidence from its customers with the changes. Had never thought of checking products that way-I'm on the Fl side of the gulf and have the same humidity issues. Thanks for the heads up.

My goodness! I had never thought of that. I guess I have been lucky so far. Thanks for the tip. Jim gave me a little magnifying glass just a couple of months ago. Up until now, I had been using it to see the dates on old pennies.

Great idea. My eyes are so bad right now I think I will stick one in my bag. Thanks for the tip.

Not a problem here in Arizona.

Not a problem in CA but an interesting tip. THANKS !

I have not seen any rusty needles or pins.

You'd think not, but I actually just bought some rusty needles at my local Joann's. It was those "as seen on TV" easy-to-thread needles where the thread hooks in from the side. Marked down to $2 on the clearance rack so I thought I'd give them a try. Don't bother. They're really THICK needles, and every single one of them had at least a little rust on them. For $2 I'm not going to bother to return them. If I'd had tessagin along she'd have spotted that for me! LOL

I think this is a great tip, as it hadn't crossed my mind that the needles could have rusted. I still have a couple of old paper needle cases - one of which had a price of 10 cents, so you know how old they were, but the needles had not rusted. However, if the pins/needles have been in a humid environment, it's likely they could rust. Even if I only have one needle in that paper needle case, I'm keeping it for sentimental reasons, if nothing else, as when I see it, it brings back memories of my Mom teaching me to embroider and sew when I was about 6 or 8 years old, as those are special memories.

Wow..interesting for sure