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LCB
Metals & Glass Since 1993 |
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I
understand that people need commitment. Assurance of a personal commitment
generates both confidence and friendship, and that's good. We at LCB feel the
same way, so let me describe a few of the things we hold valuable in our
everyday dealings with the various suppliers, vendors, business partners and
others we work with, and so, find necessary to pass along to you. No hypocrisy
around here, believe me. We value those who value us, so we can all rest a
little easier. |
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LCB
Metals & Glass does not ever share information with other businesses or private
or professional third parties. We highly value our own privacy, which is why we are located at the end of a dead
end dirt road, at the top of a mountain. We see nothing but trees and animals from our
windows, and we like it that way, because trees and animals know how to keep things to
themselves. For these reasons, we support anyone elses desire
for complete privacy, be it the physical or the informational. Any personal
secrecies you choose to give us will always be kept isolated from everything else we do,
and will only be called upon by us for the purpose of processing your orders.
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We welcome your
Visa or MasterCard as payment for your purchase. You can communicate your number and
expiration date to us via any method you prefer with equal confidence. E-mail is the
easiest, but a phone call or fax is great too. If, when you call, my answering machine
responds, just leave the information on the tape. (Don't forget, wildlife
doesn't tell, and we promise not to.) If you are hesitant about sending
credit card information via e-mail, you can divide the number into two or three e-mails, and send them
separately. Spelling the numbers, (onetwothreefour), works well in defeating pattern
searches. Statistically, there is a much greater risk of credit card number theft in malls
and restaurants than through the internet. Malls pose a threat due to the large amount of
part-time employee turnover, especially during the summer and Christmas seasons.
Restaurants impose a unique but subtle requirement with credit card payment that allows
them to take your card away, out of your sight, and return it after the purchase is
complete. Now that's insecurity. This site does not utilize a shopping cart
system or a credit card processing third party company for two reasons: 1) Prices are
increased to pay for the additional overhead, which is huge, and 2) Processing your
information through another company only increases the chance of the "mall" or
"restaurant" style of theft. At LCB, we keep it simple, safe and honest.
If you have a card with CitiBank, you may wish to inquire about a newly
devised system for internet purchases that actually changes your number
after every purchase, making the one just used inactive. Better call them
to find out. |
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We stand behind
what we sell. We create it, we ship it, and have made our living by doing it since 1985.
If there is anything wrong with what you buy from us, we will do whatever you
think is best: replace it, repair it, or refund your money on it. The last
thing we need to do is disgruntle a customer, so we try to keep them
gruntled; they seem happier that way. Locally, our customers look forward to their next purchase,
and tell us about the compliments they get from friends and strangers alike when they wear
our jewelry. Some have even told us that people they never met have offered to buy the
earrings right off their ears. We will not jeopardize that reputation. Well make you
happy with what you buy or we will buy it back and wear it ourselves. |
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Colors of our glass jewelry
are too many to name or list. In fact, there really is no way to enumerate
them all, because each finished piece is an amalgam of the 2 or 3 colors
used to create that piece, and those colors change slightly from sheet of
glass to sheet of glass. No two sheets of cobalt or magenta are the
same, for example. To complicate it even more, two pieces of glass
cut from the same sheet, but from opposite ends of that sheet, will be
somewhat different in color and texture, enough so to prevent the right
and left halves of a pair of earrings from matching. This is good because
it makes every piece a one-of a kind creation, but it's bad if anyone ever
wants to replace the left earring with a newly made piece to match the
right when the left gets lost. The garment industry has the same problem
with bolts of cloth. No two bolts of the same color ever match exactly,
but it works out for them because nobody loses the left sleeve of a shirt and wants to
replace it with a new left sleeve. We do our best to mitigate the earring problem,
(we can't help you with your shirt), by
including rubber ear stoppers with every pair of earrings purchased. Just
remember, they only work when you wear them. While on the subject of color, you
really should read the About Dichroics page,
which contains some more technical information on how dichroic glass is made,
the color properties it possesses, (what puts the "di" in dichroic), and how the garment industry inadvertently adds even more color
possibilities to the line of pendants and earrings we make. My monitor may claim to know 16
million different colors, but I can't
think of 16 million different names for the color combinations that dichroic
glass can create. We therefore settle for a set of basic names you find in life,
with a few slight additions. We've got blue, but we've also got cobalt,
turquoise, aqua, and so on. You get the idea. (Sorry, no cerise or ecru.) So,
picking a color group, (cool, warm, Fall, Spring, clear, gem, etc.), instead of an individual one, is the best way
to find a finished piece that will please both your eye and the synergetic
needs of your wardrobe. The role
of metals in determining the colors of stained glass is also an
informative subject. Our finished products contain more metals and in more
variety than the obvious sterling silver and
14K gold filled used in the wirework, as it turns out.
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My scanner and I are
usually pretty good friends, but sometimes, the scanner has issues. One of
it's biggest has to do with the color lavender. With lavender glass, Mr.
Scanner sees something that is almost transparent with a bit of yellow
added, a combination not even close to the real thing. In order to make the color of the glass
look authentic and true, I have to tweak up the color and tint controls,
which also affects the other parts of the scan, and the color of the wire suffers.
Sometimes, the gold color of the wire looks lime green, or lemon yellow, like a
base metal left out in the rain. I assure you
that it's not so in reality. Our wire is exactly what we say it is.
Further, it's never left out in the rain. I have been known to sit out in
the rain on a lawn chair and watch the drops splatter on my glasses during
especially hot days, but I never do jewelry work there. I might have a
refreshing beverage, but no jewelry. You always get
fresh product and pure ingredients from LCB. Just remember,
photography has never done our jewelry justice, and Mr. Scanner is no
exception. |
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We use a code system to
assign numbers to our items. There is no big secret to it, so it would not hold up for long in military
applications, but it works for us and is helpful when referring to items, both in-house
and with accounts. The first digit of the 4 digit number indicates the metal
used, (1 = silver, 2 = gold, 0 = no metal at all). The second indicates
glass earrings,
(8), or glass pendant, (0),
a mostly Sterling metal design, (3), a Pure
Silver item (9), or an item that is no longer made, (7), and the last 2 numerals identify the
specific style. Pretty simple, really. As an example, an 1809 is a sterling
silver
wire earring in this style. There has come to be
one exception, that being our new Bronze line, which is designated by the
prefix (20). The gold webpage numbers
all begin with "1" for glass items though, so I can group all metal codes onto one page. The system limits us to 99
different styles of an
item, but hey, worse things could happen. So far, so good.
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