I'm not naming this individual (56 trades @ 100%) yet but I've got a bad feeling. Traded my '14 Framboos for 1 VR, 1 Huna and 3 growlers of his local IPA's. Got the box today with the VR, Huna, 1 full growler, 1 empty growler and the 3rd one missing completely. Sent him a note(he's been on the ISO thread for over an hour) and have not heard yet. I've got about 24 hours before I can have my Framboos returned to me via UPS....
Is it possible the one leaked and the shipping company repacked it without the missing growler? Check the tracking information and see if there was an exception along the way.
I received a box once that the growler leaked and was thrown away... Box still arrived repacked and there was no shipping exception. It seems like an awful lot of work to ship all that beer and include the 2x "rare" bottles and purposefully leave out the growler. Are the bottles sticky? Does it smell like stale warm beer? My hunch is, if he was going to rip you off, he simply wouldn't have shipped anything.
This seems like the most likely explanation, especially since one of the growlers was empty. I had a similar situation with bottles, key bottle in trade was "missing", turns out it must have leaked. Fedex removed bottle, repacked in new box and still delivered it. When I looked at the tracking history after the fact there was an exception.
He said he has no idea and immediately offered to replace the 2 growlers...I told him I put a delivery hold on the 'Boos until this was resolved and hoped he understood.
Two of them leaked, one was thrown out by shipping company and the rest were sent on their way. No one is going to ship a box with an empty growler, even more unlikely since guy has great trading history.
If someone is going to screw you, they're not going through all that efforts to screw you out of 2 local IPA growlers, especially with 56 trades logged at 100% positive feedback. The core trade seems to be the big bottles, which you already got. Up to you, but seems a little harsh to hold the shipment for 2 IPA growlers that will be replaced.
Maybe they didnt realize it was empty. Fedex are not beer geeks like us. And if if they did realize it was empty, why would they assume it shouldn't be that way. Maybe missing growler was broke and they discarded it.
Similar thinking though... why would someone bother to tape an empty growler...period?? If someone was going to rip you off by sending an empty growler...why bother to tape it?
