Review: Saddleback Leather Medium Bifold Wallet in Chestnut

A while ago I received my Saddleback Leather goods which I had ordered. I was pretty swamped by other obligations that I did not manage to review these items and I thought I would get them done piece by piece. I am going to start with the Medium Bifold Wallet. Having not seen SBL products in person, I couldn't decide on a color so I randomly went with the Chestnut. The wallet costs $50.00 excluding shipping (which could cost a bomb depending on where you live). I forgot to mention that you should check out if there's any cheaper shipping cost with SBL customer service. They're a great bunch of cheerful people.

The front of the wallet features a small Saddleback logo on the bottom right. I actually kinda like the minimal design of the wallet. The thread they use is pretty thick (they call it the "marine-grade" thread) and for the most part pretty well stitched. There were some parts where they thread was left unfinished and I had to trim and singe them down (so they do not fray) with a lighter. More on the stitch later.

The inside of the wallet came with a business card from SBL and the design is simple as well. Actually thinking about it, $50 for this wallet may be a little on the high side as only three parts were cow hide (and it came in a cheap transparent plastic bag?!). The wallet is lined with pigskin in the card holder and note compartment. As far as I know, pigskin is quite cheap and the leather is chrome-tanned (which is a chemical tan, as opposed to vegetable-tanned leather, which uses natural ingredients in the tanning process). Now, I do not know what leather they used, but Dave (founder of SBL) claims that he uses the "best leather in the world". That's a pretty huge claim. But I guess the bulk of the cost comes from the well-known "100 year warranty policy" they have (and Dave's profit too! ;)). I think that's pretty neat but who knows how long this company would exist. I'm hoping they'd still be around long after I'm gone though!

  

On the bottom right corner again, the logo of Blue, Dave's beloved dog, wearing a Sombrero. Many people has expressed that they would rather not have this logo engraved there, but I personally do not mind. As you can see from the picture above, there are some weird lines next to the stitches. My guess is that the leather creased during the stitching process.

The note compartment is made up of 2 pieces of Pigskin back to back. I was kind of hoping it would be cowhide on the inside as well but oh well, pigskin is more wear-resistant anyway.

 Check out the thickness of the wallet above! Note that the wallet is still empty. As you can see, the brown color parts are cowhide, while the grey color parts are all pigskin. The wallet gets pretty fat when you start inserting cards in. Even with one card in each slot it gets really thick and bulky.

Now, I paid full retail for this wallet but if you are going to buy one, I highly suggest you to wait till it appears on Dave's deal to get it at a discounted price. I say this because to my disappointment, mine came with blemishes, scratches and creases on the wallet. I still feel like mine should have been sold on Dave's deal instead of full retail value.

Above is the card slot where they put the business card in. I guess it got that scratch when they tried to force the card into the tight slot. Which reminds me, the card slots are really tight at first! You have to break the wallet in for a while and they will loosen up because leather stretches.

 The front of the wallet had some creases. It is no big deal, since the wallet would get creased and scratched with use (unless you baby it) but I still feel like it should be a Dave's deal piece instead.

 The notes sit pretty deep in the note compartments, which is a plus in my opinion. I hate it when my bills don't fit and some of it juts out the top of the wallet. Pictured above are Australian bills.

I'd like to add that I recently watched Dave's "Leather 101" video on stitching whereby he explains about the superior thread and stitching machine he uses in his factory. Well, sad to say that a $12,000 sewing machine would occasionally stitch crookedly, like the one on my wallet. Check out the picture below. one of the stitching line was slightly crooked, and it finishes right on the edge of the leather. I am uncertain if this stitch would hold up in the future but that's what the warranty policy is for. The rest of the stitching line is fine and pretty straight though. I must add here that in comparison to Marlondo's stitching, SBL wins by a pretty huge margin!

Lastly, the most disappointing part of this wallet for me is at the top of the note compartment. The pigskin had a (small) cut on it! While I know that leather is a natural material and some of them would have scars from the animal it came from but this clearly is a knife cut. It was pretty unnoticeable at first but now that I saw it, I cannot not see it again. The glue is holding it down but I'm pretty sure the workers at SBL factory would have noticed this cut when they were assembling the wallet together but I guess to them it is okay for this wallet to pass the Quality Control they have implemented, if any!

 

I may be able to file for a warranty claim on this wallet since it's still new but I'm thinking it's too much of a hassle to send it back all the way to the US and wait for a new one to arrive in Malaysia.

Anyway, this is one heck of a wallet. No doubt that it is sturdy and likely to last longer than any typical store-bought wallets. I have some other SBL wallets I will review soon when time permits but they would not be as elaborate as this one (I hope)!

If you have any questions feel free to leave a comment on this post or shoot me an email directly!