Something being 'retired'?

[Lillemor]

I would like to begin to collect Fiesta. Both new and old is fine with me but what does it mean when a site lists a certain color or collection as 'retired'? How's that different from discontinued?

 

[Atterbury Dodd]

Just trying to remember--
Ah, yes. I think retired means the older pieces with lead in them.
Possibly, hope that helps
!

 

[Vornholt]

The old lead-based glaze versions vanished quite some time ago. After all, once the uranium red glaze was discontinued, you really didn't need the lead version anymore.

Actually, "retired" in this case, is simply a fancy way of telling you they're discontinuing whatever it is, in hopes of making you rush out and buy it right away.

 

[Mike in Seattle]

It doesn't have anything to do with leaded or lead-free glaze. Leaded ended, I believe, back in the late 60s. They stopped manufacturing the Fiestaware line in 1973, probably due to a combo of bad press about leaded glazes and it being looked at as old-fashioned since it had been in production since 1936. They put it back into production for the 50th anniversary in 1986 with all lead-free glazes, and it took off again like wildfire.

Retired is Fiesta's term for discontinued. Every year or so they'll "retire" a color or two and announce a new color. Some colors they start making again later by "bringing it out of retirement." I think it's just their way of taking a color off the production line so they can start a new color for people to buy. I think it sounds better to be "brought out of retirement" than "un-discontinuing" a color. Example - they retired one of the original classic colors, persimmon, a couple years ago. It's the sort of red-orange color that they've ALWAYS had. I figure it'll be back in a few years.

If you're just getting started, you can get great deals directly from the manufacturer. Go to www.hlchina.com - start there because you can check out the history of what colors were produced when. On the far right side of the screen is "Factory Outlet." Click that. Their prices direct (and this is the first quality, not the seconds like most of what you find on Ebay are, which have minor imperfections) are pretty good. They also run some specials and sales.

Macy's also carries it nationwide, but watch for sales. Macy's ALWAYS says $46-49 is the price of a 4 piece place setting - it's almost ALWAYS on sale for $24.99-26.99. There are probably only a couple days a month that Macy's has it at the higher price. But keep an eye on their sales and coupons. A couple months ago they had a weekend where it was REALLY on sale and there was a $10 coupon - I walked out the door with 2 place settings (chocolate and lemon grass - this year's new colors) for $34, tax included.

And good deals are there on Ebay as well - but be careful with color. A lot of people will post things as "vintage red" or "medium green" that are really persimmon or scarlet, or shamrock. Medium green is probably the hardest to fine, priciest colors because it was only produced in the 40s. Ditto the vintage red.

Another color you hear about is "uranium red" - it was produced longer but went out of production in the 40s. It's close to persimmon - the reason you hear about it is uranium was indeed used to get the redder color (as lots of other manufactures at the time used) and it's very slightly radioactive. My partner's dad worked in nuclear safety for decades and didn't believe it. I brought my salad plate along when we drove down a few years ago (I didn't want to carry it on a plane - figuring it would set off sirens and horns going through check-in) and flipped on the Geiger counter in the garage and watch the dear old dad freak out when walked into the house and back out and started setting it off (I had the plate under my sweatshirt). "Wait...wait...Mike, walk back over there...are you wearing an old watch with glow in the dark dial?" I let him be freaked out for about five minutes before I pulled out the plate and said, "SO...I was full of crap when I said I had a piece of radioactive china, huhn?" I just have the one piece that I found cheap and wanted to have around because sooner or later, someone asks for about it.

And pace yourself...it can be almost as addictive as buying Fedoras! lol I started getting it about 10-12 years ago because it's reasonably priced and it lasts forever. If you ever break a pieces, you can buy it open stock everywhere (including Macy's). I believe I have a setting in every color they've had in the last 15+ years except cinnabar (kidney bean colored and really blah) and white (really, really, really blah IMHO). I've only got gray because I grabbed it on impulse awhile after it had been discontinued.

But I have just under 30 colors I believe. The rarer colors (chartreuse, peach, lilac, sapphire, yellow) are at the bottom of the stack in the cabinet - I think I've got them stacked by how hard it is to find the color. And even when they discontinue a color, it's still pretty easily obtainable for a year and a half, two years. And they do sort of play games with color. I mentioned yellow - it's butter colored. A soft yellow. They discontinued that, and 2 years later came out with sunflower. It's a really acid yellow (IMHO). Sunflower's still in the current rotation, but I've heard that'll be getting retired next. They usually have 12-15 colors available at the same time. And they have servingware and bakeware, even glassware & flatware. I've avoided the glasses & flatware. I think the flatwares somewhat so-so made, and the glassware just has stripes of red, green, blue and yellow - and the colors on the glassware don't really match their currently available primary colors of dishware. And I didn't have any Fiesta linens until this Christmas - our good friend Dawn got me eight placemats and a table runner just because she knew it would drive my partner nuts. I'm always get cranking about how much we have. The niece & nephews (4, 8 & 10) - she's always got to have ether the newest color or something to match her outfit of the day (she's going to be a handful for whoever she eventually marries). The 8 year old always has to have his setting with all the same color, and he has to decide what vegetables or side dishes go in what color serving bowls or platters, and the older always wants black and persimmon (another Halloween fan like me).

 

[Miss_Bella_Hell]

Mike, when writing a dissertation like that () it is customary among computer nerds to, once finished with said dissertation, write tl;dr (too long; didn't read) and then a short summary.

 

[Lillemor]

Wow! Thanks to all who have responded. I wasn't expecting such thorough explanations. I'm usually the one guilty of extremely long posts. So I don't mind reading other people's long posts.

I live in Denmark so it's my dad who's getting me started and we're not that worried about purchase, s/h costs but I'm VERY worried about Danish custom taxes! My dad has checked the existing colors in real shops (Dillard's or something?) because the colors are so deceptive online which I think I mentioned in my initial post.

The whole deal about "sales" is a whole 'nother debate! My dad said the white, black and brown aren't nice. That's subjective of course and not having seen them in person I can't judge. I just know that I like the Turquoise and Persimmon right now. Light, bright colors will look best with the rest of our interieur...erh.....interior! Whatever, the colors we have inside our home especially in our living/dining section. The walls are a soft nearly white (fashion white) The dining table lamp is white, I usually match the wax tablecloth to the curtains which are soft and faded shades of cream/green/grey, the current wax tablecloth is cream/golden/lavender blue and a slightly deeper ruddy blue which ties in with the blue golden/rusty colors in the Persian rug under the dining table! The dining chairs are cream/butter yellow leather. We have "paintings" (posters) in green/blue/turquoise scale.

Pillivuit Maeva was the plate set we chose for our Wedding wishlist because I wanted to be trendy back then. It's still cute. Actually, setting the Maeva with some blue Fiesta might look good. I want the Turquoise prioritized though.

What's the Fiesta cutlery quality?

Because it's not just vintage people who collect tableware I asked around on different forums to get as many different insights as possible. I copied and pasted (without names or other details) the most important responses into a mail to my dad. I misdirected the mail to hub's work inbox and got a phone call from hub regarding some "really uninteresting mail". Great! I don't have to consider anyone else's taste when picking colors! Hub's a HAM as you can tell from the background of my profile pic so unless I develope an interest for that, I don't think I'll have him inteferring with my hobby or vice versa.

 

[BinkieBaumont]

I think "retired" is simply a "Genteel" way of saying , Discontinued = "it was a poor seller!", along with other "genteel" phases such as the term "Pre-Loved" and "Renovators Dream home"

 

[Mike in Seattle]

My opinion - the flatware's not very good. The handles are Fiesta colors, but to me, they feel like a somewhat flimsy plastic. I would think a few runs through the dishwasher and they'll discolor or start to crack. If you're handwashing instead of using a dishwasher, they'd probably last longer and look better longer. But there are other brands of flatware with more durable plastic handles, or are a continuous piece of metal from end to end with the plastic covering the handle area. The Fiesta flatware seems to be plastic handles with a metal fork, spoon or knife end stuck into or glue into the plastic - my thought is try to dig into some hard ice cream, or cut a moderately tough piece of meal and they'd be apt to snap.

The flatware's really a "go along" - they used to license other manufacturers to produce non-ceramic items to go along with their product, and are labeled with the logo and as Fiesta products. There were kitchen timers shaped like the classic water pitcher, cheese handles, spreaders, spice racks, magnets, juicers (I have one I've only used a couple times...in persimmon, of course), picture frames, napkin holders & napkins (which you can still get), electric percolator, toaster, etc. And there are a few manufacturers that still make things in Fiesta colors that aren't advertised as Fiesta or "Go Alongs" or anything of the kind, and yet, they match. I found a set of nesting plastic mixing bowls - I think there are 10 in the set for about $15-20 - that match perfectly and the colors they used leaves no doubt in my mind they came up with them based on Fiesta colors - no white, no black, no chocolate, no lemon grass, but the rest are among the remaining 12-13 colors that have been available for a couple of years.

The cobalt, black, brown and white are blah...but there are some who can put the dark colors together with the right linens and have a dynamite look. I'm definitely not one of those.

I think their game plan has been to release a dark color (chocolate) and then a light (lemon grass). At one time they were trying to group them as pastels (rose, seafoam, turquoise, yellow, white) and brights (cobalt, shamrock, scarlet, sunflower, persimmon). They also said a couple years ago they'd only have 14 colors available at a time. Anytime they added a color, they'd "retire" a color. And then they went against that this year with adding chocolate and lemon grass and retiring only one, persimmon. And really, it can be argued 16 colors are available now. They announced a new color for their 75th anniversary coming in 2011...and over a year ago, started releasing selected pieces in marigold (the 2011 new color).

And if you're clever...you can put together "sets" of items that'll have people searching for where you got them. Take the base for the sugar & creamer set, put on two ramekins and you have a dip or salsa serving set - I still have a couple friends searching for where they can get that set. I got the idea from a Web site that was selling the sets for an insane price, and nobody else had them...and then it hit me what they'd done. Their "exclusive" Christmas version was a white base with one scarlet and one shamrock ramekin. As a salsa set it was the red & green bowls but the base was sunflower.

Fiesta's also done some "special sets" where they take two unrelated pieces and put them together. Last year they were using their extra large round serving bowl and the stove top salt shaker as a "pasta set" - saying it was a pasta serving bowl with matching cheese shaker. Their "relish trays" are perfect for an ear of corn and it makes a perfect replacement drip tray for a George Forman grill.

And it's always fun when someone new is over for dinner and sees the Fiestaware and it's "I love this stuff!" or they remember their grandmother or aunt or someone had it and they always liked it.