Fireplace Reflectors should be Fire Resistant, don't you think?

We live in a newer townhome, with a fireplace that has an 'insert'. [This is an odd thing for my husband and I, who grew up in older homes where the fireplace was simply the fireplace. The brick you saw was what was there.] The back of this insert was starting to crumble. We talked to our chimney guy this past fall about this, and he said we had 2 options:

1. Pay a Ton o' Money and get a new Insert
2. Patch it up and then get a Fireplace Reflector to protect it.
   

We opted for Option 2, duh.

So, my hubby patched up the fireplace. Great. So now we needed a reflector.

I browsed the Plow & Hearth website, and found the FireBrite Reflector. Excellent. So, I asked my parents to get me the 18" FireBrite Reflector, Item 1642 $119.95 (Made in USA!!!), for Christmas.

However, for most of November, the item said 'Out of stock'. We called Thanksgiving week and were told it was probably discontinued, so my parents ordered the other reflector P&H was carrying at that point, which was a little cheaper and Made in China (sigh).

We started to use it after Christmas and in just a little more than a month of use in our fireplace, it disintegrated. Literally. The hinges melted and it warped like a big metal potato chip in the back of our fireplace.

I contacted P&H at that point, noting that the FireBrite Reflector was now available again and the Chinese one was no longer being advertised. (Hmmmm).

The folks at Plow & Hearth were great. They contacted me back, we discussed the issue, I returned the old one and they sent me the other one in its place. They paid all shipping; all we had to do was pay the difference between the two reflectors, which was of course totally fair.

We're past fire season now, but we'll soon have our new FireBrite assembled and ready to go for next year's fire season. Thanks, Plow & Hearth! Thumbs-up for standing behind your products.