carenthusiast, I don't believe anyone here believes you didn't encounter an issue with the product, however life is all about how you handle the setbacks. On most if not all of Meguiars products there is a number consumers can call for further information/advice. Failing that, Meguiars have a very helpful online forum that could assist you. Failing that, you could go to the official Meguiars website and contact them using the contact details provided.
I understand your initial disappointment with the product, but reading your comments as an impartial forum user I cannot help but be struck by your overly critical, conspiracy theorist rant. Accusing members of working for Meguiars PR department and Meguiars naming of a series of products to lure in a certain type of consumer? Seriously.....
There are many appropriate places freely available to you to FIX a problem like you have encountered. It appears to me, and I am guessing also to quite a few others that have read your thread, that you are here to complain more so than listen to solutions offered.
I can't be sure but are all your posts on AG in this thread?
Selectchoice,
You can call it anything you want but PR and Marketing are high paying industries and real people work there, not some imaginary creatures born out of tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorists' skull.
You may Google "Marketing 101" to start with, but as you learn more and more about various marketing techniques you will not be surprised how some products are designed, based on expectation of mass consumer response, and how those expectations are quantified.
In this particular case it's obvious to me that unlike their Professional grade exterior care products (which are really good, as far as I can tell), the "Gold Class" is just a bragging name that isn't worth the paper it's printed on (at least in case of the wipes I am discussing here). Surely, their marketing team and product designers had radically different image of the buyer base for this "Gold Class" , "rich leather" cleaning/conditioning product. Somehow, I don't believe they seriously meant this product to represent or fulfill a need in high quality and good care.
Call me "conspiracy theorist", but in my college years I did take some marketing classes, and I have some basic ideas how it works.
As to Meguiar's 800 number, I am aware of it. You can Google online the experience of consumers who had similar issue and called that same number. The best Meguiar's did (in one case I read) was to send their customer a $200 check to get their leather re-coated (basically painted and coated) . Other "lucky" customer got free bottles (two bottles in fact) of cleaner and a conditioner (as two separate products). None was offered a replacement for brand new leather seats in a luxury car. So, why should I call them? if I wanted large compensation I wouldn't call them either (nor would post here), but would hire an attorney and file a claim in court.
But I am not after that either.
At first I was just very upset with what I observed to be effects of this misnomer called "non-greasy cleaner-conditioner wipes". I was really unhappy thinking that they permanently damaged my car (but I hoped not), and asked more experienced people in this forum if they encountered similar issue in past and how would they recommend me remedy the situation.
Two days later it became apparent to me that the damage was not as catastrophic as I thought , I became more optimistic about this silicone-shine not being permanent, thanked everyone and actually was not planning to go on with lengthy posts about the whole issue.
But then I have read some posters suggesting that I was a culprit in overusing the product (which you can't really overuse, all you can do is wipe a seat with a synthetic napkin-like piece which is
pre-soaked with solution in factory. You don't control the amount of product you apply, Meguiar's does. And , unless you get 25 wipes out repeatedly wiping the same seat over and over again, I don't know how could the product be "overused" if all you did is use one wipe to wipe one seat at the time.
I didn't not use the same wipe to clean all seats because I didn't want to (assuming they are cleaner wipes) spread to next seat whatever dust it was removing from the previous one. But even if I used only ONE wipe, still I would have to start with FIRST seat and that first seat would get the exact same quantity of product that caused my seats go Armorall-silicon-shiny.
Why suggest that I have foolishly over-applied the product , as if I was some clueless noob with Makita buffer who swirled holes in his paint and now screams "O holy molly!"?
I have detailed my cars for more than two decades now and have used various products to know the difference between "overusing" a product and product doing something other than what you would reasonably expect from it.
I didn't not buy Armorall "super-shine your vinyl seats" product , I bought Meguiar's and I had a reason NOT to expect that it would be making my brand new car look like a trash.
The very fact that this is not Professional Grade product puts onus of responsibility directly on Meguiar's , as it's designed for consumption by average car enthusiast and not by savvy body shop pro-master. "You don't know how to use this product!" is not even a defense line when you are talking about over the counter product.
And since this is Meguiar's I had every reason to expect it not to do what Armorall would. To top it, Meguiar's itself typed on the container "Non greasy formula". You should buy this product to shine your old shoes (if you have any) and see for yourself how "non greasy" it is. How misleading one can be?
And why come here to turn this discussion into ad-hominem, personal matter instead of directly answering or sharing an opinion on how to get rid of hideous effects of the failed product ?
P.S. FYI, I have posted on one other thread, about a guy who clayed his brand new vehicle because it was contaminated by residue that penetrated his clear coat. I wondered why would anyone need to clay a brand new car (assuming they come off factory with protective , adhesive cover plastered over the body), but some experts here have explained to me that this happens quite often.