What do you guys (squids and jarheads) think of this tartan?

[macwilkin]

Be warned, fellows, the company that designed this tartan, International Tartans, has a bad reputation for designing tartans "on spec" for places (and now, it seems, military branches) without any kind of authorization - even for entities which already have a recognized tartan. The new tartan is then promoted with rather dubious provenance.

For example, this tartan in question is supposedly for the US Navy and Marine Corps. Even though both the Edzell (Navy) and Leatherneck (USMC) tartans are "unofficial" they have both been around for quite some time and are well recognized, so one may indeed consider them official by wont and usage.

Despite these two tartans being around for quite some time, and both service branches seeming quite content to let them be used without official recognition, suddenly this brand new tartan is claimed to be "now adopted as the 'out of uniform' emblem" for both branches? Adopted by who? He doesn't say. You'd think if there had been any kind of formal recognition it would be cited.

The only provenance for the tartan seems to be a "thank you" letter received by the mayor of San Diego! And, I'm sorry, a "thank you" note does not constitute official recognition of a tartan! And really, even if it did, what authority does the mayor of San Diego have over the Navy or Marines?

This is the modus operandi of this particular company, it would seem. The same company designed a tartan for North Carolina and another for South Carolina despite the fact that both states have passed formal legislation adopting the Carolina tartan as state symbols. On the company's web site it is claimed that the North Carolina tartan was "warmly welcomed by the Secretary of State, Elaine Marshall." First of all, the Secretary of State has no authority to formally recognize a state symbol - that has to be passed through the legislature. Second, I know exactly what happened. She received a gift of the tartan and said "thank you," as anyone would. Our museum received a phone call a short while after from someone in Raleigh (our state capital), very confused because "some man from Scotland" gave them a tartan claiming it was the North Carolina tartan, "but it doesn't look anything like the state tartan we've been using for years."

I really don't like to publicly criticize other companies, but this is the worst kind of false promotion, intended only to mislead people to buying what amount to fraudulent tartans. I feel that people really ought to be made aware and warned away.

Not only that, but at least one of the articles on his web site is plagarised with no citation or credit for an article.

T.