Milanos as they were meant to be! (Good stock of bright colored China clay) (1 Viewer)

OKYJJ

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Hello,

This is simply a public service announcement for those who use Milano chips that The Poker Store currently has really good stock of them. I am not affiliated with them in any way. I have used Milanos as my tournament set for many years, and some relabels in certain cash denominations as well. As many have experienced, their quality and small details has varied greatly from year to year (and some say factory to factory). All of the first batch I ordered back in 2015 had a nice brownish color to the denominations, standing out from the rest of the black ink, with a subtle shading to the labels that became the standard for me. But later, when I bought stock from other stores on a couple occasions, I got black denominations, darker shading to the labels, and sometimes even a different denomination size. It was a bit frustrating. Also, the one barrel of orange 10ks I got had very uneven and pale coloring, almost white on the edges, even after oiling. I am someone who can have a bad habit of obsessing over small details of items - which I'm sure is a common trait among PCF members. I like China clay for its affordability, and I like having too many chips, being ready for any situation that might arise in tournament or cash games. So China clay fits the bill - but the downfall of sets like Milano and even sometimes of Pharaoh's is inconsistencies in labels, coloring, and other qualities.

So anyway, I recently bought 200 of various denominations of Milano from The Poker Store, expanding my set, and was very pleasantly surprised by how bright and vibrant all the colors were. Especially the Oranges- they were perfect! So I had to buy more. I got another 500. I use the blues as 5,000, and got some pinks as "donor" chips for the new blues (because nowadays it costs less to just buy those extra chips than to get nice custom labels). And the pinks look so good - although they are not my favorite chip - that I'm gonna keep them and find something to do with them. I think I will use them for Bounty chips (which will of course need some labels). All 5 pinks that I had bought in sample sets back in the day look washed out and pale (even after oiling), part of why I never wanted to use them for anything.

So that's it really, just a tip for Milano fans that there is a store you can get really nice bright ones right now. For all I know, all the new stock of Milano anywhere might be this good (they may have worked out their quality control issues). Or, these might somehow be *old* stock that this store got a hold of by chance. No idea. But thought I would pass along the info.

I did find one negative thing in the black 100s though - a strange over-beveling and off-center beveling in several of them in that particular denomination. Kind of annoying; you get one problem solved just for others to crop up. But anyway, colors and labels are all very nice, so if you're looking to add to your set, now's the time. :)
 
Did you buy any $5? I'm curious if they still are thicker compared to other denoms. Thinking of doing an update since those I got has more than one chip larger height each barrel.
 
Did you buy any $5? I'm curious if they still are thicker compared to other denoms. Thinking of doing an update since those I got has more than one chip larger height each barrel.
I did buy a few $5s. Comparing a 25-pack of the new $5s compared to a 25-stack of old $5s (that have a larger darker denomination), the new ones are about a half-chip shorter.

I bought several different denominations and unfortunately there were small height differences between several of them. Most are now mixed up with other chips and so it would be a pain to sort them all out and compare heights again, but I noticed it as I was unwrapping all the new packs.

So it appears that is one problem they have not sorted out. It is also present in other China Clays, like the Pharaohs. I was all happy with my discovery that the cheap 750 cases would hold exactly 80 chips per row for my cash set of semi-custom Pharaoh's, but then I realized that only works for certain chips and not others. The purples only go to 79 while the turquoises are more like 81.
 
Lol I am so sorry. I don't have them all labeled yet and so can't make a real impressive picture. But I will put something up here shortly to illustrate the differences. And I can post a link too if that is alright. Still new here (in terms of actually posting).

As comments above have discussed, the Milanos still have problems. It just appears that color saturation and funky labels are no longer among those problems.

Here is The Poker Store listing:

https://www.thepokerstore.com/products/500-milano-10-gram-pure-clay-poker-chips-bulk

They have the same pics as everywhere else that sells them, but the Oranges and Pinks are now better than the pics.
Dude, when I click a post with that kind of title, I expect to recieve some chip pr0n for my troubles, just saying ;)
 
Ok here you go. Not the greatest pics but at least some illustration of what I’m taking about.

The pinks are the greatest contrast. The old samples I have are almost completely colorless. These are full of nice dark pink.

The oranges you can see the ones I’ve had for several years are dull in color, especially on the edges. The new ones are bright Orange.

The other pic shows 3 label varieties on the $1K. The one on the left has the brown denomination and is what both my oldest and my newest ones look like. The middle one is another variety, fine just a little different. The one on the right has dull color to the chips (and almost greenish but that is hard to see in the photo) and a too-exaggerated shading on the labels.

As for the blues, the blue color has always been fine, but you can see the Orange edge spots on some of my older ones have faded out and look bad. The new ones are bright.

All in all, the Milanos are still imperfect, but if you like these chips and are looking to add to your set, The Poker Store has got the goods right now.

I am beginning to worry that maybe the color somehow leaches out of these over time. Cause I don’t remember the orange and pink chips and spots bring this bad severs years ago. (The pink spots on the green chips also have problems; I could have posted those too but it’s more of the same.) Either I didn’t notice how bad it was or it has gotten worse with time. It’s not like I keep them in sunlight. They are in my game closet behind a curtain. It’s not like I ever used any weird detergents on them, just water and mineral oil. Hmm.
 

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I was just kidding, but thank you! :)
 

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