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Tiki Central / Collecting Tiki

Is this a real Trader Vic's Fogcutter mug? A hobbyist mug? A bootleg?

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Picked up a TV Fogcutter mug at Goodwill the other day. Pictures here: http://imgur.com/a/yDavC

The raised artwork on the mug isn't very sharp and the paint job looks pretty shoddy. Still, the bottom reads (faintly) "Made Only for Trader Vic USA." Is it real, or could this be a copy made by some kind of hobbyist?

I feel like I come across other poor-quality (low-relief) mugs fairly often and I always kind of wonder what the story is. I don't know much about the mug-making process, but I always assumed they were bootlegs; made by casting an existing mug rather than the original mold. Anyone have any insight?

It's real, the quality is just really that poor :-|
It's seems about the same as mine, and you can just make out "Made only for Trader Vic's" on the bottom

Some periods/makers are better than others, you can see the range on OM:
http://www.ooga-mooga.com/cgi-bin/all/search.cgi?terms=vic+fog+cutter&des_id=any&man_id=any&img_id=any&shp_id=any&clr_id=any&details=yes&mode=search_process&x=0&y=0

Ha! I was just going to say that yours looks like the one posted by "cooldude4000".
I guess it REALLY does, since that's you! lol

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Thanks! Yeah, I checked Ooga-Mooga, and it just made things murkier (especially since one of those is called a "hobbyist mug"! Mine most closely resembles the modern unspeckled version, but those appear to be labeled "1993" on the bottom and the markings on mine appear to make it older than that. I guess it's just one of those things that I'll never 100% know the answer to. Anyway, I'm glad I went back and bought this one! It's not the pride of my collection or anything, but for two bucks you can't go wrong.

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