The Brick investigating after more customers complain of exploding glass furniture

Other customers from The Brick have come forward with their experiences of glass furniture spontaneous exploding after CTV News initially reported last week of a similar incident happening to a Calgary woman.

Dulce Acierto lives in Red Deer and purchased the Tuxedo 7-piece dining table set from a The Brick store there. She says it’s the same one Zarifa Hniedi, the woman from Calgary, purchased, only the colour of the chairs are different.

Acierto says the tempered glass table top spontaneously exploded in 2019 while no one was in the room and with nothing placed on the glass.

“I’m like shocked right? Like how did it happen?” said Acierto.

“There were some pieces on the wall, some in the chair and you can see it’s all over the place.”

The glass dented her newly renovated floors and her walls. Damages that she had to fix herself.

In response to CTV’s initial story on March 4, Greg Nakonechny, vice-president of The Brick Legal and Corporate Secretary, said in a statement that they’ve “confirmed that this is a rare incident and are not aware of other similar incidents with respect to this product.”

Acierto says that’s not true because she reported her incident to The Brick associates the day after it happened, but was told she wouldn’t get a refund and she never got answers.

“They should talk to the manufacturer and see what’s the possibility and why it exploded like that. It might be the house temperature but I don’t think so because I have another small table downstairs that has glass and it has been here since I bought the house.”

Paul Koniec purchased a different glass product from The Brick in Deerfoot Meadows last summer. He says two months later it spontaneously exploded, sending glass flying everywhere. Koniec is thankful no one was in the room at the time and his young daughter wasn’t hurt.

Following a negative online review where he stated, “I bought this two months ago and the glass shelf spontaneously shattered. There was no weight or anything on the glass shelf,” Koniec says The Brick refunded his purchase if he took down the review.

A glass technician with Budget Glass in Calgary says he isn’t surprised to hear of the tempered glass exploding spontaneously as he’s seen it happen many times during his 40 years in the industry.

Kelly Boggs says as a safety feature, tempered glass is meant to shatter into small fragments.

“If it was plate glass and if does break it would come through and hurt you. Tempered glass will shatter but at least you don’t get hurt. If you’re wearing cut offs you’ll probably get nicks, but it’s better off than the glass that cuts your flesh.”

In another statement to CTV News addressing the latest complaints, Nakonechny said spontaneous glass breakage is a rare, but the business is investigating.

“We do take these matters seriously. Although we track these incidents, we have commenced an investigation into these incidents to identify the frequency of similar experiences and whether there are steps that The Brick can take to mitigate against this happening. We have also contact the manufacturer to see if there have been deviation from expected product experience.”

Nokovnechny also says that spontaneous glass explosions can be triggered by a number of factors including “scratches, direct blunt contact, heat and pressure which may occur during the manufacture, delivery and after delivery use of the product and imperfections or defects in the glass.”

Acierto says she is sure none of the potential triggers happened to her table.

“We put place mats. We don’t put hot things on the table especially me. I’m meticulous. I take care of my things.”