I’m curious if Gallup Trading has a good reputation. I see some of their artists are well known, but they also have a lot of items simply listed as tribe name which are nearly dental, which makes me worry that they’re being cranked out in a sweatshop somewhere. For example, a number of items on this page: Zuni – Gallup Trading
Does anyone know much about them?
I don’t see anything at all wrong with the items shown. It’s all clean work with good attention to detail. What exactly makes you think it looks like it came out of a “sweat shop”, which frankly to me seems defamatory towards this company?
Looks like they have a lot of items by Harrison Jim 
(with reasonable prices). I might have to check them out when I’m out there this summer…
They are listed in my wonderful Trading Post Guidebook that I bought years ago at Hubble Trading Post. I have used it a lot when I travel to find good legitimate shops. Here’s a couple screenshots (the info carried on to another page) of the information (looks like I had even written some notes because I called them with a question about one of my pieces).
Jason (the administrator of the forum) has said on here a number of times that artists sometimes will make the same design repetitively if they find it sells well.
If you read the info on their site, they said they have been doing business for almost a century. I would have absolutely no qualms shopping from them. At all.
Making a series of items of the same design is actually far more common than making one offs which tend to be much higher end items focused on the top 5 or 10 percent of the market. The repeatable items are the true ‘bread and butter’ every day high quality items from which the majority of Native craftspeople derive most of their income. To assume that items of this type are produced in a so called “sweat shop” is absolutely disrespectful to the individuals who choose to make their living this way, and to the businesses who support them. Further, rather than creating the impression that the individual making these comments is somehow ‘savvy’, it demonstrates a deplorable lack of knowledge and understanding of the legitimate hand made Native American jewelry industry as a whole.
I have purchased from them online and visited their booth at the trade show that takes place during Santa Fe Indian Market. I have absolutely no qualms about purchasing from them and think they have some nice stuff. They carry a lot of Aaron Anderson. If I remember correctly (but please don’t quote me on this), the owner is a woman of Japanese or Asian heritage married to a Native American.
