You pay good money for a good car, it ought to work. Just venting, and certainly no offense intended, but I don't subscribe to your rationale in this case at all. If I bought some POS off-brand for 90 bucks, I could see that. But I went with AE because they are the best. I shouldn't have to accept quality control issues just because I didn't build it myself. I wouldn't buy a Porsche and expect to have to put the shocks together myself to ensure a quality build.

Mistakes in production happen. It's up to the company to ensure those mistakes are rectified in a way that wipes those mistakes from the customer's memory, and turns a negative experience into a positive one. Hopefully, AE is listening.