Have owned AKREX for many years and PGIRX since inception of fund. No thoughts of selling either. This quote reflects much of the basic approach each of these funds takes:

We believe in owning exceptional businesses for as long as they remain so, paying appropriately for their growth prospects when such opportunities present, and holding on during periods of richer valuation out of respect for the exceptional quality of the business. Akre Focus Fund Report 1/31/21

msf - Thanks for comments. Believe you are, in effect, making or confirming my point.
Don't expect that new-to-Vanguard investors that did any sort of due diligence prior to investing with Vanguard will be surprised with Vanguard's current customer 'service' levels.
It is what it is.
Think the issue is more relevant to older investors (like myself), who first invested with Vanguard during era when Mr Bogle was either running the place, and/or alive. We actually remember when there was a there, there.
But that was then, and it is now. Think we have to get over it, and move along. Nothing to see here .... etc.
For example, FWIW, a family member had to do a 401-k rollover, and asked for my advice regarding where the money should go, i.e., which custodian?
I asked them if being able to talk with a person about their investments was important, and how long they wanted to wait for this 'privilege'. Based on answers (Yes and 15 minutes or less), I recommended Fidelity or Schwab. They went with Fidelity.
I faced a similar decision myself several months ago, with respect to an in-service 401-k to IRA rollover. I chose Fidelity, and invested the check that I received in several very low cost ETFs. As it happens, none of them were Vanguard (or Fidelity) ETFs, but they might have been.
Think that Vanguard, by way of John Bogle, created a a revolutionary idea or maybe a public good - like the town common. This was the expectation that investing for the little guy can be incredibly inexpensive and efficient.
While Vanguard is not itself a public company (i.e., for-profit entity with stock that is traded on an exchange and which is owned by stockholders, with officers and board that are accountable to the stockholders), Bogle's revolutionary ideas were copied (and improved?) by other public companies and delivered very efficiently via ETFs and brokerage accounts to the public. (Wonders of capitalism and competition.)
Note: In an effort to compete - and drive their own costs even lower - Vanguard was forced to eliminate new "mutual fund accounts", as opposed to "brokerage fund accounts" for their clients. (There are some exceptions. Understand, for example, that employees of financial firms with restrictions on holding brokerage accounts outside of their employer - for compliance reasons - can open a "mutual fund account" at Vanguard.)
In any event, there is not much reason (really) to invest with Vanguard anymore. Not sure that there is anything that Vanguard can do that Vanguard competitors can not do. (Exception might be very low cost money market funds to act as the "clearing" investment in a brokerage account. But that's about it.)
As long as Vanguard exists in its current form, it is sort of like the Frontier Airlines effect often noted in various cities around the the country. As soon as Frontier makes a city a hub or mini-hub, competitors' ticket prices go down at that location. Once Frontier is operating in your city, you don't need to fly Frontier to get the benefit of lower ticket prices.
Same thing with Vanguard. As long as it is around, it will keep competitors' prices in check. But you don't need to own Vanguard mutual funds or ETFs to get the benefits of its unique low-cost structure. You can (and should?) get them almost anywhere.
PS: Two years ago, Jonathan Clements commented on Vanguard's customer service issues at his "Humble Dollar" website. Titled "Whither Vanguard", it is available here. "Whither Vanguard" was originally posted on this board by the late Ted Didesch. Ted's post is here: https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/51709/jonathan-clements-whither-vanguard

https://www.mutualfundobserver.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Table-7.png
One of the funds in the portfolio is the Fidelity Freedom 2020 portfolio, FFFDX. Why does it make sense to include in the portfolio a 'target date' fund that for many years in the 'backtest' had an evolving (with time) asset allocation that was different from the current allocation?
Think - for example - that inclusion of a 'target date' fund might make more sense if the specific target date (i.e., 2020 for FFFDX) was adjusted to a future year, rather than a year in the past ... right?

The Professor may have been looking at Lipper, which classifies WIGTX as a global small/mid cap fund. M* currently classifies its portfolio as substantially all foreign, and the fund itself as foreign small/mid growth. But with a 176% turnover rate, who knows what it looked like six months ago? I haven't gone back to check.
ADVLX has also outperformed HAISX since 5/23/2019, albeit not by nearly as much and with a tailwind (being a growth fund). Both Lipper and M* classify it as a foreign small/mid cap fund. Just 1/40th of its portfolio contains large cap companies (HAISX has none), while it has more microcaps (6%) than HAISX (1%). In short, they're both small cap funds.
In contrast, OAKEX is a midcap fund, with 5/8 of its portfolio in midcaps, and just 1/5 in smaller companies, none of those being microcaps.
Portfolio visualizer comparison of the three funds
With regard to M*'s robotic rating, it's just that. IMHO a work in progress that isn't worth paying any attention to, at least yet. Also, the negative rating is a machine's "opinion" for the whole five years the fund has been around, not just the last 2.5 years.

This is a very interesting fund. September commentaries say: ...".over the past 2.5 years, the period roughly corresponding to Cedar Street’s management of the fund, it has been the best performing international small cap fund in existence."
On the other hand, M* gives them 5 stars but Negative rating. It is quite possible that M* gives negative ratings without full understanding of the funds. But, if I am not mistaken, Oakmark International Small Cap beats Harbor International Small Cap for the last 3 years, 2.5 years, and 1 year. And for the last 3 years WIGTX decimated both of these funds.

This week’s Barron’s is disappointing in that Randall Forsyth is missing for the second straight week. Ben Levisohn, filling in at the Up & Down Wall Street spot isn’t nearly as good, IMHO. Levisohn addresses Friday’s disappointing jobs numbers - but I’m not quite sure where he’s going …
Generally, this week’s publication reflects a highly bullish tone. Several articles mention a continuing accommodative Federal Reserve stance. One article is titled “A Homebuilder Stock That Could Soar 65%”. Another bullish take appears in the magazine’s lead article, “The Trader” with its headline: “The Trend is Your Friend.”
One note of dissension appears from perma-bear Alan M Newman in the section featuring recent “snippets” from different market pundits. Here’s a brief excerpt:
“There are now so many parallels with history-making manias such as the South Sea Bubble, the Roaring ’20s, Tulip Mania, and even the relatively recent Tech/Internet Bubble that the present era in retrospect, may one day appear the craziest of all …. Today’s parallels are every bit as crazy, even hilarious. While the blockchain technology that many of the roughly 4,500 invented crypto currencies is based on is valid, there is ample reason to dispute valuations …
A Google search for ‘intrinsic value of Dogecoin,’ returns ‘..has no intrinsic value’. Thus, Dogecoin has turned out to be the 2021 equivalent of “carrying on an undertaking of great advantage but no-one to know what it is.’ You can’t make this stuff up, folks.” *
There’s an in-depth look at SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s efforts to overhaul equity trading platforms with the goal of making the prices paid by small investors fairer. Robinhood, particularly, is in his cross-hairs. Gensler likes to shake thing up. One may recall about a dozen years ago when he took on the mutual fund industry, publicly decrying what he considered excessive fees - at the same time his twin brother Robert managed one of T. Rowe Price’s largest equity funds.
* Excerpted passage from Barron’s - September 6, 2021
Feel free to add other opinions from Barron’s or other sources / pundits you may follow.

We are looking at building a portfolio that can not be changed for 5 years looking ahead from today (other than rebalancing). It might be helpful to include VWINX in the mix because it doesn't rely on a five year continuation from today of out-performance principally related to market behavior during the recent central bank supported stock market melt-up. VWINX has performed well since 1977 through many types of market conditions. And, looking at the 2008 to early 2009 stock market catastrophe suggests it may outperform again when the next catastrophe occurs -- if it doesn't outperform again before then.
Here is a picture that looks at the performance of VWINX and the mixed asset funds in the Catastrophe Portfolio since 9/25/2002 which is the inception date for COTZX (FAYZX is omitted due to its short life).

I too have Fido Vang and Schwab accounts, but to avoid lots of funds spread all over, I try to run each account with a specific philosophy. It is very difficult to track dozens of positions if you do not have a benchmark to compare the account to.
VWINX generally is one of the funds I compare conservative positions and allocations to, but one of the reasons it has worked so long is the ballast from bonds that have had a wonderful 30 years. If rates risk and the market falls, I doubt VNIX will out preform

Finishing the comment from above: I love reading the monthly discussions from Mr. Bolin. He is providing a very useful information month after month. There always so insightful and analytical Yet it can be difficult to construct a portfolio because each month brings some new funds and different analyses. It would be very useful if he would have some specific portfolios and up date recommended changes when he thinks it's necessary.
This months catastrophe portfolio is compelling, and one I may invest in for the long term. As a retiree of many years its just what I want.

Kiplinger says that Vanguard and TRP "declined to participate". Perhaps what this means is that Kiplinger is still waiting on their customer service departments for responses:-)

That is funny. TRP has cut back on many services. I used able to access many M* tool including Portfolio X-ray. Guess my asset base is not high enough to qualify as their valuable customers. instead of talking with a live representative, I use their on-line chat or message system. Not exactly fast, but I get them to answer my questions.

For years now, I have had access to M* tools including Portfolio x-ray on T Rowe Price. I think the only tool that I do not have access to is the analyst report. I have never had an account with T Rowe Price.

JR writes in essence that minor discrepancies among multiple sources of data are on the same order of magnitude as the difference between multiplicative and additive calculations. So don't sweat it.
I'll decompose that because I disagree with two out of three parts:
1. Data sources will be inconsistent. While true, that's a problem that can be circumvented by using a single data source containing all the necessary data.
Shiller's data contains:
a. CPI-U by month - so one can calculate inflation over any period of time
b. Earnings (E) by month - so one can calculate earnings growth over any period of time
c. S&P price (P) by month - so one can calculate P/E by month and thus multiple expansion over any period of time
d. Dividends (D) by month, so one can calculate D/P (dividend rate) over any period of time.
(JR adds another source of discrepancy; for earnings growth he cites a source for the entire economy, not for the S&P 500.)
2. The order of magnitude of these discrepancies is roughly the same as that of percentage differences when comparing multiplicative and additive results.
That is, if one factor adds 3%/year and another factor adds 2%/year, we can combine them by adding and get a 5%/year gain, or we can multiple them to get (1+3%) x (1 + 2%) - 1 = 5.06%. It's just a small difference and comparable to differences introduced by using multiple data sources. Granted.
3. The percentages (which may be off slightly due to #2) are unchanged over time. For example, if one factor accounts for 2% of the gain in a year and another factor accounts for 3% of the gain in a year, the same will be true over 45 years. That is, compounding the returns doesn't change the factor impacts (here 40%:60%).
This is wrong, and this is the main point I've been driving at.
Consider inflation and multiplier expansion. For simplicity, we'll assume that no divs are paid and earnings don't grow.
Annualized rates are: Inflation 3.51% and multiple expansion 2.19% (from original column)
To allocate weights, we just take each value's percentage of the sum total.
Inflation accounts for 3.51/5.70 = 62% of the total, and
multiple expansion accounts for 2.19/5.70 = 38% of the total.
After 45 years, inflation has increased the price by (1.0351)^45 - 1 = 372%, and
multiple expansion has increase the price by (1.0219)^45 - 1 = 165%
Over 45 years, inflation accounts for 372/537 = 69% of the total, and
multiple expansion accounts for 165/537 = 31% of the total.
One cannot allocate percentage impacts by using annualized figures. Compounded over time, the larger factors loom ever larger while the smaller factors play less and less of a role. The reason for this is compounding, i.e. multiplying, rather than adding returns.
Worth a mention: None of these items obscure the general pattern. Tinker with them all, and inflation still comes out as the largest factor, followed by profits, then dividends, then multiple expansion
He looked at a 45 year period. But when we take the longer view, more than double that time, i.e. a century, the general pattern shifts. Dividends are more important than inflation.
Over 45+ years, annualized inflation is 3.51% and average dividend rate is 2.75% (I get 2.77%).
Over a century, annualized inflation is 2.77% and average dividend rate is 3.83%.
I won't bore you with the formulas, but I will make it easy for you to reproduce and check. Using Shiller's spreadsheet, here are the four expressions needed:
Jan 1976 - March 2021:
inflation =POWER(E1811 / E1268,1/45.25)-1
av div rate =SUMPRODUCT(C1269:C1811,1/B1269:B1811)/(45.25 * 12)
July 1921 - June 2021:
inflation =POWER(E1814/E614,12/1200)
av div rate =SUMPRODUCT(C615:C1814,1/B615:B1814)/(100 * 12)

But FIDO hopes you've at least thought about an exit strategy. I consider this thoughtful of them.
One may imagine the message you would have received from a RobinHood account.
"Don't you want to buy some more?" "You call yourself an investor?" "Looks like a pretty chicken s#*@ trade to our system."

Robinhood: "buy more! Don't you want to earn some confetti animations and more badges!"
[producer, to the director's earpiece]: "Because RH needs the order flow since 80% of quarterly revenue came from it."

WTF are badges? I've been using RH for more than 5 years and never heard of them.
I really don't get the hate on RH. People using the platform do benefit from PFOF in aggregate; I've also used Fidelity for 10+ years and have cumulatively saved less than $1 for "price improvements" because of their "better" execution.

If Vanguard has spent $1B on technology the results are thus far invisible to me, as in absolutely no difference over the past few years (except for glitches they have had to reverse).

I personally have not seen any technology updates which have improved my Vanguard experience.

Meanwhile, Fidelity’s on hiring binge.
Re TRP …
- One might attribute the poor customer support to Covid restrictions. I accepted that for nearly a year before recognizing their problems were deeper seated. I’ve tried unsuccessfully to uncover if in recent years perhaps they’ve out-sourced their phone support? I ask because 10-15 years back it was fairly easy to get kicked up to a manager. And usually that resulted in substantive results - be it a direct from the top answer about operations or resolution of some personal beef. But in recent years there seemed no continuity to the phone support operations. As others may have noted, sometimes different reps appear to be working at cross-purpose.
- The “nasties” in customer support seem apart from their outstanding investing capabilities. And their stock price has soared - up about 35% YTD by one report . If you can save $$ on the customer support, that’s extra cash in the pockets of investors in the company.

If Vanguard has spent $1B on technology the results are thus far invisible to me, as in absolutely no difference over the past few years (except for glitches they have had to reverse). Meanwhile they have been disinvesting in customer service. Backasswards is right.

Does anyone suppose that manager longevity not only relates to their performance success but also to their access to businesses and company managers they've built up over the years? I tend to think that the likes of Danoff, Tillinghast, Miller, etc., etc. might have quicker or easier access to their time and insight.
I forgot to add that I had owned Fidelitys Contrafund FCNTX since roughly 1982. I was generally always pleased with its performance and saw little reason to change until it became quite massive in AUM and returns seemed to track that of the S&P500 +/- a percent or two here and there. Two years ago I sold a good chunk and invested the proceeds into BIAWX. Since then BIAWX has returned 83.82% to 47.61% for FCNTX. It has been a reasonable exchange so far.

I don't know how one chooses.
Isn't that really the point? That one doesn't know, except in hindsight, whether one's manager will be there tomorrow, whether a fund's method is "solid" or will change, or even if it doesn't change whether it will continue to be successful over time or in the next bear market or whatever.
Sticking with an investment should involve continual evaluation. Is this a fund I would buy today? If not, then why am I holding it?
Out of curiosity, I ran a screen for funds that currently have a manager who has been there for at least two decades. Aside from five oddball funds without star ratings, the remaining 144 distinct funds break down as:
5 star: 10 funds, 7%
4 star: 30 funds, 21%
3 star: 50 funds, 35%
2 star: 34 funds, 24%
1 star: 20 funds, 14%
The M* "neutral" distribution is 10%/22.5%/35%/22.5%/10%. This is about as close to that as one would expect to get when pulling 144 funds out of a hat. Longevity would appear to count for nothing. Perhaps even less than nothing, given survival bias (funds that stay around for decades tend to be better performing ones, so these should have skewed toward more stars).
There are several funds in the list that I recognize. A couple are:
LLPFX, "One of the best mutual funds in history" - Jaffe, 2/6/2000. This fund, along with its sibling LLSCX have had the same managers for over three decades. Both are currently rated 1 star.
TEFQX (Firsthand e-Commerce Fund until May 2010): "[M*'s] top rated 5 star funds were all technology and telecom funds that met investors fancy 2 1/2 years ago [mid 1997]. This led to their subscribers pouring money into the Janus and Firsthand Funds". TEFQX not only survived, but is currently rated 4*.
However, Kevin Landis' Firsthand funds generally imploded. His flagship Technology Value Fund (TVFQX) was converted into a business development company, technically not even a registered investment company. That happened not as a result of the dot com bust, but as a result of the GFC years later.
This is all a long winded way of saying that I agree, one can't know how to choose. As a corollary, one can't know whether to stay the course.
Regarding Fidelity's management turnover (i.e. expectation that a new fund manager would still at the fund a few years later), late 80s/early 90s:

This is typical: A look through Fidelity's long list of equity funds finds only about six managers who have been managing the same fund for five years or more. A tenure of one to three years for one fund is much more common, though most managers have been with Fidelity longer than that, graduating from one fund to another.

June 15, 1992
https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1992-06-15-9202140732-story.html

My initial sentiment was only about sticking with solid method over time.
Your initial post showed how wonderful FLPSX was compared with other funds you considered as alternative investments at the time of a market peak (give or take). The fund navigated that one bear market (2000-2002) exceedingly well, even gaining in value. In all other bear markets during the fund's lifetime, it roughly paced the market:
July 16, 1990 - Oct 16, 1990: -17.46% vs. -19.9% for S&P 500
March 24, 2000 - Oct 9, 2002: +18.05% vs. -49.1%
Oct 9, 2007 - March 9, 2009: -53.64% vs. -56.8%
Feb 19, 2020 - March 23, 2020: -36.85% vs -35%
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/14/a-look-at-bear-and-bull-markets-through-history.html
https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/stock-market-sp500-hits-record-high-intraday-bear-market-recovery-2020-8
That one fluke does suggest that "Perhaps it is all luck" after all. Its "solid method" of investing didn't help it reproduce that success in other bear markets. Take away that one fluke and I think you'll find FLPSX 's performance is right in line with that of some good funds and below that of some others.
If the intent of the initial post was to show that funds with "solid methods" perform well, what was the purpose of including FAIRX? It hardly seems like a fund with a "solid method" of investing, at least not in recent years.
Rather than illustrate your thesis, FAIRX seems to act as a counterexample - that funds with lousy methods of investing can do as well as funds with solid methods.
Has he not largely adhered to the fund name?
FLPSX was a small cap fund for about half its lifetime. It managed to remain focused on small caps through the early 2000s even as AUM exploded. It used the tactic of buying more and more different small caps to spread out the money. This tactic ran out of steam when it hit 1,000 different companies.
As I recall, Fidelity explained that the fund was investing in a significant number of mid and large cap companies not because it had grown too large, but because it was remaining true to its "solid method". It claimed that its investing discipline naturally led to invest in larger cap stocks due to market conditions at the time. Ultimately Fidelity had to drop this charade and acknowledge that the fund had morphed into a mid cap fund.
With respect to adhering to its name, "Tillinghast concedes that Low-Priced, which purchases only stocks that sell for $35 a share or less, is 'a bit of a gimmick.'"
https://www.kiplinger.com/article/investing/t041-c000-s002-small-and-mid-cap-funds.html

Let us propose that in the late 1980s or early 1990s we were persuaded, from press or elsewhere, that this guy Tillinghast was worth giving some money too.
Using performance since inception, an objective time frame, is a definite improvement over using a subjectively chosen date in the middle of 2000.
In a similar vein, my "horse changing" date was also objective. When a fund is reclassified, especially if due to increased girth, it's a time for owners to examine what they own. Tillinghast had increased the fund's holdings to over 1,000 securities; he had exhausted this tactic.
Ah, there is a same-house fund that has matched or beaten Tillinghast: FCNTX.
If we're playing this what if, hypothetical game, what would have persuaded you to invest in FLPSX at inception, in a fund and in a manager with no track record? We can hypothesize anything, but it would help if it were believable. Likewise, what would have persuaded you to have invested in FCNTX?
At least that fund had a track record, albeit with three managers over its five year life span (as of 1989). That included its then current manager who had just taken over at the beginning of 1989, and who, like Tillinghast had no prior fund management experience.
To add insult to injury, both those funds sported a 3% load at the time.
https://www.thestreet.com/personal-finance/fidelity-removes-loads-from-five-funds-10095722
In Dec 1989 (when FLPSX started), if one were perusing the press, one could not have helped but be impressed by Lynch's fund. Alas, FMAGX was closed. But there was another LCG fund aggressively implemented lookin' good.
FDGRX had a manager with ten years experience, the last two managing this fund. And from its inception in Jan 1983 through Dec 1989, it was blowing away FCNTX, 219% to 157% cumulative returns.
None of this is to say that these are not all fine funds. But in the late 80s/early 90s, Fidelity was rotating managers like crazy. There was no expectation that any manager would be around for a long time. Just look at FCNTX, with its three managers in five years before it settled on Danoff. Magellan was the exception.

Good stuff. Hard to believe Giroux has been running the fund for near 15 years. I have a modest weighting in PRWCX along with about the same amount in DODBX.
Read D&C’s semi-annual last evening. They have the fund invested 66% in equities. Their stocks overall have a much lower average PE than the S&P. In fact, they hold a 4% short position on the S&P which they see as overvalued. They like financials (which do well when interest rates are rising) but have sold some off recently. Also overweight energy.
Here’s a brief (possibly “suspect”) quotation: “The equity portfolio’s composition is very different from the overall market, and trades at a meaningful discount to both the broad-based market and value universe: 13.9 times forward earnings compared to 22.3 times for the S&P 500 and 17.9 times for the R1000V. Stocks that benefit from rising interest rates are currently trading at particularly low relative valuations, and represent an area of emphasis for the portfolio.”
LINK to June 30, 2021 Report /// DODBX
Apologies for any thread drift. Hard for me to view one fund without comparing it to the other, as both are integral to my approach.