"the tone was clearly way superior to anything else in the shop."

Given the number of mandolins in the average shop, such a comparison doesn't really amount to much.

As for "coiling strings the other way round", in my limited experience, (barely 40+ years of mandolin and 50 of guitar playing) I find that strings tend to unwind when you take them out of the packet. The only ones which didn't were the late lamented "Nashville Straights" which came already unwound in a long thin cardboard box!