Are there any concerns regarding ordering a knife from Amazon.com?

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Klein Helmer

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Hello everyone,

I made a thread a few days ago asking for help in selecting my first knife. I got some great responses and I think I now know which model (well, it is between two, the ZT 0200, and the Adamas 275) I will purchase. I have been doing some searching online, and it seems like I can in either case find better prices from sites other than the manufacturers'. Have any of you had any experience ordering knives from Knifecenter, BladeHQ, or Amazon? If there is any reason to question their reliability I will just spend the extra money and order directly from the makers.

Thank you, and thanks again to all of the people who taught me so much about these knives,

- Helmer
 
Knifecenter and BladeHQ are fine. The website with the same name as that one river has good prices sometimes but you always have to pay tax so it's not worth it for high end knives. Also, if you choose their free shipping option, you can't choose which shipping service they use, even with Prime, so sometimes you get some crappy services. We had Ontrac one time and when they missed us they left it with a neighbor. I much prefer BladeHQ and KC, but BHQ leaves user passwords unencrypted on their servers so I don't feel safe leaving my billing info on there so I delete it after every order.
 
I have had nothing but good results from knifecenter, knifeworks, bladehq, and gpknives. I have had good results from amazon but once I recived a knife that was scratched up like someone had played with it or used it at the warehouse or maybe even returned it, it was a all black spyderco manix 2. It was sold from amazon not a seller thru amazon
 
When you order from that South American river site, your order may get farmed out to be fulfilled by a seller who may not be on the up and up. My advice would be to stick with any of the sites mentioned above. That's my $0.02.
 
I always order from BladeHQ. I've ordered about 3 knives from amazon and they all had funky grinds. May have been a coincidence, but 3 in a row from different sellers and makes and models is just too much of a coincidence for me.
 
Klein Helmer said:
Hello everyone,

I made a thread a few days ago asking for help in selecting my first knife. I got some great responses and I think I now know which model (well, it is between two, the ZT 0200, and the Adamas 275) I will purchase. I have been doing some searching online, and it seems like I can in either case find better prices from sites other than the manufacturers'. Have any of you had any experience ordering knives from Knifecenter, BladeHQ, or Amazon? If there is any reason to question their reliability I will just spend the extra money and order directly from the makers.

Thank you, and thanks again to all of the people who taught me so much about these knives,

- Helmer
Click to expand...

For future reference, threads like belong in the Feedback forum. We aren't really talking about knives as the primary topic.
 
Smokinape said:
I have heard of people getting fakes from 'zon
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Amazon itself doesn't sell fakes. Amazon has 3rd party sellers who may or may not be reputable, just like ebay. However, Amazon's return policy is quite good.


bobs1415 said:
When you order from that South American river site, your order may get farmed out to be fulfilled by a seller who may not be on the up and up. My advice would be to stick with any of the sites mentioned above. That's my $0.02.
Click to expand...

That's not how Amazon works. If you place an order and it says "sold by Amazon" then the order is not farmed out. The order is fulfilled by Amazon. If you place an order with a 3rd party seller then your order is fulfilled by that particular 3rd party seller - the one you chose. It's not a random ordering system. You pick the specific vendor you want.

I've had no problems buying from Amazon or 3rd party sellers on Amazon.
 
The only problem with Amazon is that they are not a dedicated knife store. What this means is that they really don't know what to look for. Many people have reported buying a knife that was sold as new, yet it arrived only to appear used or carried. This may have gotten better, however the most memorable instance was with a Benchmade 710. A person bought the knife and it arrived with distinct scratches and marks on the clip, blade and handle. It was sent back, not long after another person bought the same model from Amazon and received the exact same knife that had the same scratch patterns in 3 places. Sometimes it's just not worth it to save a couple bucks when this sort of thing happens. It is my preference to buy from our supporting dealers, as they know their business and help support our community.
 
Have only had one problem ordering a knife from Amazon out of maybe a dozen knife purchases (all Spyderco, Kershaw, Victorinox), and the problem clearly was caused during manufacturing.

Actually, I emailed the company, and the best they could do was blame me (for abuse of a brand new knife, still oil on the blade and all) and said I could send it in. I filled out an exchange form on Amazon instead, and they sent out a new one before I had even sent it back (you get 30 days to send it back). So, in my experience, Amazon has better customer service than at least one major knife company.
edit:Also they pay for shipping back, so there's no out of pocket cost for an exchange.
 
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You aren't going to get anyone from amazon willing to hand pick a cherry knife for you like any knife stores are willing to do. It is worth it to pay a few bucks more to help support the knife community especially when they provide added services like that IMO.
 
Morrow said:
For future reference, threads like belong in the Feedback forum. We aren't really talking about knives as the primary topic.
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Sorry about that.

Thanks for the heads up.

RevDevil said:
The only problem with Amazon is that they are not a dedicated knife store. What this means is that they really don't know what to look for. Many people have reported buying a knife that was sold as new, yet it arrived only to appear used or carried. This may have gotten better, however the most memorable instance was with a Benchmade 710. A person bought the knife and it arrived with distinct scratches and marks on the clip, blade and handle. It was sent back, not long after another person bought the same model from Amazon and received the exact same knife that had the same scratch patterns in 3 places. Sometimes it's just not worth it to save a couple bucks when this sort of thing happens. It is my preference to buy from our supporting dealers, as they know their business and help support our community.
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Are those the people in the Manufacturers' Forum?

Brisket said:
You aren't going to get anyone from amazon willing to hand pick a cherry knife for you like any knife stores are willing to do. It is worth it to pay a few bucks more to help support the knife community especially when they provide added services like that IMO.
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Interesting.

How would I go about asking for someone to find me a cherry knife? Is that the sort of thing you can only get from a physical retail store, or could I make such a request at a place like BladeHQ or Knifecenter?
 
These folks. My experience may echo that of other members, but most if not all the dealers listed would gladly check and hand pick a specific knife (if stock permits) for you. That would assure that you get yourself one of the very best pieces available.
 
RevDevil said:
The only problem with Amazon is that they are not a dedicated knife store. What this means is that they really don't know what to look for. Many people have reported buying a knife that was sold as new, yet it arrived only to appear used or carried. This may have gotten better, however the most memorable instance was with a Benchmade 710. A person bought the knife and it arrived with distinct scratches and marks on the clip, blade and handle. It was sent back, not long after another person bought the same model from Amazon and received the exact same knife that had the same scratch patterns in 3 places. Sometimes it's just not worth it to save a couple bucks when this sort of thing happens. It is my preference to buy from our supporting dealers, as they know their business and help support our community.
Click to expand...

Yup, this happened to me before I knew what I was doing as far as buying knives online.
I often wonder if they buy other dealers returns and sell them as new.
Two Spydercos that I bought from them didn't even have the plastic sleeve or the normal paperwork included.
 
I live in the middle of nowhere. It is literally 125 miles to the nearest shopping center, 80 miles to the nearest Wally World, further to the nearest knife store. So, I do a lot of business with Amazon. Over the years I have bought 10s of thousands of items from them. From clothes to food to durable goods. Even knives. Things that people can just jump in their car and go get, I have to order - so I order a lot.

That said, I try to first deal with dedicated knife sources such as Knifeworks, KivesShipFree, Northwest Knives, and others. But sometimes it is just easier to buy certain types of knives from Amazon and their prices are usually pretty good. I expect that I have purchased around 20% or so of my knives from them, mostly less expensive knives.

The thing is, I have never had a problem returning ANY item back to Amazon if purchased directly from Amazon. They take any item back within 30 days, for any reason. If the item is damaged, they even pay shipping on the return. There was a mention above about 3rd party sellers. Amazon clearly labels such on the product description page. You won't buy from a 3rd party thinking you were buying from Amazon unless you fail to read the product description. It is right there above the "buy" button.

That said, Rev is exactly right. Amazon will just grab a knife out of the bin and send it to you. They are not knife people. But then, unless you make a specific request, that is what most of the knife dealers do as well. Amazon just makes it very easy to return items to them. There is a reason that Amazon is at the top of the JD Power customer service ratings every year.

Bottom line: I prefer buying knives from dedicated knife dealers - especially better knives - but do not have a concern buying from Amazon when necessary. They are great people to do business with. Over many, many years every issue that I have had (and you will have issues with any company at some point) has been quickly and appropriately dealt with in my favor. But I would suggest buying from those folks that support this site as a first choice and use Amazon as a 2nd choice. That is usually the best move.

Best of luck.
 
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Esav Benyamin said:
No, manufacturers generally charge MSRP (Manufacturers Suggested Retail Price). Dealers can discount this. Internet dealers almost always do. Bladeforums Dealer members are the most reliable and will price competitively.

Paid Bladeforums Dealer members:
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/forumdisplay.php/761-For-Sale-by-Dealers
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/935876-***List-Of-Bladeforums-Dealers***
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RevDevil said:
These folks. My experience may echo that of other members, but most if not all the dealers listed would gladly check and hand pick a specific knife (if stock permits) for you. That would assure that you get yourself one of the very best pieces available.
Click to expand...

SaintlyBrees said:
I live in the middle of nowhere. It is literally 125 miles to the nearest shopping center, 80 miles to the nearest Wally World, further to the nearest knife store. So, I do a lot of business with Amazon. Over the years I have bought 10s of thousands of items from them. From clothes to food to durable goods. Even knives. Things that people can just jump in their car and go get, I have to order - so I order a lot.

That said, I try to first deal with dedicated knife sources such as Knifeworks, KivesShipFree, Northwest Knives, and others. But sometimes it is just easier to buy certain types of knives from Amazon and their prices are usually pretty good. I expect that I have purchased around 20% or so of my knives from them, mostly less expensive knives.

The thing is, I have never had a problem returning ANY item back to Amazon if purchased directly from Amazon. They take any item back within 30 days, for any reason. If the item is damaged, they even pay shipping on the return. There was a mention above about 3rd party sellers. Amazon clearly labels such on the product description page. You won't buy from a 3rd party thinking you were buying from Amazon unless you fail to read the product description. It is right there above the "buy" button.

That said, Rev is exactly right. Amazon will just grab a knife out of the bin and send it to you. They are not knife people. But then, unless you make a specific request, that is what most of the knife dealers do as well. Amazon just makes it very easy to return items to them. There is a reason that Amazon is at the top of the JD Power customer service ratings every year.

Bottom line: I prefer buying knives from dedicated knife dealers - especially better knives - but do not have a concern buying from Amazon when necessary. They are great people to do business with. Over many, many years every issue that I have had (and you will have issues with any company at some point) has been quickly and appropriately dealt with in my favor. But I would suggest buying from those folks that support this site as a first choice and use Amazon as a 2nd choice. That is usually the best move.

Best of luck.
Click to expand...

Great info.

I really appreciate it.
 
I buy at least half or more of my knives on Amazon, just because they often have the best price. I've never had the slightest prob. When you pay to be a "Prime" member, you get 2 day free shipping, and their customer service is unsurpassed. On two occasions when we had to make a return (non knife items), Amazon shipped the new item before we had shipped the old item back to them. I like our Bladeforum dealers, but when I can save money at Amazon, I'm not going to pass it up. Sprint runs, etc., I'll buy where I can get it.
 
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