Are you a seller or a keeper?

K

KVT

Joined
Feb 17, 2019
Messages
1,216
When I first got into knives, I should’ve ran the other way. Er, I mean, I used to sell a knife for every 5 or so I bought.

Over time my tastes have been honed and I know what I’ll like and not like. I’m usually right. I also have a few regrets on some I sold. I make a few purchase mistakes every now and then, but for the most part I love most knives I buy.

So much so, I cannot seem to part with any of them. This has been a horrible financial decision and it just does not stop.

I’ve amassed quite a number of knives with no signs of slowing down. I’ve run out of room multipl times and I just seem to make more.

Sure there’s 3 or 4 knives I wouldn’t mind parting with - mainly a few cheapies that were dumb buys. It’s almost not worth the hassle to make the $20-$30 I might get selling them.

Anybody else a keeper?

Or do flip knives on the regular?
 
Both

One out, two in. Two out, one in. Keep them flowing and hold onto the ones that work well for whatever the need.

I have given many a Esee 3 or 4 to friend's / co workers and will continue to do so.

Chasing knives is part of the fun. Could be worse vices I guess.

Here’s a picture. Siegle’s. I have a hypothetical use for all of them ( I only really use one of them though 😂).

330990B3-B943-4FE2-80A9-72B4F146545B.jpeg
 
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I look at part of my collection as a well stocked knife store. At any time, I can go in and browse, and pick the one I want to try out.

The other part of my collection is a museum. It has historical knives, of which I’m the curator. I go in and look at them, wonder were they been, the stories they could tell.

Everyone of them I bought for a reason. If I sold one, It would leave a hole.

There are worse ways to spend money. With that said, I’m pretty much done buying. Unless very specific knives are made that add to complete sets I already have.

I’m not starting any new sets.
 
My missus says I'm a keeper...

Oh you mean knives? I sell some, give some away and keep few. I don't like unnecessary clutter, so besides a handful of sentimental knives, my "collection" is very sparse. Been carrying the same folder 95% of the time for nearly 2 years now and I'm looking at upgrading to a knife with better steel. Once I've upgraded, I'll sell or give away the other knife. I don't own many knives anymore.
 
Every few years I seem to purge the collection only to then accumulate more down the road. This cycle has been going on for nearly 30 years now with no signs of letting up anytime soon.
 
I'm a keeper!!I sold a few of my more popular collectable knives years ago while laid off for a while to cover medical stuff but for the most part I keep what I buy because I like them!!!

Haven't counted in a bit but I'm pushing 80 knives now I think!!!!!
 
KVT said:
When I first got into knives, I should’ve ran the other way. Er, I mean, I used to sell a knife for every 5 or so I bought.

Over time my tastes have been honed and I know what I’ll like and not like. I’m usually right. I also have a few regrets on some I sold. I make a few purchase mistakes every now and then, but for the most part I love most knives I buy.

So much so, I cannot seem to part with any of them. This has been a horrible financial decision and it just does not stop.

I’ve amassed quite a number of knives with no signs of slowing down. I’ve run out of room multipl times and I just seem to make more.

Sure there’s 3 or 4 knives I wouldn’t mind parting with - mainly a few cheapies that were dumb buys. It’s almost not worth the hassle to make the $20-$30 I might get selling them.

Anybody else a keeper?

Or do flip knives on the regular?
Click to expand...

^^^All of this^^^
 
I don’t sell knives often, but I have sold a lot in the past.

Really got into knives when I was about 16, starting off with a Buck 119. Amassed a somewhat sizable collection, about 40-50 knives or so, including some fairly nice stuff (for some reason I ended up with a ton of high-end 1990s-era ATS-34 folders) and then sold nearly all of it when I graduated high school and realized the Buck 119 was the only knife I was actually using.

I’m 24 now and have re-built a decent collection, but I now have much more refined taste and select the knives I buy with a lot more precision. The result is that I really only get knives I love and truly use. Good, comfortable fixed blades. Before, I used to acquire a whole range of stuff I would have no desire to use.

Right now my “to get” list is pretty small. I just got the Dave Beck custom I wanted, so what’s left on my list is a Cardwell custom order, and some very specific Gossmans and a Rod Garcia.

Pretty much nothing of my current collection will leave me. What I don’t like, I have already sold.

Edit:
Talk about good luck! A few hours ago I managed to jump on Scott’s latest drop and picked up a Polaris in Magnacut with a Python handle. The Polaris is a grail for me and has been at the top of my list for a long while now.

Very happy, and now I have an even smaller “to get” list.
 
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I recently flipped almost my entire collection in the pursuit of quality over quantity. Nothing wrong with having lots of knives, but I wanted to focus on knives that I felt like were more time-tested designs (very subjective haha) instead of chasing shiny new objects.

When I first got into this hobby a few years ago, I couldn't imagine spending much more than $100 on a knife, and I amassed a collection of about 20+ folders...mostly budget offerings from the likes of Civivi, Kizer, Petrified Fish, etc. There's a lot available at the sub-$100 price point these days, and it was fun to experiment with different steels, scale materials, blade shapes, locking mechanisms, and deployment methods and find out what I enjoyed without spending a lot.

But this year I caught the Spyderco bug bad and wound up selling almost all of my budget collection so I could step up to more mid-tier offerings from their range: Manix 2, PM2, Native Chief, and Endura. I've also got a Shaman on the way, plus a TRM Atom, and an MBK Old Guard. Nothing particularly special about any of these - they're all production knives. But they are all designs that have been around for a while and make use of higher quality materials. All on washers too - I have realized that I prefer that over bearings for the most part.

As I started acquiring nicer knives, my budget models wound up just sitting there. So for me selling my knives was less about money - honestly I didn't even come close to breaking even. But it felt worth it to me to clear some clutter and get them to new homes where they will hopefully get used. It was freeing to realize that I didn't have to keep something that wasn't "sparking my joy" anymore lol. But that's just me!

I'm hoping to keep these newer acquisitions around long term, so I don't know that I'll be selling knives at the same volume in the future. But who knows, maybe I'll wind up selling all of these eventually to buy knives in the next price tier! 🤣 I'm know I wouldn't be the first!
 
The first thing is to curb the impulse buys, those cause the most financial trouble for me and end up being the knives that I will dump.

Controlling impulse buys (oh its so cheap! Oh its a drop! Oh its a limited edition!) Is difficult and I've made some small gains.

Letting go knives is hard. I usually try to give myself a good reason, like family vacation, savings account needs to hit a certain number, drawers running out of room, someone staring me in the eye saying "YOU HAVE TOO MANY DAMN KNIVES"....whatever works.

For every knife I buy, I give away 0.60 away and sell 0.30...It's not 1 yet, but I'm getting there.

What is this, knifeaholic anonymous?
 
Keeper, I mean well when I say I will thin the herd, but it does it happen. I try to stay true to the belief of buy one sell/give away two, but finding the ones to let go is hard.
 
I've always considered myself a User.....
Not a Collector.

Well, after buying Lots of knives, I think that's changed some?

Currently, since I found out thAt I can Make them, I have Too Many!

I recently had the question of "What knives do Makers buy?"
but I was afraid to ask that. People have different reasons for not sharing info.


I can tell you I keep some for scale, for reference, for study.

I'm pondering getting rid of most, of what isn't Mine.


After all, I have Many Many Thousands of knives.
(In my head)
;)
 
I am a keeper, mainly because I’m far too unmotivated (ok, lazy) to go about selling something online. In my 45+ years on this planet, I’ve not yet done a person to person transaction over the internet, and I likely never will.
 
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