Best and Worst Customer Service Experiences?

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VorpelSword

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I have got on at length about a sub-optimal experience I had some twenty years ago . . .so I won't repeat it here.

I do have three pretty good ones from the recent past though:

Buck just returned a m ore than forty year old 112 bought at an "antique" store. Thheir Spa Care was reasonable at ~$6 and the knife. is now fully functional and looks as good as it can for what it is.

last year (I think) I sent off a William Henry for similar treatment. I got the knife as an estate find and it had been EDC-ed by someone for quite a while, showing pocket wear. The WH customer service folks repaired a broken bit, sharpened and polished it up real nice. Cost me under $40 all in.

A few years earlier, the folks at Chris reeve were willing to go the extra mile for me on a custom engraving on aa Sebenza 3 just before Christmas. I chose to defer that for another time . . .but they were right there for me and would have gotten it done and back in time.

And so . . .what Customer Service experiences have you had lately good or bad?
 
Worst: Kunwu knives … they don’t stand behind their product. As with most Chinese owned companies, you are on your own if any issue arise. In this case I found a manufacturing defect (bad CNC milling) on the $400 Excalibur I owned. They told me to kick rocks and that it “wasn’t a defect”.

Best: CRK never disappoints. The best in the business in my opinion. I recently sent them several knives that the previous owner installed red loctite. They replaced all the hardware and barely charged me for the replacement. Knives came back as good as new.
 
Best: Mick/Josh at Strider Knives, got my knives back from Duane but also always fixed my other gear in a reasonable time
Worst: Duane Dwyer, he likes keeping knives sent to him to fix
 
Let me start by telling you that I own a CJRB Frack, a CJRB Tundra and a CJRB Double Tap. All three are amazing knives. So, the day that Artisan Cutlery announced the Darkwing Kickstarter campaign (May 5th, 2026), I started trying to contact them with a pre-sales question. It is now two weeks later with no answer to any of the queries that I made via multiple emails and many telephone calls. There is conflicting info posted about the blades on the Blackwing and the Hellwing. Are they PVD or is one DLC, or are they simply painted black and tumbled? This is a simple question that could have been answered in a single call or email. It’s a kickstarter campaign and I did not want to place an order, only to be disappointed when I received the knife, months later in August. So, I decided to look on Bladeforums and other places for any info on Artisan/CJRB and how to successfully contact them for blade clarification; and I was extremely disturbed with what I found. There were MANY instances where people were unable to contact Artisan/CJRB via any means. And, unfortunately, these queries were all from people who purchased knives directly from Artisan/CJRB and received no response when trying to access warranty or replacement services. Many of them were failed Pyrite button locks and other knife fails. Based on what was posted in many places, the general consensus is that customer service is non-existent at Artisan/CJRB. Some waited months or even years for an initial response to their simple queries; and many wound up using credit card chargebacks to resolve their situations. In addition, I just looked at Artisan’s corporate address and it’s a UPS store. You really can’t put any customer service reps in a mail drop mailbox, so I will assume that they have absolutely no physical presence in the United States. Reading these comments was truly disturbing and made no sense for a company who’s knives have been nothing short of amazing, so I just don’t understand. Maybe I was lucky and received good examples; as I read in a few places that they produce a lot of “lemons” that are shipped to people on a regular basis. This is sad as the Darkwing looks like a great knife. Fortunately, there are hundreds of other knife companies that would love to take my $259; and would gladly and quickly answer any pre-sales question posed to them. It looks like Artisan/CJRB needs to hire a customer service department as they will just lose business and everyone’s confidence by ignoring sales and customer service calls. I for one will be looking elsewhere to spend my hard earned cash. 😞
 
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