Concerns About Survive! Business and Misleading Lead Time Estimates

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mlmcasual said:
I hope not. What you are describing would be a form of a Ponzi scheme.
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And that was the concern many of us voiced years ago. PayPal refunds are nearly instantaneous if you have the money. If you can't refund money right away it is because you don't have the money or you are ignoring the request. Either way not good.
 
Considering they have already stated they are paying bills from weekly sales it would seem they are waiting on sales from the 7/7 and LE in order to be able to make refunds. Which would mean all of the pre order money is gone, With all of these to go:


GSO-12: We have steel
GSO-6: We have steel
GSO-4.5 Bushcraft Knife: We have steel
GSO-10: We have steel
GSO-8: We have steel
GSO-5.1: Waiting on more steel
The Necker II: Waiting for steel
The SURVIVE! Necker: Waiting for steel

Of course they have seen this thread. They are simply ignoring it because they have no ground to stand on and lies will just come back to bite you sooner or later. Survive! has always priced their knives too cheap, I know people will howl about that but it is true, The second gens should be at least 30% higher. The Seconds I have I cannot find a single solitary thing wrong with them. The 4.7 I paid 315.00 for and I consider it a bargain considering its fit, finish, and detail. I have hundreds of knives, I can make fair comparisons. It is above the high end Fallkniven and maybe just a hair below Busse Customs. Who knows maybe it will break in half if I drop it on the floor though, that would be my luck. :D

If you can't keep up with demand you either need to increase production capabilities or have hard limits about sales. Unfortunately many people can't see past the dollar signs when sales are rolling in.
They sold much to far in the future with not enough thought given to what it costs to keep the doors open and product regularly flowing and be able to get out of the pre order cycle. It is not enough to just buy materials. There are a million small details from sanding belts to trash bags to deal with. You cannot run a large manufacturing system with no money of your own, it just does not work. They should focus more on that 'Craft' aspect and do micro runs, charge more, plenty of money and no hassles.


Esav suggests less feet to the fire, more light, Ok.

Here's a scenario I've been pondering. Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that they are in the proverbial hole with water pouring in but are salvageable, how many people would invest in Survive! at that point? I don't mean buy more products with no delivery date, that formula obviously does not work, but actually invest hard cash with a delayed small return to make them viable? Personally I could put in 25-30k towards the effort but they would need to have someone else managing the show while Guy just focuses on production which seems to be where his talent is. Wonder how much money it would take?
 
Skystorm said:
Esav suggests less feet to the fire, more light, Ok.

Here's a scenario I've been pondering. Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that they are in the proverbial hole with water pouring in but are salvageable, how many people would invest in Survive! at that point? I don't mean buy more products with no delivery date, that formula obviously does not work, but actually invest hard cash with a delayed small return to make them viable? Personally I could put in 25-30k towards the effort but they would need to have someone else managing the show while Guy just focuses on production which seems to be where his talent is. Wonder how much money it would take?
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They already did that on a smaller scale with knives except for having someone who knows what they are doing business run things. The basic business problems about staffing and management were brought up years ago. I would hope that the would listen and understand the critique of how they do things now in order to survive but I doubt it. I think anyone throwing investor money at this company would be making a huge mistake. Same with ordering more knives. You are paying for a knife someone else already bought and is owed. The next person is paying for your knife. How far does it go until it all falls apart. Not being able to issue refunds is a sign of this. Edit to add: if the money is there to refund then why isn't it being refunded immediately?
 
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None of this conjecture is helpful.

The fact is, Survive Knives has not delivered per their quoted lead times and despite promises to correct that situation they continue to perform as before. It appears they've applied that same lack of principles to issuing refunds. That is plenty enough to paint them in a poor light without everyone's imagination running wild.
 
I get all that. This was just a hypothetical what if, assuming they were put on a stable platform and paying investors back from actual profits, not additional negative pre orders.



craytab said:
They already did that on a smaller scale with knives except for having someone who knows what they are doing business run things. The basic business problems about staffing and management were brought up years ago. I would hope that the would listen and understand the critique of how they do things now in order to survive but I doubt it. I think anyone throwing investor money at this company would be making a huge mistake. Same with ordering more knives. You are paying for a knife someone else already bought and is owed. The next person is paying for your knife. How far does it go until it all falls apart. Not being able to issue refunds is a sign of this. Edit to add: if the money is there to refund then why isn't it being refunded immediately?
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Citori said:
None of this conjecture is helpful.

The fact is, Survive Knives has not delivered per their quoted lead times and despite promises to correct that situation they continue to perform as before. It appears they've applied that same lack of principles to issuing refunds. That is plenty enough to paint them in a poor light without everyone's imagination running wild.
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You lack of principles explanation is just as much conjecture as the they don't have the money explanation.
 
Was not able to call them yesterday about my refund. However, still heard nothing back, so I have sent another email today. I have provided the invoice #'s and the paypal in which to have my refund sent. Not sure what else I can do at this point. It has been 10 days since my first email to them and I did get a prompt response from Jordyn saying it would take a few days to process. Heard nothing since then, and cannot even get another response from the last 3 emails I have sent. Patience is running very thin...
 
You can file a dispute with Paypal, request a chargeback through your credit card company, start a thread in the GBU, file a complaint with the FTC and the AG of Idaho. There are always options.


Bapple said:
Was not able to call them yesterday about my refund. However, still heard nothing back, so I have sent another email today. I have provided the invoice #'s and the paypal in which to have my refund sent. Not sure what else I can do at this point. It has been 10 days since my first email to them and I did get a prompt response from Jordyn saying it would take a few days to process. Heard nothing since then, and cannot even get another response from the last 3 emails I have sent. Patience is running very thin...
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Skystorm said:
You can file a dispute with Paypal, request a chargeback through your credit card company, start a thread in the GBU, file a complaint with the FTC and the AG of Idaho. There are always options.
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Just one thing to note on that, for those that don't know. SK! has stated they WILL blacklist you if you file any charge disputes and you will be banned from any future SK! purchases from SK. Just an FYI.
 
Always a good business idea to retaliate against your customers for requesting a return of their money for a product you cannot/did not deliver.


mlmcasual said:
Just one thing to note on that, for those that don't know. SK! has stated they WILL blacklist you if you file any charge disputes and you will be banned from any future SK! purchases from SK. Just an FYI.
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Skystorm said:
Here's a scenario I've been pondering. Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that they are in the proverbial hole with water pouring in but are salvageable, how many people would invest in Survive! at that point? I don't mean buy more products with no delivery date, that formula obviously does not work, but actually invest hard cash with a delayed small return to make them viable? Personally I could put in 25-30k towards the effort but they would need to have someone else managing the show while Guy just focuses on production which seems to be where his talent is. Wonder how much money it would take?
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The basic problem is a lack of production. Guy is too slow. If I were considering investing, I would want Guy gone. He is the problem, IMO.
I am not considering investing.

Edit: I appreciate that many here think Guy adds a magic element to the product, raising it above the masses. But doing that on a blade by blade basis isn't production, it is custom work. Therein lies the problem, S!K has taken production factory orders, at factory prices, & pumped out handmade numbers.
 
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Skystorm said:
Always a good business idea to retaliate against your customers for requesting a return of their money for a product you cannot/did not deliver.
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It seems to me to be a way of keeping customers from using financial institutions to get their money back. Customers getting upset and wanting their money back is one thing but banks looking into why you aren't refunding money is a completely different matter.
 
When 1 person is out sick and shipping falters= There's a problem.

When your small business is on the ropes and you're deeply indebted to your customers because of prepayments there's no 2-Day weekends.

When you take orders and payments 2 years out- How do you know what the costs and expenses will be in 2 years time?

It's a real shame because they might not be on the ropes But who knows. The lack of communication is creating a run on the bank and not working in their favor. Now instead of making knives they have to delegate resources to answer emails and process refunds.
 
I don't have any skin in the game but kept reading quite a few posts here. Why am I commenting?
The progression of opinions and feelings are just too similar to another preorder at Kickstarter which I was a part of. The lack of communication was the same and some investors /customers kept holding on until the end and even made excuses for the creators after they publicly declared to have wasted the whole $1mil.
I guess thats what is meant by "hope dies last". Kind of denial and wishful thinking.

Also a handful of overly loud voices got refunds which proves "the squeaky wheel gets the WD40". I would be surprised if the loudest in here have to wait long for their refund and everybody else will feel more relaxed since then things will seem OK again.

While I think the Kickstarter project was designed to funnel money away and only pretend it was wasted I don't see any bad intent here.

The problems might be genuine and they are honestly trying their best effort to turn things around. Now they might not tell us all the details or even do questionable things like "robbing Paul to pay the steel for Peters knife" but they aren't really con men at heart.

I wish them the best and all their customers as well. For me I'll only ever buy existing products from now on. The 20% more is worth the reduced risk of not getting anything at all.
 
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:thumbup:
Skystorm said:
Considering they have already stated they are paying bills from weekly sales it would seem they are waiting on sales from the 7/7 and LE in order to be able to make refunds. Which would mean all of the pre order money is gone, With all of these to go:


GSO-12: We have steel
GSO-6: We have steel
GSO-4.5 Bushcraft Knife: We have steel
GSO-10: We have steel
GSO-8: We have steel
GSO-5.1: Waiting on more steel
The Necker II: Waiting for steel
The SURVIVE! Necker: Waiting for steel

Of course they have seen this thread. They are simply ignoring it because they have no ground to stand on and lies will just come back to bite you sooner or later. Survive! has always priced their knives too cheap, I know people will howl about that but it is true, The second gens should be at least 30% higher. The Seconds I have I cannot find a single solitary thing wrong with them. The 4.7 I paid 315.00 for and I consider it a bargain considering its fit, finish, and detail. I have hundreds of knives, I can make fair comparisons. It is above the high end Fallkniven and maybe just a hair below Busse Customs. Who knows maybe it will break in half if I drop it on the floor though, that would be my luck. :D

If you can't keep up with demand you either need to increase production capabilities or have hard limits about sales. Unfortunately many people can't see past the dollar signs when sales are rolling in.
They sold much to far in the future with not enough thought given to what it costs to keep the doors open and product regularly flowing and be able to get out of the pre order cycle. It is not enough to just buy materials. There are a million small details from sanding belts to trash bags to deal with. You cannot run a large manufacturing system with no money of your own, it just does not work. They should focus more on that 'Craft' aspect and do micro runs, charge more, plenty of money and no hassles.


Esav suggests less feet to the fire, more light, Ok.

Here's a scenario I've been pondering. Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that they are in the proverbial hole with water pouring in but are salvageable, how many people would invest in Survive! at that point? I don't mean buy more products with no delivery date, that formula obviously does not work, but actually invest hard cash with a delayed small return to make them viable? Personally I could put in 25-30k towards the effort but they would need to have someone else managing the show while Guy just focuses on production which seems to be where his talent is. Wonder how much money it would take?
Click to expand...
 
Guy's talent seems to be design, and looking back through the early posts on the forum from several years ago, engaging with customers to generate product interest.

I'd imagine the best thing they could do would be to take him out of a labor position and replace him with a few qualified people, and have him concentrate on overseeing QA, and actually managing the business.

If you're grinding all day, you ain't managing squat.
 
timichango said:
Guy's talent seems to be design, and looking back through the early posts on the forum from several years ago, engaging with customers to generate product interest.

I'd imagine the best thing they could do would be to take him out of a labor position and replace him with a few qualified people, and have him concentrate on overseeing QA, and actually managing the business.

If you're grinding all day, you ain't managing squat.
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Well, honestly the whole thing is a mystery.


私のお金はどこにありますか？
 
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