Fading popularity of traditional knives

[CVamberbonehead]

The traditional knife hobby seems to draw some striking parallels to one of my other hobbies which is bourbon. Bourbon had been in decline for years and there was a glut of it on the market, lots of good stuff to be had for very reasonable prices. Enter hipsters, whom seeing craft beer as now too mainstream have moved into bourbon and suddenly it’s the “new” cool thing. The market is booming creating shortages due to low aging stocks from the previous glut and huge demand and now crazy secondary prices. Now let’s look at the traditional market, it too has been in decline for years and now there seems to be a bit of resurgence, the shortages of GECs and inflated secondary markets strongly mirror the bourbon market. Are hipsters to blame? I believe so, they ruin everything but you can draw your own conclusions. However, I see a silver lining to both hobbies, the market will (and has in the case of bourbon) take off trying to keep up with this new demand. Eventually it will become too mainstream and the bottom will drop out and we will once again be in a glut of fantastic product at great prices. Unfortunately, there will be some collateral damage and we will likely lose some great companies in the process.

Anyways, that was my long winded way of saying I believe traditionals are on a short term (in the grand scheme of things) upswing and the market will scramble to keep up. And we, as true collectors, will benefit when this swing trends down. I think we are seeing this with CSC rising from the ashes and I don’t think we’ve seen the last of Queen/S&M.

Ugh...hipsters are awful..

 

[Prester John]

Can't talk traditional without coming around to the Bowie.

That pattern wasn't made for peeling apples.

The Bowie is a multi-tasker. Great weapon but also for skinning and cutting game (maybe sometimes killing it), cutting wood, etc.; anything and everything you would want a knife for. And now it's legal to carry again in Texas!

 

[colubrid]

You're more right than you know.

Who wants to peddle that garbage? The sales people for the rest of the human race who don't give a shite about knives but need one for whatever.

Look, we're the weird ones and the less than 1% of the worlds populace at large. We're the tiny fraction of the society that is obsessed with knives, and have raised an inanimate object to cult worship item status. We obsess over the knife like it was some kind of porn, and spend much more money on them than they are really worth. Is there anyone here who really thinks a 3.99 gas station special won't cut a piece of twine or open a package? Like the Bic pen that will sign a check just as well as a high cost pen? In reality, there is actually very little need of a knife in modern urban life in the 21st century. And people who really do need a knife because of their job, just use in most cases a replaceable blade utility knife. In the last ten years, I haven't seen one single contractor who worked on our kitchen remodel, bathroom remodel, or other work use anything but a Husky, Stanley, Milwaukee or Super Knife replaceable blade utility knife. All the stock clerks at the stores I go to carry a replaceable blade utility knife in a belt holster.

We can go on and on about steel, but the Joe Average knife user just doesn't care. If it cuts he's happy. If doesn't, then he'll either strop it on the sidewalk or chuck it in the trash can and buy another 3.99 gas station special. It's easier.

It's just like the car enthusiasts. They can't understand how someone could drive around in some plain jane Toyota when a Porsche is way better. The truth is they don't care. Few drivers are car nuts, they just want something to pick up the kids from school and take them to the soccer game on Saturday, and doesn't break down a lot. Same with knives. If the 3.99 gas station special works, the buyer is happy. And the truth is, the cheap no name stainless steel Chinese knife will work pretty well because the serrations will saw through most stuff he'll need to cut, just like the cheap serrated paring knives in the kitchen utility isle in the grocery store will work just fine on bread, vegetables and fruit. And the cheap serrated steak knives in most restaurants cut the steak because the serrations make even cheap steel viable. Aside from obsessed knife nuts wanting to show off their cult worship item of the day by using it at the table when theres a very functional steak knife there. But wheres the self glory in that?

When I was stationed in Europe, I was at Aviano Air base for some TDY with the engineers. I'd get home to my off base apartment in time to see all these Italian ladies getting ready to make dinner for the family. First thing they'd do is go out front and strop the old dark stained carbon steel kitchen knife on the stone steps. Some were some very old knives with worn down blades. Nothing fancy, just a cheap thin carbon steel blade butcher pattern and a couple wood slabs riveted on for a handle.

When the knife got too worn down to function, it got trashed and they spent a few lira and bought another one. If you mentioned spending a lot of money on a knife, they'd have thought you crazy. It wasn't on their radar or operation procedures. Their way had worked for them, their mothers, their grandmothers and all the way back to the Middle Ages. And their working husbands carry as cheap a knife as they can get by with of the same reason. Opinels Douk-Douks were designed to be cheap disposable work knives. Not cult worship items like some have made them and all knives.

The ugly truth is, aside from us obsessed knife addicts, most the world gets by very nice with cheap 3.99 gas station wonders because it doesn't matter. The cheap steel is still harder than most of what you go to cut. String, cardboard, meat, whatever. And if you want talk self defense, a lot of people have been killed by a piece of license plate material sharpened up on the cement floor of a cell, and some tape wrapped around the back end, and shoved in where it counts. A gas station knife is more than adequate to hurt someone very badly, as is a Stanley 99 for 6.99 down at Home Depot. It's only the knife snobs that think a knife has to cost a certain amount and certain xyz123 steel to be a real knife.

If Mark Hamon's character ever shows up with a Stanley 99, Home Depot will sell out by sunset the next day.

In comparison to all the money we spend on other worthless things a pocket knife is nothing.

I think obsessing over a knife is a way better idea than us men getting suckered into DeBeers marketing strategy to buy worthless diamond engagement rings because they convinced women they need to have one to show emotional value..

read the history of the diamond engagement ring below. It is a fairly new concept:

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/diamond-de-beers-marketing-campaign

Bottom line is we need to be real men and stand up for our knives and spend our money the way we want to.

 

[mfunnell]

It seems to me as something of a newbie (to the forum and to the porch, though not to using kinves) that everyone's interest in knives is likely different from the next one's interest. It's not for me to say who has a "legitimate" interest and who's interest is somehow "illegitimate".

Until relatively recently (a couple of years ago, when I joined the forum) my 'interest', such as it was, was entirely utilitarian. I bought (and buy) knives to cut things: kitchen knives for cutting food, other knives for cutting other things - mostly pocket knives and mostly traditional SAKs, for the range of tools beyond just the blades (plus a multi-tool or two). I joined the forum while trying to figure out how to get hold of a knife (which kind of straddled the border between 'traditional' and 'modern') I found I could no longer buy. Start googling knives and you'll end up being directed here

Now, as it happens, traditional knives (kitchen, pocket, fixed-blade) seem best for my needs and preferences when cutting things. But I've recently developed and explored an interest, beyond any 'need', in modern locking mechanisms for folding knives and in modern steels. I now have knives with Axis locks, bolt-action locks, Triad locks, Compression locks, liner locks, frame locks and 'traditional' locking backs. With various modern steels: 154CM, Aus8, Aus6, CTS-XHP, 8Cr13, S30V, S110V, laminated steels, 'traditional' stainless and carbon steels - and I might try some other steel types.

Because of the lock types and steel types, most of these knives I've been exploring are 'modern' folders, almost none of which are much, if any, better than my 'user' knives for cutting the kinds of things I need to cut. Some of them are a good deal worse, in a practical sense, for my uses.

I regard both aspects of my knife use as completely legitimate - the mostly 'traditional' knives I use to cut stuff and the mostly 'modern' knives I'm messing about with just to find out what they're like (even though I pretty much have no earthly use for them).

...Mike

 

[UnderDawgAl]

Look, @jackknife, I don't appreciate you bringing everyone back to reality with those level-headed comments. It seems as if you're being so bold as to say that all those Amazon boxes could just as easily be cut open with a cheap knife as with a custom-made, high-dollar, space-age steel-bladed artisan-crafted multi-hundred-dollar knife that we take pictures of and polish and never use for fear it'll be called used or otherwise get a scratch.

 

[CVamberbonehead]

Good points brought up in this thread. Most knife jobs in an urban area can be done with either no knife at all (everythings pre perforated) or a small traditional knife (like a peanut).

 

[Will Power]

The traditional knife hobby seems to draw some striking parallels to one of my other hobbies which is bourbon. Bourbon had been in decline for years and there was a glut of it on the market, lots of good stuff to be had for very reasonable prices. Enter hipsters, whom seeing craft beer as now too mainstream have moved into bourbon and suddenly it’s the “new” cool thing. The market is booming creating shortages due to low aging stocks from the previous glut and huge demand and now crazy secondary prices. Now let’s look at the traditional market, it too has been in decline for years and now there seems to be a bit of resurgence, the shortages of GECs and inflated secondary markets strongly mirror the bourbon market. Are hipsters to blame? I believe so, they ruin everything but you can draw your own conclusions. However, I see a silver lining to both hobbies, the market will (and has in the case of bourbon) take off trying to keep up with this new demand. Eventually it will become too mainstream and the bottom will drop out and we will once again be in a glut of fantastic product at great prices. Unfortunately, there will be some collateral damage and we will likely lose some great companies in the process.

Anyways, that was my long winded way of saying I believe traditionals are on a short term (in the grand scheme of things) upswing and the market will scramble to keep up. And we, as true collectors, will benefit when this swing trends down. I think we are seeing this with CSC rising from the ashes and I don’t think we’ve seen the last of Queen/S&M.

In Europe, the hipsters have poked their beards into Gin now and that's becoming the rip off trendy drink...old drunks like me need to keep an eye on price

In an earlier post I talked about some of the recently departed cutlers, Schrade, Camillus, CS,Queen Cutlery- I have to say that my experience makes me feel that it was their inability to produce consistent QC that was their main downfall, and one reason why GEC is praised is for its very reliable and excellent QC. Price, imports,niche may play a role but if the quality is very variable buyers become wary, and migrate. Modern knives seem to have this advantage in simpler construction and precision design & execution. A traditional cutler who could and will invest in up to date technology could really secure their future using old patterns, traditional designs but having the dependable QC and modern steels as well as carbons-all assembled satisfyingly But, I fear it won't happen, not in the US anyway.

 

[Reitwagen]

Why be nostalgic about old steels?

A question that I have often asked.

 

[Chui]

.......don't know so much about the 'fading popularity of traditionals', so much as the rising popularity of new knife designs within the backdrop of the madly competitive knife manufacturing marketplace across the whole world.

If you looked at traditionals alone, my own feeling is that they have slightly increased in popularity overall, with a particular penchant among a growing number for higher-end traditionals.

However, if you compare this with the very many so called tactical variations, the modern concepts and materials that exist with lockers, flippers etc., then I'd suggest it looks like traditionals are being left behind.

Furthermore, I'd bet anyone a penny - sorry, cent - to a pinch o' **** that there are far more people universally buying and carrying knives in the last 10 years than there's ever, ever been.

Of course, there are flipsides to this, and would suggest one is here in lill ol' UK - that many more kids, dads and grandads used to have a wee penknife in their pocket than we do now due to our government and the media's hype and their perception of knives per se

 

[gaj999]

.......don't know so much about the 'fading popularity of traditionals', so much as the rising popularity of new knife designs within the backdrop of the madly competitive knife manufacturing marketplace across the whole world.

Good point. People always want new and better. Or at least different. Certainly traditionals seem to be losing ground in the general market for knives. Without the collector market, I wonder whether mid range manufacturers like GEC could survive.

Furthermore, I'd bet anyone a penny - sorry, cent - to a pinch o' **** that there are far more people universally buying and carrying knives in the last 10 years than there's ever, ever been.

My knee-jerk reaction is to say "You're on!". But then I realized that you said more people, not a higher percentage. The way population has grown, there could well be more people carrying knives while at the same time, the percentage of people who carry knives may have fallen through the floor. Dunno. Could be a close one. Better not risk that penny.

 

[jec88]

I agree with the op on how the people that don't really use knives tend to carry modern and the people that tend to use knives alot tend to use a traditional. I just got in a deer lease that is about as backwoods as it can get. Most of the older guys are in the 40=60 year age group and bring their sons. Most of the men are loggers, pipeliners, linemen, cattle and poultry farmers and the only knives I've seen have been stockman and trappers. The kids are carrying what their dads are carrying. One thing I found odd was that even a fixed blade seems out of place. I know on the forums when you see a post about what to use for hunting and a folder is rarely suggested, but around here, that is about all that is used for hunting. One kid was carrying a fixed blade and used it to open a sack and that drew some Daniel Boone/your going to cut your leg off, comments from the older men.

 

[Mikael W]

What do you think about fixed blades in this discussion? That hasnt been discussed much.

There are many traditional fixed blades still in production today.
Just look at the Russell Green River models.
The Classic Moraknife can trace its roots at least 1200 years back in time.
It is still very common to find at least one Mora in most of the homes where I live (Sweden).

Regards
Mikael

 

[ArchVV]

Oof, good reading, but I genuinely don't understand the traditional/modern schism! Is it really just a platform for virtuous prose and pontificating??? Reader's Digest is alive and well!

At least on BF, it would sure seem that "traditionals" are enjoying a resurgence. However, I don't think it is the traditional aspects of these knives that are drawing people at all. They are simply, different. I've really come to appreciate several traditional patterns, but I certainly prefer to have them made with modern materials and I sometimes really wish they had a frickin pocket clip.

 

[Chui]

- sadly too, I get the feeling that many more modern folders - with their quick one-handed opening methods - are carried by many more these days for effect rather than use

Traditionals are usually always a two-handed affair......showing one of those off to your buddies doesn't have the same effect as the snap! of one of the many, many mindless tacticals

And what does it all matter......well, I guess that's a whole new and emotive debate

 

[CVamberbonehead]

I agree with the op on how the people that don't really use knives tend to carry modern and the people that tend to use knives alot tend to use a traditional. I just got in a deer lease that is about as backwoods as it can get. Most of the older guys are in the 40=60 year age group and bring their sons. Most of the men are loggers, pipeliners, linemen, cattle and poultry farmers and the only knives I've seen have been stockman and trappers. The kids are carrying what their dads are carrying. One thing I found odd was that even a fixed blade seems out of place. I know on the forums when you see a post about what to use for hunting and a folder is rarely suggested, but around here, that is about all that is used for hunting. One kid was carrying a fixed blade and used it to open a sack and that drew some Daniel Boone/your going to cut your leg off, comments from the older men.

Around here most of us hunters use fixed blades for big game. Pocket knives come out for small game. I dont really have a preference personally. A full size trapper is a good choice for all around use though(rings true in daily life too)

 

[22-rimfire]

Everything I've heard is to quite the contrary. Traditionals are having quite a resurgence in the last few years. I believe I remember both Mike at CK and Derrick (RIP) of KSF saying that the traditional market has picked up a lot of steam.

That is my general take as well although it is still a somewhat limited market niche.

I will pose a question... why are the typical modern knife companies now making hybrid traditional knives? I think they sell real well overall. Hence, I believe the market is actually growing broader.

 

[CVamberbonehead]

Im seeing a lot of talk about modern stainless steels being superior, and how makers should use that instead of carbon steel. I see your point guys, but on the other hand...
Supers steels are a pain in the neck! If you actually use a knife, you WILL dull it. Its just a matter of time. With 1095, you can get back a razor edge in 5 minutes. You can use a rock, a mug bottom, the edge of your car window, you can even get a decent stropping on the leg of your jeans. With a modern steel, you just have to make do with a dull knife (which is dangerous) until you can get back to your expensive high tech sharpening system. That sucks.
Not everyone wants to buy a worksharp either. I dont. I use stones, just like my dad taught me. I use a diamond stone on my harder stainless steels.
Plus, some of us like the well used look of patina'ed carbon steel. Just saying, it looks pretty cool. Lol

 

[Danke42]

A modern super stainless steel like LCN200N is super easy to sharpen. On par with any of my carbon steel traditional blades.

The "bragging rights super hard" super steels are harder to sharpen but you don't really need that application in what's usually a very small non locking blade. You won't be cutting ten miles of rope while half in ocean.

 

[CVamberbonehead]

A modern super stainless steel like LCN200N is super easy to sharpen. On par with any of my carbon steel traditional blades.

The "bragging rights super hard" super steels are harder to sharpen but you don't really need that application in what's usually a very small non locking blade. You won't be cutting ten miles of rope while half in ocean.

Thats very possible, I dont have anything like that so I dont know. If a steel like that was put into a traditional pocket knife though, imagine the price jump.. You would be paying for a knife with expensive materials and lots of hand work going into it. It would be pricey, where as good carbon steel is cheap and easy to work for the maker. No complex and expensive heat treat procedures either. So, if someone wants a traditional with a high tech steel like that, the best option for buyers and makers alike would be to get a custom knife made.

 

[spyderg]

Not so sure about a huge price jump. Both of my “Enigma” knives cost me only about $10-20 more than a similar pattern GEC would. Yet one is US2000(Cruwear), the other M390. Both have titanium liners, mosaic pivots and beautiful maple burl covers.
The M390 indeed takes a bit more work to sharpen but not the US2000. Like Cruwear it takes a fine edge, holds it a long time yet sharpens quite easily.