How many knives made daily?...

PocketKnifeJimmy

PocketKnifeJimmy

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I was reading an article that said GEC makes about 50 pocket knives daily. I don't know how many days they work in a year, but am guessing they are producing about 15,000 each year. Does anyone have an idea how many pocket knives the other companies, like Case or Queen, produce yearly?
 
PocketKnifeJimmy said:
I was reading an article that said GEC makes about 50 pocket knives daily. I don't know how many days they work in a year, but am guessing they are producing about 15,000 each year. Does anyone have an idea how many pocket knives the other companies, like Case or Queen, produce yearly?
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I was told by a Case employee in 2008 that Case made about a million knives a year. That includes folding and fixed blades and would be about 4,000 a day. When Ken Daniels was still with GEC I saw him at a show and he was saying then that their goal was to make 80 knives a day. Queen I have no idea on but I would like to know as well.
 
This info may be a bit dated, but several years ago I read an article in Knife World, that Victorinox made 35 million knives a year. More recently, I saw where Opinel made something to the tune of 7 million knives a year. Both factories are very highly automated.
 
I was told by the folks at Opinel USA that Opinel produces 16,000 knives a DAY, that's a heaping spoonful of blades right there! not sure how that works out for the year but, I could probably make due with a part of those 16,000 each day...probably just weekdays? ;)
G2
 
Wow.. thanks, guys! When I read that Case does maybe 1 million per year.. I thought to myself... holy cow!... But then reading Opinel in the 7 million... Swiss Army knives in the 35 million.... well!!!! Gec is certainly in the low numbers game... as I believe Queen likely is. Curious to hear what Queens numbers are too :-)
 
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These two 'How It's Made' videos give some perspective, as to the automation and sheer scale of the manufacturing of Case (1st vid) and Victorinox (2nd vid) pocketknives:

[video=youtube;LyTKaVE8olc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyTKaVE8olc&feature=player_embedded#at=31[/video]

[video=youtube;3nU87Xl9s2M]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nU87Xl9s2M&feature=player_embedded[/video]


David
 
I had seen both of these videos before, but had to check them out again today... thanks for posting them.. love to watch these things. I like the SAKs, but they just do not speak to me for collecting purposes.... On the other hand, many Case knives do. Obviously they too use a lot of automation... but still maintain something about them. The Queens have the obvious old school labor involved... as do the GEC ans Canal Street brands... so they appeal to me very much. Queen is now owned by one of the former co-founders of GEC... so I believe Queen is going to do well, along with Gec and Canal Street, in the higher end non custom traditional pocket knife arena. Case, though using a lot of automation, still makes a quality and warm to the heart product, and has a great long history to them. I will do my best to do my part of keeping them all in business ;-)
 
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Interesting thread, PK Jimmy!

I had never given any thought at all as to how many knives per day/year these smaller companies produced. Just never even crossed my mind to wonder, until now! :thumbup:

Thanks! :)
 
I also have some information about Case in the mid to late 1970's...at that time they made two million pocketknives a year. They had two pocketknife factories then (plus one for kitchen and fixed blade knives), the factory that they occupy now plus one in Arkansas. Of course the knife market was way different then, with most of Case's production going to knife users as opposed to collectors. They made way fewer variations then but produced a lot more of each knife. They over 10,000 retail dealers to supply. I know that the biggest seller they had at that time was the 6265 SAB folding hunter, and they made over 200,000 of those per year. Their slowest selling models were produced in the range of 3,000 per year.

I also recently read that Leatherman makes 12,000 multitools a day, which would come out to 3 million a year.
 
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Seems like collectors will be the only way for most of the remaining pocket knife makers to stay alive. Lowly priced imports make that the current reality.
 
PocketKnifeJimmy said:
Seems like collectors will be the only way for most of the remaining pocket knife makers to stay alive. Lowly priced imports make that the current reality.
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Not to steer the direction of the thread away, but I disagree. Almost everyone I know carries no knife. Just like um at an amusement park today being less than amused and I see very few (no) watches on people. Just like knives, no one uses our carries anymore. Very few at least. Granted, when they do, it's a cheap import a lot of the time, so it's a double hit.
 
medicevans said:
Not to steer the direction of the thread away, but I disagree. Almost everyone I know carries no knife. Just like um at an amusement park today being less than amused and I see very few (no) watches on people. Just like knives, no one uses our carries anymore. Very few at least. Granted, when they do, it's a cheap import a lot of the time, so it's a double hit.
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Actually, it sounds more like you agree with my view than disagree. I mean, yes, pocket knife carry has likely been going the way of the DoDo for a few decades now... and with most people that still want one going to the cheaper imports, it's the collectors who may keep the few remaining American makers of traditional style pocket knives, alive. If there were no collectors, the user market would likely not be enough market for Case, GEC, or Queen to continue.
 
PocketKnifeJimmy said:
Actually, it sounds more like you agree with my view than disagree. I mean, yes, pocket knife carry has likely been going the way of the DoDo for a few decades now... and with most people that still want one going to the cheaper imports, it's the collectors who may keep the few remaining American makers of traditional style pocket knives, alive. If there were no collectors, the user market would likely not be enough market for Case, GEC, or Queen to continue.
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Very true. I cede the point.
 
PocketKnifeJimmy said:
Actually, it sounds more like you agree with my view than disagree. I mean, yes, pocket knife carry has likely been going the way of the DoDo for a few decades now... and with most people that still want one going to the cheaper imports, it's the collectors who may keep the few remaining American makers of traditional style pocket knives, alive. If there were no collectors, the user market would likely not be enough market for Case, GEC, or Queen to continue.
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Knife carry is higher than you probably think, I find that people just usually fully conceal their knives in my area and don't advertise or use them in front of others. Seeing a pocket clip or someone using it in public is a lot rarer. I've had a class in college where out of a class full of people only 2 people admitted to not carrying a knife when the teacher asked, out of that many students you might have seen at most a couple pocket clips if you were really looking hard. Though to be fair that was a class geared for EMS students, so it wasn't exactly a normal major where you don't use tools. In a normal class like math I might see 1-2 pocket clips, but from my experience if you take 5 random students usually at least one of them has a knife. Though it is usually something along the lines of a small SAK, leatherman, or a cheap folder tucked away somewhere.

Watches on the other hand are going away, and just aren't common as people use their cellphones. Is it a bad thing, not really in my opinion they both tell time and gets the job done. Not to mention it helps minimizing what you are carrying. I still wear a watch mainly due to trying to get into the medical field, and it comes in handy to grab vitals. And I have seen a few bad accidents in the last few years so I just feel better wearing a watch so I have the option of getting vitals as pulling out a cellphone isn't the most ideal setup to look at the timer.
 
I did not now the numbers of knives produced daily by some of those companies, both on the low and the high end!
On the note of the later part of the post.....I believe that most people just keep their knives out of view, but they have them.
 
It is astounding to me the large numbers that Victorinox and Opinel make the huge numbers of knives that they do. If they afre making millions of knives a year, then somebody is buying them. But then I see someone in a store trying to punch their way into box with a Bic pen, or sawing away with a house key, and I wonder where they all go. Most people I know do not carry a knife, and even in my own family, while I have convinced most that at least a small SAK is handy to have, they are not knife nuts. The only knife I see much of in public are the little 58mm SAK's like classic's and ramblers. Or the pocket clips on the young guys. But then I don't see a lot of young folks wearing wrist watches anymore either.

So...the mystery of where are all those knives going?

Carl.
 
I think GEC is more like 70-75 per work day. That is a number Chris has given me a couple times.
 
Kinda helps you put things in perspective. GEC in the scheme of things is a pretty small manufacturer, I always knew that, but never really compared their production to say Case. It makes me want to get more GECs LOL. They seem even more unique, and non mainstream now. I imagine the Opinels are popular in developing countries, where knives are essential, and superfluous features aren't necessarily, or desirable. Maybe not, I'm just thinking out loud. Some of the pics on there sight though, that have been posted over hear, show their knives, having a presence in the mid east, as well as more aboriginal settings.
 
I've wondered about that same mystery myself Carl. Someone must be buying, carrying and using all those knives! Especially Opinel, except for the guys on the forum I've met only one other person around here who even knew what an Opinel was. Same thing with watches, as they slowly go away from the younger crowd who use their cell phones like their great-grandfather used his pocket watch, others still wear watches and are even going upscale. Rolex makes millions of watches a year, and those cost thousands of dollars each :eek: Someone is buying them.

That's why I love my annual Boy Scout camp, nearly every single Scout is wearing a watch, and every one of them is carrying some kind of knife, whether it be a traditional style Scout knife, new or old, a modern clip style folder, or some kind of SAK or lockback. They just better have their Totin' Chip!

Cheers,
Griff
 
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