If given the chance, what knife company would you work for and what changes would you make....>

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serpico69

Joined
Jan 4, 2021
Messages
17
Hi all,

I enjoy this forum. I am a total newbie who found a new hobby (better late than never).

I wanted to buy a proper high end folding knife and did a ton of research and for better or worse ended up with a Chris Reeve Sebenza. I bought the small 31 PJ and then added a 31 PJ large. I absolutely love it.

I will probably add an inkosi or a zaan at some point but it got me thinking..

This forum is full of knowledgable very smart knife aficionados and what if we were able to join a company and make a change or add a product or affect pricing, what would it be and do?

I will start:

I would choose to work for Chris Reeve..small entrepreneurial company, nice people from what i hear and they have amazing customer service
Idaho is cool. I am in Florida..ha

I would then after working there "suggest" the following:

I would make a total number of each knives for that year and when they sell out they sell out. Prices would be high and sought after and exclusivity would be even more-so.

What would you all do?
Thank you looking forward to comments
 
serpico69 said:
I would make a total number of each knives for that year and when they sell out they sell out. Prices would be high and sought after and exclusivity would be even more-so.
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Why would that make sense at all? If they are selling almost all they make now, why would you want to lower the amount of product you are putting out? And raising prices to create exclusivity out of nowhere would more than likely backfire. Why is your knife suddenly more expensive when you are using the same materials you did last year? I'm not seeing any logic in this, except for someone to crow about how exclusive their product is and breaking their arm trying to pat themselves on the back too hard. You would just be angering your existing customer base and making it harder to acquire new sales.
 
unwisefool said:
Why would that make sense at all? If they are selling almost all they make now, why would you want to lower the amount of product you are putting out? And raising prices to create exclusivity out of nowhere would more than likely backfire. Why is your knife suddenly more expensive when you are using the same materials you did last year? I'm not seeing any logic in this, except for someone to crow about how exclusive their product is and break their arm trying to pat themselves on the back too hard. You would just be angering your existing customer base and making it harder to acquire new sales.
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I feel like I’ve read something like this somewhere else on the board...
 
A friend and I were discussing something along these lines a couple days ago.

Bold Statement Coming:
I’d like to work for Survive Knives

Honestly it would take buying the company. I’d do a slight rebranding and have enough capital investment to run complete batches then sell the product on hand(way more complicated than that but I’m sure you all get it). They were so close to becoming a powerhouse in the US manufactured market yet they landed so far away. They have a great product but I won’t even buy their product on the second hand market out of principle.
 
I see it the other way round : what knife company would like to make a small run of one of my designs ? Seems more realistic, in some way...The constraints on design will be very real, though.
 
Spyderco, though I'm not a fan of Colorado. I would make a Military 2, compression lock with four position clip.

Chris Reeve might be interesting, I have a cousin in Idaho, but have never been there. I would make the insingo blade an option on the wood inlay models, and would also make available more robust thumbstuds as an option. I can't grip the sebenza/inkosi ones for the life of me, which is why I quickly sold the large bocote one I had.
 
KAI: I agree with making ZT less pocket jewelry and more usable, functional tools. ZT's marketing doesn't even make sense anymore. Get rid of Speedsafe entirely, there is absolutely no need for that when KVT works better and autos becoming legal in more places. They are planning on releasing a KVT and Speedsafe Kershaw.. a waste of a good set of bearings if you ask me. Move more production back to the US, and how about coming out with a few domestically produced manual folders? I don't always want a flipper, sometimes I just want a good quality manual. They are capable of making a very solid knife, unfortunately all these gimmicky mechanisms are really annoying.

Buck: Slow down and tighten up the quality on some of the rougher modern knives. Stop using flimsy plastic on the lightweight folders (Bantam) and go with something like FRN. Also, you can't solve all of your problems with riveted assembly. Optimize the clips on some, put less obnoxiously wide clips on the 110 slim series, and skip the hollow ground blade on the bigger outdoors knives in favor of something stronger. Lots of potential there, but if Buck doesn't get with the times they will be left behind. Thankfully it seems like they are really trying.

I'd work for Case, Ontario, Ka-Bar, and maybe CRKT (maybe..), but I'm not so sure I'd have much good input. I'd probably try to upgrade steels or tighten up QC as much as possible where needed. I'd work for Spyderco just to be around the people, but they wouldn't want or need my help.

CRK seems like they'd be hard to work for, there would be a lot of pressure and if you messed up I don't know if they would be very forgiving about it.
 
I like the ZT ideas from others,especially getting back to their roots,like the 0301; theres plenty of other companies doing gentlemans knives ZT does not need to be one of them.Except for the 308 they definitely strayed from their original goal,i would bring it back on track,try to bring back the MUDD knife,maybe get a collaboration from Crusader Forge for example....
 
MolokaiRider said:
CRKT.

Stop making fun and interesting designs in poorly built and substandard materials.
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unwisefool said:
Good answer, they always have neat designs and just meh materials and QC.
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Maybe they've turned a corner.

kVaIpfQ.jpg
 
Without giving it much thought,
Kershaw,
I would upgrade the materials & move production to the U.S
 
I'd like to work with Reate or Shirogorov, assuming I can make any changes at all.

Reate wise, I'd scout and hire a good designer. They make excellent knives but don't have any excellent in-house designers. They have a few models that have done well, such as the Jack, but otherwise they fall flat. I would also focus a bit more on making sure all knives are centered well, I've seen a few off-center knives from them and it's inexcusable.

Shirogorov wise, I'd make all knives have captured screws/pivots. It's senseless to not do that. I'd keep the proprietary pivot but add the bits necessary for takedown with every purchase, the cost of the knives can easily support one or two $1-2 bits added for free. I'd have them increase the sharpening choils slightly. Lastly, I'd improve on their customer service. Before Shirogorov and Recon1, I've never had a company leave me hanging for two weeks while I wait for a reply. With Reate I directly messaged David Deng and they shipped out replacement screws within a day - they only charged me for flat-rate shipping. That's amazing.

kylemiller said:
CRK. I'd slam dunk all the Seb 31 CAD files into the recycling bin and reformat the hard drive 12 times before incinerating it.
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That's funny! I like the changes to the 31, otherwise I feel the company is stagnant. Their biggest change besides the 31 is changing to S45VN, big whoop.
 
3fifty7 3fifty7 I was going to type the exact same thing about survive! I love the models I have and its a shame they dont have a clue how to run a business. Hopefullly one day they will turn things around
 
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