I just wanna A custom one
So I asked "can i get a customed one?"
(I didn't say to him but i even had willing to pay under 1000bucks, and wait for year for tiny looking knife)
If it is not available
I think I'm gonna seriously consider to buy current one before
But I got this mail,
Now I'm seriously consider not to buy one
A custom made knife by me - is basically a knife you pay for and wait 5 years to get.
A knife on the shelf is a custom knife made exactly the same way - but started 5 years ago and ready now.
My S30V highly polished straights and tiger claws fit in 4 baskets of 50 knives each. It will be years before I make more. They are very rare - and priced down from $229 to $159 for the recession.
If I have your size - you are in luck! The only rarer knife I made is the curvy. There are perhaps 50 here and 100 out in the world.
I have not told anyone - but I am going to an all distributor model within two weeks - at that time I will take my website down except for existing customers that want to size swap or are owed something.
So - if you want a knife shipped by the original creator of the HideAway - you have about a two week window. I will continue to do production of the knives - I just won't be selling direct to customers shortly. I simply find the workload of doing both all the communications and shipping and all the hand making - too much for me.
Knives you buy now - will ship same day.
William (Incorporator of HideAway in 2003!)
The reason I do not make customs in the way you want me to is because if I take your money - I will get an email once a week asking it it is ready. If it takes a year that will be 52 emails - at 3 minutes each - or 156 minutes. I will be considered a dog on the net if I ever take money for anything that does not ship next day - and the average customer will squawk so loudly I will not sell another knife for months.
(Get me started and ask me to send you all the emails I have a day or two after an order - promising me I will never sell another knife until they get theirs.. - they are funny!)
I am an electric engineer with a BSEE and an MSCS. When I consult on critical databases and applications - perhaps I bill out at $5000 a day. I cannot afford to spend my life tracking when when when emails on customs. Sometimes I grind before heat treat. To round corners I use industrial tumblers for 14 hours. I can run a tumbler for 14 hours with 1 knife in it for $500. OR the same machine with 1000 knives in it - for $500. You do not think I do $500 dollars of setup on a double disk grinder for one knife - to make the knives exactly .125 thick for perfect sheath fit and for the ability to buy another sheath later. I can run all the different custom ones through the grinder - but for sure as hell I cannot run just one knife. Heat treat chamber - not going to heat it to temper one knife. So batching things adds time a customer cannot handle. So I have to predict and pre-make. Especially because the average customer does not even have the same email 90 days later.
It is a mixed bag double edged sword. Everyone wants a perfect knife - not something sloppy. Perfect for sheath fit - is ground within one or two ten thousandths of an inch. All my knives meet that. Everyone wants to buy the picasso or davinci made model - or even the salvadore dahli. The ones that get one rave and are happy. They rave loudly and far - but not quite so loudly and not quite so far as the thousand folks that did not get one and are so mad and loud on the net about me being out of business. Does not matter that I took no money for a reserved knife - (I never take deposits) - you will still hear on the net - such a shame so and so did not get their knife - and the whole net will echo it like whatever scumbag bitching ever paid a red cent to me.
Then there would also be endless emails about can I make one with two red stripes and one green stripe - because the one on display with two green stripes and one red stripe is not quite right.
Consider that of my on the shelf customs - about 10% of reservations pay - and over the course of a year maybe 10% more will pay - if I leave the reservation intact. So when I make 20 straight knives in a metal and a size - the first day - all will be reserved (but not paid) - so I will free up the reservations - and so it will continue as I make more and more. Eventually 2000 people will have them reserved - 50 will be on the shelf hoping to get paid for. Then by some freak of nature - one day for no reason under the sun - other than maybe a good customer feedback on some blog - 150 will pay all in the same month within a few days. Then I have to scramble into my time machine go back 5 years and start 150 more.
You can pretty much understand that if I have had it to the point of not intending to deal with regular customers on things I have already made and can ship same day - I am not too likely to burden myself with the uncertainty of last minute customs. When you cut on a 4 headed water jet machine - you make 4 at a time. With a laser cutter - you do even more at a time, stacked differently. Lets say with all these batched processes - I make just one totally unique never to be seen again - and at the last stage my hand slips and clunk - it is wrecked in two seconds - all that batching restarts. Customes have proven to me that they cannot handle that kind of delay.
Artists I send blanks to - add custom interest to the process. They keep the blanks and sell their finished products and I get nothing. I do not complain about that publicly ever. For example James Coogler has a site selling knives from blanks he got from me along with advanced money like $500. I adore the guy - he has always been nice - and he went through some very hard times - so I gladly write that all off and would never dream of asking for blanks or money back. Folks have to eat. But what I will read on the net is that knives from other artists sold by me are like blood diamonds and I am a scumbag that does not pay them enough. My last fee to artists for putting their touches on my almost finished blanks (maybe with $30 into them) after heat treat was $50 for the artist. There is shipping to and from. Picture me tracking all my $70's in groups of 50 blanks to 30 different artists - that would be $105,000 alone if the money is advanced. It never works out money wise - but it adds interest to the knife.
I have to make enough on my own production to cover all that. Well - not anymore - because I stopped using other artists other than my own hands.
What I discovered about business was that you have to have and ship whatever is ordered within a day of order - or you will suffer. I am not going to try to tell my woes to a customer that has driven through McDonalds every day this month and gotten their cheeseburger within two minutes - that I cannot possibly do as well as those high school dropouts. It just does not fly. Just my emails from customers asking what it costs to ship a knife are fun to read. They mean - what money will the post office collect from me - they do not mean who pays me to drive to the post office, who provides the padded envelope, the labels, the computer, the web (I write all my own webs thankyou!) and etc. They want to argue on the phone that shipping costs $3 instead of $5. They are right - customer is always right.
In two weeks - all that part of my business will go to a distributor - and I will just make knives and accessories for them. I will no longer be as burdened by 6000 spam emails a day and etc. Will catch up on everything owed that could not be delivered instantly - and be free at last, free at last.
Actual reality is that requests like yours are hard or easy from me based on total aggregate orders - because it is the totals that let me run heat treat, grind, and tumble and all those machines that you cannot turn on for just one knife. For customs I make cost effectively - I use my capital to create the right number to be worth it, and sell them over years. When volumes go up - everything is easier - drop your knife on its beak, and another can get started in the next batch right away. For me - I have to predict the future to know what I can and cannot promise. I do not buy metal for one knife - I buy 4 by 8 sheets on pallets. Just the kydex for the sheaths - is 16 4 foot by 8 foot sheets to order from a factory. If I run out of kydex, the next sheath costs me $2000.00 The gator head for a bra clip is $1.25 in qty 1000, $2.50 in qty 999. When I look at the future - given the government is spending 150% of what they take in - I see inflation or collapse. That is why I like keeping bucks in knives and grand estates and not paper. But in a collapse - who will have money to buy enough knives to make batches fast enough to fill in any gaps in size etc? I rather put my money into gardens and greenhouses now.
Others do knives like you want - and take them to shows a few times a year and sell them all. At my peak - I did indeed make 100 knives a day and all the accessories to go with them. The work was hard - but easier than the customer communications. My humble mind has gotten to a space where I do not ever ever want to owe a customer something. Not even just promising something that will be unpaid until delivery. I just want to make my knives and accessories at my pace and then let them go, without disappointing anyone that thinks I can create their fantasy knife on their schedule with my money.
So I asked "can i get a customed one?"
(I didn't say to him but i even had willing to pay under 1000bucks, and wait for year for tiny looking knife)
If it is not available
I think I'm gonna seriously consider to buy current one before
But I got this mail,
Now I'm seriously consider not to buy one
A custom made knife by me - is basically a knife you pay for and wait 5 years to get.
A knife on the shelf is a custom knife made exactly the same way - but started 5 years ago and ready now.
My S30V highly polished straights and tiger claws fit in 4 baskets of 50 knives each. It will be years before I make more. They are very rare - and priced down from $229 to $159 for the recession.
If I have your size - you are in luck! The only rarer knife I made is the curvy. There are perhaps 50 here and 100 out in the world.
I have not told anyone - but I am going to an all distributor model within two weeks - at that time I will take my website down except for existing customers that want to size swap or are owed something.
So - if you want a knife shipped by the original creator of the HideAway - you have about a two week window. I will continue to do production of the knives - I just won't be selling direct to customers shortly. I simply find the workload of doing both all the communications and shipping and all the hand making - too much for me.
Knives you buy now - will ship same day.
William (Incorporator of HideAway in 2003!)
The reason I do not make customs in the way you want me to is because if I take your money - I will get an email once a week asking it it is ready. If it takes a year that will be 52 emails - at 3 minutes each - or 156 minutes. I will be considered a dog on the net if I ever take money for anything that does not ship next day - and the average customer will squawk so loudly I will not sell another knife for months.
(Get me started and ask me to send you all the emails I have a day or two after an order - promising me I will never sell another knife until they get theirs.. - they are funny!)
I am an electric engineer with a BSEE and an MSCS. When I consult on critical databases and applications - perhaps I bill out at $5000 a day. I cannot afford to spend my life tracking when when when emails on customs. Sometimes I grind before heat treat. To round corners I use industrial tumblers for 14 hours. I can run a tumbler for 14 hours with 1 knife in it for $500. OR the same machine with 1000 knives in it - for $500. You do not think I do $500 dollars of setup on a double disk grinder for one knife - to make the knives exactly .125 thick for perfect sheath fit and for the ability to buy another sheath later. I can run all the different custom ones through the grinder - but for sure as hell I cannot run just one knife. Heat treat chamber - not going to heat it to temper one knife. So batching things adds time a customer cannot handle. So I have to predict and pre-make. Especially because the average customer does not even have the same email 90 days later.
It is a mixed bag double edged sword. Everyone wants a perfect knife - not something sloppy. Perfect for sheath fit - is ground within one or two ten thousandths of an inch. All my knives meet that. Everyone wants to buy the picasso or davinci made model - or even the salvadore dahli. The ones that get one rave and are happy. They rave loudly and far - but not quite so loudly and not quite so far as the thousand folks that did not get one and are so mad and loud on the net about me being out of business. Does not matter that I took no money for a reserved knife - (I never take deposits) - you will still hear on the net - such a shame so and so did not get their knife - and the whole net will echo it like whatever scumbag bitching ever paid a red cent to me.
Then there would also be endless emails about can I make one with two red stripes and one green stripe - because the one on display with two green stripes and one red stripe is not quite right.
Consider that of my on the shelf customs - about 10% of reservations pay - and over the course of a year maybe 10% more will pay - if I leave the reservation intact. So when I make 20 straight knives in a metal and a size - the first day - all will be reserved (but not paid) - so I will free up the reservations - and so it will continue as I make more and more. Eventually 2000 people will have them reserved - 50 will be on the shelf hoping to get paid for. Then by some freak of nature - one day for no reason under the sun - other than maybe a good customer feedback on some blog - 150 will pay all in the same month within a few days. Then I have to scramble into my time machine go back 5 years and start 150 more.
You can pretty much understand that if I have had it to the point of not intending to deal with regular customers on things I have already made and can ship same day - I am not too likely to burden myself with the uncertainty of last minute customs. When you cut on a 4 headed water jet machine - you make 4 at a time. With a laser cutter - you do even more at a time, stacked differently. Lets say with all these batched processes - I make just one totally unique never to be seen again - and at the last stage my hand slips and clunk - it is wrecked in two seconds - all that batching restarts. Customes have proven to me that they cannot handle that kind of delay.
Artists I send blanks to - add custom interest to the process. They keep the blanks and sell their finished products and I get nothing. I do not complain about that publicly ever. For example James Coogler has a site selling knives from blanks he got from me along with advanced money like $500. I adore the guy - he has always been nice - and he went through some very hard times - so I gladly write that all off and would never dream of asking for blanks or money back. Folks have to eat. But what I will read on the net is that knives from other artists sold by me are like blood diamonds and I am a scumbag that does not pay them enough. My last fee to artists for putting their touches on my almost finished blanks (maybe with $30 into them) after heat treat was $50 for the artist. There is shipping to and from. Picture me tracking all my $70's in groups of 50 blanks to 30 different artists - that would be $105,000 alone if the money is advanced. It never works out money wise - but it adds interest to the knife.
I have to make enough on my own production to cover all that. Well - not anymore - because I stopped using other artists other than my own hands.
What I discovered about business was that you have to have and ship whatever is ordered within a day of order - or you will suffer. I am not going to try to tell my woes to a customer that has driven through McDonalds every day this month and gotten their cheeseburger within two minutes - that I cannot possibly do as well as those high school dropouts. It just does not fly. Just my emails from customers asking what it costs to ship a knife are fun to read. They mean - what money will the post office collect from me - they do not mean who pays me to drive to the post office, who provides the padded envelope, the labels, the computer, the web (I write all my own webs thankyou!) and etc. They want to argue on the phone that shipping costs $3 instead of $5. They are right - customer is always right.
In two weeks - all that part of my business will go to a distributor - and I will just make knives and accessories for them. I will no longer be as burdened by 6000 spam emails a day and etc. Will catch up on everything owed that could not be delivered instantly - and be free at last, free at last.
Actual reality is that requests like yours are hard or easy from me based on total aggregate orders - because it is the totals that let me run heat treat, grind, and tumble and all those machines that you cannot turn on for just one knife. For customs I make cost effectively - I use my capital to create the right number to be worth it, and sell them over years. When volumes go up - everything is easier - drop your knife on its beak, and another can get started in the next batch right away. For me - I have to predict the future to know what I can and cannot promise. I do not buy metal for one knife - I buy 4 by 8 sheets on pallets. Just the kydex for the sheaths - is 16 4 foot by 8 foot sheets to order from a factory. If I run out of kydex, the next sheath costs me $2000.00 The gator head for a bra clip is $1.25 in qty 1000, $2.50 in qty 999. When I look at the future - given the government is spending 150% of what they take in - I see inflation or collapse. That is why I like keeping bucks in knives and grand estates and not paper. But in a collapse - who will have money to buy enough knives to make batches fast enough to fill in any gaps in size etc? I rather put my money into gardens and greenhouses now.
Others do knives like you want - and take them to shows a few times a year and sell them all. At my peak - I did indeed make 100 knives a day and all the accessories to go with them. The work was hard - but easier than the customer communications. My humble mind has gotten to a space where I do not ever ever want to owe a customer something. Not even just promising something that will be unpaid until delivery. I just want to make my knives and accessories at my pace and then let them go, without disappointing anyone that thinks I can create their fantasy knife on their schedule with my money.
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