Knifemaker's Guild Show

Comments have been removed out of respect to the parties involved.
I do wish that threads of this nature and these types of comments would not come up the day before the show.
Some times people just have to agree to disagree.
 
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Charlie,

Plain and simple I respect you and Harry enough to edit out any gripes, no matter how I feel.

I wish you well. Please support the Staff Photographer. :thumbup:

Coop
 
Interesting comments by all. particularly Les' comments about the best attended shows being in Vegas. I remember going to the Guild show back in the early 90's when it was in Orlando the first time. It was in the bigeest room at what was the biggest hotel in Orlando at the time. It was overwhemig and to my untrained eye, looked almost as big as Blade. I was told that for the following year, they were moving it inot the even BIGGER room that Marriot was building. And the place was packed. Fast forward to 2006 or thereabouts and the show is back in Orlando and is no more than 1/4 the size of the first show I attended. So I wonder how much of the problem the Orlando location actually is?
 
I find this thread very interesting. This year was my first trip to Blade and I had an absolutely fantastic time. I enjoyed the time I spent in the Guild section but time ran out before I was able to peruse it completely.

In discussing my experiences with quite a few makers, they said I really should attend the Guild show some time.

Strictly from a logistics perspective, I have absolutely NO desire to be in Orlando in the summer. As mentioned, the area is expensive, I don't enjoy hot humid weather and Disneyworld is of no interest to me.

There is a much stronger possibility that I would take a trip to Louisville to attend. Hopefully, the move will improve the show and potentially return it to the quality show it was in the past.

Peter
 
Harry,

You are either missing the point or are choosing to ignore it.

Interesting how Coop and I are holding a "grudge" that no one cares about.

While at the same time you take a swipe at Coop:

sit back and try to remember where the show photographer was when the new members were receiving their voting membership last year. I don't know what the arrangements were and don't care. I would have liked to have had some publicity as would others. I got over it.
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Apparently, you haven't gotten over it or you wouldn't have made the comment.

As you said you didn't even know what the arrangements were...but it still irritated you. Enough so that you had to bring it back up.

The role of the "show photographer" sounds like something you should bring up at the business meeting. Perhaps with clarification you will find Coop was not invited to the business meeting.

Perfect....Me... LOL not hardly. However, I go back to my first sentence in this post.

You have had both honorary and associate members post "issues" with the professionalism of your Guild.

You have had a maker discuss the "Shrinking" show. This would also indicate a shrinking active membership.

Then there was the post by Sidehill:

There was a time when the month before the Guild show seemed to generate a lot of chatter on this website. Those days seem to be past.
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Hope the show works out well for you.

I know several people going to the show. They have been attending in one capacity or another for over 20 years. I will be interested to hear their take on the show.
 
So the Knifemaker's Guild Show should now be over. To anyone that actually went, how was it? Number of tables, size of crowd, general mood?
 
We just got back from the Guild Show. We had a great time and sold some knives. Friday was one of the best days we have ever had a show of any kind.
I apologize for offending anyone especially Les and Coop. I have a great deal of respect for each of these men. It just frustrated me to have this sore subject brought up days before the Guild show for no apparent good reason. Again I apologize. I also have a great deal of respect for most of the members of the Guild and especially those that are trying hard to put life back into the organization. I am of the opinion that sometimes people just have to agree to disagree and go on with the program. I hope that what has happened in the past will not continue to affect this industry. We have too many outside groups to contend with for us to be fighting amongst ourselves.
With that said, many of us have already reserved tables for next year. Comments were very positive and we are looking forward to a great show.
 
Glad to hear you had a good show. I am really looking forward to next year in Louisville.

With the exception of Blade, I think most shows are smaller less attended than they used to be, especially the high end custom knife shows. The Las Vegas show was way off this year and I have heard that attendance at the New York and Chicago shows were down also. I heard Solvang isn't even doing a show next year.

It's just a different game than it was 20 years ago. The Internet has a lot to do with it as does more shows throughout the country.

But having said that, although the Guild Show may not be as big as it once was, they did have a good crowd last year and like First Twin, I sold more knives there than at any other single show that I have done.
 
I have been following a 2008 Guild Show Pictorial Review that Murray White's doing for the CKCA and there were some absolutely gorgeous knives there. And seems like everyone had a great time.
 
Thanks Kevin -- anyone that wishes to read the review and see about 150 images of folks and knives can do so by visiting the CKCA website

www.customknifecollectorsassociation.com

Forums>General>reviews>2008 Guild show

somehow Harry, I completely missed you even though I do have a business card and I likely left a CKCA brochure with you. I met lots of HM's a the show and gave them all the brochure and hope to see positive results. Many seemed enthused.

Lots of good knives there and I enjoyed the show tremendously and when I get home in a month after the 2 more shows we will be attending an reporting on -- AG Russell and Troy HammerIN followed by Chicago two weeks after arriving home, I will photograph the knives and have them up in CKCA as well as my own site.

The hotel and food is extremely expensive so hopefully things will get better with other shows although I hear that the Chicago show in 2009 will be in downtown Chicago. Hmm, wonder if it will be near the camera stores?

Anyway, the whole idea behind CKCA is to get all makers and collectors on the same page so that we can enjoy all shows and other means of acquiring and enjoying knives.
 
I saw your post over on CKCA, and you did a great job. We were sitting between Charles Ochs and Brad Zinkler and directly across from Bruce Fuller and Jerry Corbit. I think what we saw most was your back side.:D You did post a couple of pictures of Ron Best's knives that followed Charlie and I home. I also got a folder I liked and kept one of my test knives for a user after I get it engraved. It was a good show for me from the collectors side of the table too. We got the brochure and both of us plan on joining the CKCA. Thanks for dropping it off. I have tried a couple of times without success with the on line subscription and will give it another shot tonight.

The Guild Show was a good one. Some great makers were present and knives were there to be had. The best part for us was talking to all the customers/collectors that stopped by our table. The atmosphere is different from the Blade Show and much more relaxed, although I was pretty tense up until I had presented my knives for judging on Thursday. We had a great time and look forward to Kentucky next year.
 
Harry you should have hollered. I was at JC's table a lot taking a look at the folder I bought and will pick up from him later in the month. I was around those tables so much and yet basically must have missed you somehow and yet I had marked it down to visit your table. darn!

I was probably busy passing out flyers or bugging guys about price tags/info or about using credit cards -- I have put the bug in the Guild's ear too. They seem to be more receptive particularily when there are makers believing as I do that sales increase with both ideas.

glad you saw the review and hope that others will stop by also. you do know that there is a large review re Blade 2008 inthe same area eh? enjoy it too.
 
We will try to flag you down next time. While I love to talk knives, many people appear to just want to stand there and look, so I am a bit hesitant if they don't appear to want to get into a conversation.

Over the years Charlie and I have been back and forth about prices on knives and have reached the conclusion, after deliberate tests, that putting the price on the knife and having it face up so the customer can see it, works best for us. I think that we both scored on knives because we weren't shy about asking the price when a maker had no price marked on his knives. I told the maker that if he had posted the price he would have sold it on Friday instead of Sunday. I saw it then and assumed, like many I'll bet, that it was more than I wanted to spend. It wasn't.

On the credit card issue it gets a little more involved. There is a good bit of risk involved for the seller with little recourse. We have looked into this several times, with several banks and have not liked what we have found out when we waded through the fine print. We are still holding out on the credit cards.
 
I agree about showing the price of a knife regardless of how much it is. When I see a knife without a price it says to me the price is "How much you got?".

I did a lot of looking around about credit cards. I found that different banks have very different policies. Some people seem to have gotten a pretty good deal through their banks. My bank is certainly not interested in low volume merchants. I use ProPay and it works for me for the shows. I use PayPal for website sales. I am convinced that I have made a few sales because I did take credit cards. So far, I have not had a problem.

Murray, nice job on the show review.
 
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