Pretty disappointing Blade Show

I was there on Friday afternoon, and I really enjoyed it. I like the tactical knives, but I agree the gear was a little much. I didn't need dehydrated vegetables from Texas. But I did get to see the guys from Emerson, Spartan Blades, Treeman Knives, Omnivore Bladeworks, TOPS Knives, and Miller Brothers Blades. It was great to meet the men who make my knives. I came home with a Machete with D-Guard from Treeman Knives and a large Tomahawk from Omnivore Bladeworks.
This was my first Bladeshow, so I don't know how the old ones were. This one was great, however, for me. It was like meeting some very old friends for the first time.
 
Just expounding on something already mentioned and why it was a fad that will never go away.
 
I have never been to Blade, but have been to SHOT several times. I agree that it is very difficult to sell enough knives at Blade to pay for the costs of travel, tables, hotel and food, and still make a profit, but I look at it differently. I think it's an opportunity for makers to show their knives to new customers that may have never heard of them. Some of these people will order knives at a later time, and some will become life-long customers. I think it's a great chance to advertise yourself, not just sell knives.
 
OP here....Got back yesterday evening and all my buds said the same thing. Too much doomsday/tactical and not enough b-l-a-d-e stuff. A lot of the big names in the ABS were not there and I'll bet the common everyday knifemakers (like me) were down in attendance by one third to one half from the old days.

Ivory and stag were off the scale $$$. A set of ivory slabs that would be $100-$150 were now $399. A simple little stag taper...not the huge stuff...but one you'd use on a 3" drop point blade, for example, was $80! Good Lord! Stabilized wood that was $25 or so was now $50-$60 a block. Unreal. The big shots that charge a grand or more per knife won't feel the cost-price squeeze. However, the average guy like me that gets $200-$225 for a fixed blade hunter is getting slammed on materials cost.

The most telltale sign though, in my opinion, was the absence of the big boys...that dozen or so mastersmiths that you love to check out their work each year, rub elbows with, swap lies with, try to convince yourself you are just as good as they are.....not there this year. I wonder why?? Heck, even SOG had the Gunny there signing autographs..the line was, oh...25 folks long and that was it...I figured it would be wrapped around the hallway.
 
As others have said the cheaper priced stuff made from across the pond has put a damper on the USA made stuff, not kicking them but CRKT won like 3 awards at the banquet last night..........
 
This stuff kills me Blade was a awesome show for many years. Where thing really started going bad for Blade is when the desided to open the other half of the room. Its a shame and pure greed. Yes they had a nice little waiting list to get a table at Blade show when it was less tables but when the economy really started going bad and some makers had to drop the show after the table increase. Well now Blade had to find a way to fill all those extra empty tables. Guess how they did it. By filling with all that junk crap your seeing there now. The Blade show pormoters don't give a rats ass about the makes or the integrity of the show. Its all about dollars.

And in reguards to the AG show it is great show with many great makers. I have been to all of them but I don't think this show will be around to much longer either. Im not sure who said it is growing every year but its not there has been less tables each show. For some reason we just cant get any of the collector there(very hard to fight into) and it is right in the heart of the bible belt.(please don't take the wrong way) You can have all they best makers there but if know body is really selling year after year they will likely quit coming.
 
If the really well known makers can sell out on the internet or dealer sales, there is no reason to lose a weeks work, or pay all the travel and show expenses.
 
I attended Blade this year, and felt that it was disappointing.

I don't attend Blade with the primary purpose of selling knives; mostly just to look around and chat and possibly pick up materials.

It seemed as though there were fewer makers at the show, and far less choices for materials.
 
I'll echo what others are saying for emphasis. I don't think the trend is isolated to knives. I am an avid collector of watches and obsolete currency, and I can tell you the watch collecting crowd has much the same complaint. They whine that lately the conventions that once were the ONLY place to get real goods, now is flooded with import crap and non-horological goods. Likewise the currency collectors whine that more and more non-numismatic stuff is showing up at their conventions/marts.

It's a sign of the times. It's getting increasingly hard for dealers to ignore the profit potention of import crap and unreleated merch. More and more find that it's easier and more profitable to sell online and skip the shows/conventions/marts altogether. Why incur the travel costs? That's just unnecessary overhead. You get more customers online than you do in a convention hall.
 
It is a simple solution. If the real makers, not the manufacturing companies, boycotted the show and didn't buy tables....It would open the eyes of the promoters. But...let's face it. That will never happen.
 
Is Blade magazine still relevant at this point? I didn't go this year, but I did make it to the show last year and found it very disappointing. I remember earlier Blade Shows, where I could find anything from well organized collection displays, to antique or late production items, to the latest factory and custom knives and swords. Back in the 90s even Bladeforums had a booth and organized events. Last year antique dealers were scarce, I only saw one or two display collections, and there was a very meager showing in throwing knives, swords (what little there was was almost exclusively flea market garbage). It was boring to put it simply. A show that used to take me 3 days to explore, took less than a few hours to cover; it is definitely no longer worth the cost of travel; and, yes much of the show is now devoted to cheap tactical (mall ninja) junk.

n2s
 
Mike Davis said:
It is a simple solution. If the real makers, not the manufacturing companies, boycotted the show and didn't buy tables....It would open the eyes of the promoters. But...let's face it. That will never happen.
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If it did, the promoters would simply continue the trend, and turn the show into the world's greatest fleamarket -- and find a cheaper venue.
 
I think I am going to try a new venue---art & crafts shows. I doubt if I'll find any serious collectors, but I'll be trying to find a niche in the art knife community. A & C shows are fun to work. ...Teddy
 
This was my first Blade show this year - so everything was new for me!

My one pet peeve was that the show started shutting down Saturday at noon. By lunchtime Saturday, there were a dozen tables in the makers section that were vacated. I presume the makers had sold their stock and closed up shop. By the end of the day on Saturday, it was a ghost town. I decided not to go back on Sunday because it would not have been worth the time...

I paid for the early Friday (noon) admission - and I'm glad I did. The materials suppliers were only mildly picked-over by the vendor crowd by noon (the vendors did their shopping before the exhibition floor opened!). By late Friday, a lot of the really choice stuff was gone. By noon Saturday, several things I went back to look for were gone.

TedP
 
12345678910 said:
If the really well known makers can sell out on the internet or dealer sales, there is no reason to lose a weeks work, or pay all the travel and show expenses.
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I've never been to Blade, but I can see this point. I understand that the high end makers need to keep their name out there and mingle with the clients, but at some point, it's cost prohibitive. Looks like Blade is getting close to pricing themselves out of a show within the next few years if something doesn't change.

I know lots of people who don't go to several gun shows put on by certain promotion companies because they've turned into flea markets that have a few guns for sale. If I want flea market stuff, I go to flea markets! Not sure a show as big as Blade can handle losing attendance when the people walking in the door can get the same deal every weekend at some other market.
 
I liked the Blade show. I enjoy visiting with everybody and there are more world class makers there under one roof than anywhere in the world. I believe they removed the dividers and filled the entire room for the first time. This may give the impression there is less substance there than usual because it is spread out over a large area, but every one that I wanted to see was there.

This was the first time I was unable to see the entire show over three days moving at my normal gimpy stagger.

I think there was a lot of ivory and desert iron wood at reasonable prices, more than other years.

Yes, there is a lot of tactical stuff. I have two observations to make about this:

1: if it draws people into the show that wouldn't normally be there, is that a bad thing?
2: America has been at war in the middle east for over ten years. Do you think that ABS style fighters and Bowies are the best tools for these solders? There is a place for serious tools/weapons and the definitive book on that subject was not written in the 1800's.

There is no doubt there were fewer ABS folks, and a lot of the ABS folks didn't have a great show. I'm of the opinion there may have been a bit of an ABS bubble and it may have popped. Things come and go in cycles. The people making excellent work will see their long term prospects improve as some of the folks dropping the bottom out of things move on to other things.
 
Nathan, I talked to a couple of my fellow ABS guys who are higher up the food chain than I and they say that a fair bit of the focus of the ABS type buyers seems to have shifted to the Arkansas show in February. It is a smaller show, but not too small and supposedly, all of the tables are sold out for 2014 and there is a waiting list. I think we may have seen a continuation and perhaps escalation of the conflict between the ABS and the show promoters this year. Did you notice where the main entrance to the hall was in 2013? Remember where it was in prior years? ;)
Blade is still the biggest show in the world, but we have already seen it have some of its thunder stolen on the super high end tactical side by the USN gathering. The Pit looks less crowded at night in 2012 or 2013 than it did in 2005 or 2006, at least to my eyes, and a lot of the guys who appear to be missing were wearing USN badges back then. The Blade people should also study what has supposedly happened to the Paris show SICAC over the last 10-15 years.
I had kind of a bad show. I was not able to get there until late Friday night, so I did not set up until Saturday, and didn't sell anything until 30 minutes before the show closed in Sunday afternoon. With that said, the one piece that I did sell was a big damascus fighter and I sold it to one of the nice dealers from China, so hopefully, that will bear some fruit in the future.
Nathan the Machinist said:
I liked the Blade show. I enjoy visiting with everybody and there are more world class makers there under one roof than anywhere in the world. I believe they removed the dividers and filled the entire room for the first time. This may give the impression there is less substance there than usual because it is spread out over a large area, but every one that I wanted to see was there.

This was the first time I was unable to see the entire show over three days moving at my normal gimpy stagger.

I think there was a lot of ivory and desert iron wood at reasonable prices, more than other years.

Yes, there is a lot of tactical stuff. I have two observations to make about this:

1: if it draws people into the show that wouldn't normally be there, is that a bad thing?
2: America has been at war in the middle east for over ten years. Do you think that ABS style fighters and Bowies are the best tools for these solders? There is a place for serious tools/weapons and the definitive book on that subject was not written in the 1800's.

There is no doubt there were fewer ABS folks, and a lot of the ABS folks didn't have a great show. I'm of the opinion there may have been a bit of an ABS bubble and it may have popped. Things come and go in cycles. The people making excellent work will see their long term prospects improve as some of the folks dropping the bottom out of things move on to other things.
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Well yeah, but with the new layout the first thing you see when you walk in is the William Henry booth and everybody knows they're the preeminent, uh...

...wait, huh?
 
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