SMKW Christmas catalog

TorzJohnson

TorzJohnson

Joined
Aug 4, 2001
Messages
4,973
First off, I've bought from SMKW before and had a real good transaction, good price, quick shipping etc. They did right by me, I have nothing against the company at all. But this catalog... let's just say it's fun to read. There's some good stuff like Bucks in there, but there's a lot of Frost floating around too.

For those of you who haven't gotten the catalog yet. I draw your attention to FRC815, the Frost Tennessee Skinner.

FRC815.jpg


Disregard, for the moment, the bizarre lime green spacers or the shapeless imitation stag handle. No, the real star of this gem is the blade. You can't see it so good in the pic above, but it has a faux damascus pattern that looks like a giant pasted a dirty thumbprint on the blade. In the description it says "not true damascus". Now, who in the hell ordered this $6.99 knife and complained that it wasn't true damascus? :confused: Somebody must have, or else they wouldn't have that disclaimer there.

There's some other amusing disclaimers in this catalog. For instance, there's some Zippo lighters, "Riders of the Silver Screen" campfire series; the disclaimer reads "The Campfire series of lighters is intended for the collector, recreational and campfire use only. It is not intended for tobacco use". OK, Mom, whatever you say. :p

Last but not least, the Turantula:

DBTA58.jpg


Hell, I don't need to say anything about this. You guys can come up with something I'm sure.
 
Over the years when I've looked through the catalogs they have always made mention if the damascus was fake.
 
WadeF said:
Over the years when I've looked through the catalogs they have always made mention if the damascus was fake.
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Yes, yes of course. I was making a little joke there, old chap.
 
Yes, I recieved a catalogue from them recently, and over half of what was in there was junk and other assorted cheapo stuff.
 
I really like buying from SMKW. I've never had a problem. Sure they sell a lot of junk (I admit, I have bought my share :o I don't know why.) but it is pretty obvious what is junk and what isn't. They use fair descriptions of their items. My only real complaint (I emailed them about this but never recieved a reply) is that they don't often state the country of origin in their descriptions. :grumpy: I believe they used to be better about that. I have not ordered some knives, that I have considered buying, from them simply because I wasn't sure they weren't made in China. I'm not too keen on that country. Especially when it comes to knives. SMKW's shipping and handling charges seem a bit high also, but that is true of most catalog companies nowadays. :grumpy: But my orders have always been filled accurately and nearly always shipped promptly even though I always pay by check. :)

I think the Frost Skinner with the lime green spacers (!) and dirty fingerprint (not true) damascus is way kooool. :p Unfortunately, I can't think of anyone I dislike enough to buy it for. :D I do have some enemies that I could make a gift of the Turantula as it does appear to be very dangerous to the user. But I better not. Mississippi has the death penalty and I'm sure a competent jury would find a gift of that knife to be premeditated murder. :D

For anyone worried about my junk knife purchases, I'm trying to ween myself off of them. And I'm not that bad, as I have never been tempted by anything from Bud K. :D Besides, most junk knives are made in China.
 
I think the SMKW catalog is going the way of BudK, with just a few good knives sprinkled in here and there. It's almost impossible to turn the page without getting a little Frost on your fingers :grumpy:
 
They used to have some decent stuff mixed in at places, not so much any more.

SOmetimes their descriptions are nuts, this is not verbatim but close: "made with 100% real metal", "Made on the same machines that decent knives are made on", "made with 100% west german electricity, the best there is!".
 
DaveH said:
SOmetimes their descriptions are nuts, this is not verbatim but close: "made with 100% real metal", "Made on the same machines that decent knives are made on", "made with 100% west german electricity, the best there is!".
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Thanks for pointing that out, now I have to go back over the whole thing looking for those little nuggets. :)
 
SMKW is a great outfit to do business with. They have the good stuff on the website. The catalog is just plain fun.
I use mine to test my edges ;)
 
I agree SMKW is getting more junk, but I wonder whose fault that is. Frost no longer makes knives in Japan, on page 60 are Smith & Wesson stag knives on sale. A good price, but they are made in China, how would you know since the catalog does not say. They do have some good knives thrown in, SOG, Cold Steel and a bunch of German brand knives. They also have some good deals on Schrade knvies, not my favorite knives, but since they are out of business I might pick up a few.

One problem is if you buy what you think is a good knife, lets say a Buck, you might be buying a knife from overseas, heck some Bucks are now made in China. Maybe this is the sign of the times instead of SMKW getting cheaper. :confused:
 
SMKW is going with what sells to the tourist crowd that drives by on the way to Pigeon Forge and Dollywood. They do carry a few good lines, but it seems that every catalog I get from them is more and more of the cheap junk. Like any business, they are expanding the lines with the highest sales and profit margins. It is a sad commentary on the general public's knowledge of one of our oldest tools.
 
I live with in a 45 min drive from them and I go up there quite offten.There catalog is getting more like a QVC catalog but I guess that is so the tourists can order thier fancy collector crap.If you go in the store about half if not more of thier inventory is good to top quailty stuff.The tourists are after the 5 to 10 dollar knife and I would guess that 90% of the people that go in there buy the cheap stuff.
They have a great display of Spyderco,Sog,Cold Steel,Buck,Camilus,Kabar and about any Case includeing older Cases that you might want.It is a really nice place to spend a half day looking around.
 
The last Gerber I bought was marked Taiwan, and although it seems to be as good as my older Gerbers, that Taiwan on the blade irks the hell out of me. I have had quite a few name brand knives that I haven't been happy with at all and wondered why that brand had so many devotees. About 8 or 9 years ago, out of the SMKW catalog I bought what Frost Called their Mouse Knife. This was a very small keychain knife with a thumb stud for opening the blade and a thick, enamel painted finish on the handle. I am an industrial electrician and have carried this knife every day since I bought it. I have never had a better knife for stripping electrical cables. It is so short, that blade control is absolute and over-penetration into the wire is almost impossible. It is quick to resharpen and it is the only cable stripping knife I have never cut myself with. The paint on the handle is long gone but the knife still goes to work every day. Co-workers love it and always ask to borrow the "mouse knife".
Moral of the story: If it works for you and does the job, don't worry or apologize for the name on the blade.
One more thing about SMKW. I see quite a few posts from people about sharpening knives. The only real method to get good at sharpening is to practice. For about $30.00, you can get a whole bunch of knives from SMKW with all kinds of different blade styles and use these to learn to sharpen a blade without worrying about trashing the knife. Everybody has their place in the world and so does SMKW. Just my $0.06 worth.
 
Gee, some of Gerber's blades are made in China... At least Taiwan blades are much better than China made ones. I think of Taiwanese blades on par with Japanese blades five to ten years ago. Now, that being said, China made blades are not so bad if you're paying $20 to $25 per knife. You just can't demand Sebenza performance on a 1/20th the price.
 
u812's right - they carry a lot more quality knives than 5 years ago. The catalogs don't target higher-end stuff as much for, I suspect, two reasons - they can't compete price-wise with online stores on the high-end stuff (usually close to retail if it's not closeout), and the catalog items ship from a separate warehouse that is several miles away from the showroom. Sometimes the showroom has items not in the warehouse, and vice versa. They try to keep the showroom stocked from the warehouse, but there are always gaps.

I suspect the catalogs target seasonal items and those items that they have higher inventories of in the warehouse.
 
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