The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details:
https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is $300 $250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
Possibly the best idea anyones ever hadHere's one more twist:
What if we just asked Bill Howard to provide a "Bill Howard Special" as the forum knife? I'm pretty sure he's only going to say "yes" if it is a knife that they can easily source the patterns, materials, etc. for and fits within their current production schedule. Wouldn't it be interesting to see what Bill Howard chose to give us as a forum of traditional knife nuts?
Run out the Plank if ye please Mr Power!All this talk of COMBS
There's only one COMBS worth talking about and it's one sharp COMBS too
Sean Combs
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Here's one more twist:
What if we just asked Bill Howard to provide a "Bill Howard Special" as the forum knife? I'm pretty sure he's only going to say "yes" if it is a knife that they can easily source the patterns, materials, etc. for and fits within their current production schedule. Wouldn't it be interesting to see what Bill Howard chose to give us as a forum of traditional knife nuts?
Its all fun to make suggestions of what pattern what we would like but I'd bet we'd only have a shot going with a pattern they were going to produce anyway.
I think that's how it usually works anyway.
I thought the goal of the Forum Knife polls was to come up with something that did/does please the majority?
This is all too Machiavellian for mePlease don't be discouraged if someone stomps on your idea, that usually means it is a good and valid one. Bad or unpopular ideas usually die on the vine, if someone thinks your idea should be suppressed, it's probably because they think it might get alot of support and they want to prevent that from happening.
Bladeforums Traditional Knife works also!
Yeah, I'll just say it: this sounds an awful lot like the words of someone who wants another Bladeforums knife that jumps to $700 valuation on secondary like the BF #86 has so they'll make a big profit when they sell their extras they "got for a friend". Whenever I hear terminology like "for the collector it generates exclusivity", what I hear is, "I want to make sure I'm able to get paid when I sell these on secondary, and it's more important for me to have something to flex with that others couldn't get, than it is to just have a nice knife and be happy as a knife collector". Yeah, I don't respect that all, sorry. If I have completely mischaracterized you here, then I apologize, but that's how your entire post comes off.
Let's just put this back in context why don't we? The entire quote you seem to have issues with is, "I will also argue that we need to set a limit on the number of knives to be made. There are multiple reasons why this should be done, the two most important being 1. it allows a manufacturer to enter into the production talks with a production goal from the outset, and 2. for the collector it generates exclusivity."
The simple fact of the matter is that we need to set a number. It's impossible to expect any manufacturer to offer to make an unknown amount of product at a set cost. If you take a really good look at what happened last year you'll see Mike had to commit to buy 300 knives to get any of them made, and for a while it looked like he wouldn't be able to meet those numbers in sales. This has been something that's a pretty damn simple issue that people on this forum seem to forget or ignore every year.
At no point have I suggested what the number should be. But again, people seem to think I'm arguing we should only make 100 when I wrote "We would do more for our hobby to have a manufacture make a run of (for example) 100 pieces of a pattern such as the Farmers Jack at $200 each, than to have 400 Medium Stockman stamped BF Annual at $50 each."
Think about it. Did I say we should only make 100? I did not. In context this was to point out that we do more for the hobby by having a run of a pattern that's not common than we do to settle for another fairly common pattern. I hold to this. As I pointed out by having a hard to find pattern manufactured we have, in fact, shown manufacturers (like GEC) that they could sell more knives in those patterns, and they did so. Let me repeat that; by introducing a run of hard to find pattern knives we increase the number of knives in such patterns that are available. That helps the hobby.
Now here's another rather basic concept; no matter how many we decide on it's going to be exclusive. Because whether the number is one or 1,000 it's got a limit. And like it or not, some people will buy just because of that simple fact. That's not elitism; nowhere has it been said, "you can't buy one because...".
Now I've been characterized as someone who's looking to profit from the sales of the Traditional Annual Knives, and frankly that pisses me off. Feel free to look and see how many of them I've bought and sold. In fact I've given them away (on this forum), I've sold one (at cost to an old time member of this forum), I've offered to sell another (to waynorth, who was looking for one), and I've traded one (for an SFO to another member who missed out on the annual sale). That's the extent of my "profiteering" in 14 years of supporting this annual project.
In my opinion by promoting the return of old pattern knives we're actually making a contribution to the hobby. Likewise, I think those who don't really care just so long as it's stamped with a logo (and from, let's not forget, a limited run) are just out for themselves.
I will also argue that we need to set a limit on the number of knives to be made. There are multiple reasons why this should be done, the two most important being 1. it allows a manufacturer to enter into the production talks with a production goal from the outset, and 2. for the collector it generates exclusivity. I understand the reasoning of those who feel everyone should have an opportunity to own a knife that shows them to be part of this forum, but the fact is it doesn't work.
Sales made just to generate numbers of sales devalues the product and adds little to the hobby.
Frankly I don't see flipping of the Forum knife to be a big deal.