This is why i order my knives from USA

It is not because of Norway. It is entire Europe. I'm from Holland and any 'small' US gear brand is flabbergasting expensive here too. For example: a Taiwan made Maxpedition Falcon II costs here a whopping 230 USD at the offical online Dutch Maxpedition dealershop. A standard Spyderco Military 275 USD. But even if you look at eBay.de (Germany): there is a SK-5 Recon Scout for sale on this moment for 350 USD!? Cheapest SK-5 Recon Scout I could find here is still 240 USD.
 
Guys I will tell you a little about Russia. I earn about $ 4 an hour. I work for a major cellular company, and my salary is considered high by our standards. A surgeon at a local hospital receives $ 200 a month!!! Food prices are the same as in Canada, told me about this friend who came to visit me.

Here are approximate prices on knives at local stores:

Benchmade Griptilian 3.45" X15 - 120
Spyderco Military,Orange G-10 Handle - 220
Buck Vantage - Pro (Large) Linerlock Folder 3-1/4" S30V Blade - 100
Emerson A-100 Folder - 210
Buck Paradigm - 150

On my 30 birthday my friend gave me a cqc-7. He paid for it $ 280. His salary - $ 300 per month.
 
Minimum USA wage is for jobs where the worker is either considered termporary, dead end job, or competing with undocumented person (latin american illegal alien). Most other low paying jobs pay more than $10 per hour, but our culture expects such a person to advance through training or college degree and make much more eventually. If not, he cannot support a family. Way back, I earned $2.25/hour minimum wage during college but now command $100/hour as an engineer, and I work part time by choice.

However, I learn something every day. Today I learned that the radix point is a character used to separate the interger portion of a number from the fractional part. I had never heard that term before, I always have used "decimal point" instead. Thank you.
 
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Most of you guys are under the mistaken impression that the knives are marked-up by resellers/retailers and the difference goes into their pockets. Most of the mark-up is taken in the form of taxes, tarrifs and other fees and goes to the country of importation.

Don't fail to understand that the USA is huge, it is 3X the landmass of all of Europe. As one single nation, we enjoy economies of scales that smaller nations can't dream of. For the OP, Boston, MA, has about the same population as all of Norway and probably buys more knives as well.
 
khtima said:
Guys I will tell you a little about Russia. I earn about $ 4 an hour. I work for a major cellular company, and my salary is considered high by our standards. A surgeon at a local hospital receives $ 200 a month!!! Food prices are the same as in Canada, told me about this friend who came to visit me.

Here are approximate prices on knives at local stores:

Benchmade Griptilian 3.45" X15 - 120
Spyderco Military,Orange G-10 Handle - 220
Buck Vantage - Pro (Large) Linerlock Folder 3-1/4" S30V Blade - 100
Emerson A-100 Folder - 210
Buck Paradigm - 150

On my 30 birthday my friend gave me a cqc-7. He paid for it $ 280. His salary - $ 300 per month.
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это очень ужасно! Why are knives in Europe so expensive? (please excuse мой русский язык. i have only had 3 semesters of study)
 
khtima said:
Guys I will tell you a little about Russia. I earn about $ 4 an hour. I work for a major cellular company, and my salary is considered high by our standards. A surgeon at a local hospital receives $ 200 a month!!! Food prices are the same as in Canada, told me about this friend who came to visit me.
On my 30 birthday my friend gave me a cqc-7. He paid for it $ 280. His salary - $ 300 per month.
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This is very generous to make a gift, which worth about monthly pay. Where did he get $$ to pay rent/lease, utilities that month or he was saving for years?
 
CWL said:
Most of you guys are under the mistaken impression that the knives are marked-up by resellers/retailers and the difference goes into their pockets. Most of the mark-up is taken in the form of taxes, tarrifs and other fees and goes to the country of importation.
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That is certainly not the case where I live. Even with me paying Paypal fees, International shipping, FULL customs duty and VAT and buying the knife retail in the US I can land most high end US factory brands here at 30%-40% less than buying locally through the official importer/retailer. In some cases the saving is over 50%.

Also you get to choose EXACTLY what you want.........and when it comes to Limited editions and Sprint Runs.......forget it. By the time the official local importer even realizes that the knife is being made they are all sold out at the factory.

Until the local distributers/importers come in line with their pricing structures, buying direct is the best way to go.
 
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Jeru said:
It is not because of Norway. It is entire Europe. I'm from Holland and any 'small' US gear brand is flabbergasting expensive here too. For example: a Taiwan made Maxpedition Falcon II costs here a whopping 230 USD at the offical online Dutch Maxpedition dealershop. A standard Spyderco Military 275 USD. But even if you look at eBay.de (Germany): there is a SK-5 Recon Scout for sale on this moment for 350 USD!? Cheapest SK-5 Recon Scout I could find here is still 240 USD.
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That's quite right. The importers/distributors in Europe take a really high margin. Nevertheless, if you order knives from the US yourself, it is not cheap either: you pay VAT - sales tax - which is 20% here and import tax, which is (I think) 25%.

Which brings me to a question. I have two knives (a Kershaw Leek and a SOG Twitch 2) which I bought in the US and took home myself, so I didn't pay any of these taxes. They're unused and brand new, but on second thoughts I don't like them that much. So I want to sell them. I don't have to make a profit, so I will offer them for a little less than what I paid for them.

This offer is likely attractive to European buyers (to be more precise: buyers from the EU), who don't have to pay the taxes (and who will enjoy low postage), but not to US buyers, who will have higher postage (and maybe even US taxes - I don't know about that).

How do I offer these knives on this forum? As "Knife X for sale - Europeans only"? Or does anyone have a better advice?
 
CWL said:
Most of you guys are under the mistaken impression that the knives are marked-up by resellers/retailers and the difference goes into their pockets. Most of the mark-up is taken in the form of taxes, tarrifs and other fees and goes to the country of importation.
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That still doesn't explain why Taiwanese, Chinese and Japanese made stuff is twice(!?) as expensive here than in the US? This isn't the case with Nike, Eastpak, Apple or whatever (those are 'only' around 30% more expensive here)
 
Turbo-Henrik, I totally understand that you would buy your products where they are cheaper, but dude - you've got it like everybody else (if not better).
Norway has no debt and a helluva lot of oil and your student money isn't intended to be spent on two knives a month. It's for course literature, housing, food, clothes and bills. You don't even have tuition fees, unless it's a private school.

As you can see I'm from Sweden and a LOT of people from Sweden go to Norway to work (especially blue collar workers), like as if it was the promised land, because you make more money there than in Sweden.
The U.S. has a much bigger marketplace and stockpiles are consequently larger than in our small village-like-countries; and so, along with our high taxes, we can't compete with their prices.

Of course you should buy your knives where they are cheaper, be it the U.S. or elsewhere. But, perhaps you're buying too many on a student budget..?
 
bh49 said:
This is very generous to make a gift, which worth about monthly pay. Where did he get $$ to pay rent/lease, utilities that month or he was saving for years?
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He lives with his parents, they retired. I think they help him with money as possible. For example payment of all services for the apartment (not rent) cost $ 100.
 
High gross margin means long inventory turnover. How many knives do they keep in stock? At those prices there's no way they can move them anywhere above half as fast as they do over here.
 
It's not just American knives that come with higher prices. Nor Taiwanese or Chinese knives. Any knife is more expensive in Europe. Even SAK, that are made in Europe.
Apart from custom and import taxes, the reason for this is the market. As someone posted before, the knife market in Europe is pretty small, and that explains why knives come so expensive.
As for prices in the US, my guess is that, depending on how many knives you are going to buy, and which class of knives, you might find that buying them here or travelling to the US and taking them back home would cost the same...so why not travel overseas? :)

:cool:
 
Fellow Norwegian here. I have alomost given up searching for knives in this country. The market is so small and the prices are way to high.
I think everytime I ordered a knife from the US, the price of the knife itself plus shipping and if godforbid it should be stopped by the customs and get taxes put on top of it, I still get it cheaper than buying it here. IF I could even find the knives I`m after here in Norway.
Same goes for alot of other things I shop from the US; training gears, clothes, books etc etc.

Btw I make around $33 an hour.
 
i agree with stoffi, there is more important issues than saving 200kr on a knife.
but i don't really care, as i don't buy exotic knives anymore, i got sick of full tangs, coated blades, indestructible etc.

give me a helle/brusletto knife and a gränsfors hatchet, and let me put it in a bergans backpack, and i'm as happy as can be.
folding knives may be an exception, but i have bought what i need.
spyderco tenacious for work, opinel when not at work.
 
I live in Europe, The Netherlands, and usually buy my knives in the US via a well-known webshop there. is there anyone who can give us tips on where to buy your knives in Europe?

As an example, take the Chris Reeves small Sebenza. It costs around §400 in the US. If I order it from the US, I have to pay sales taxes, import taxes and postage which make it about 40 percent more expensive. That's §580 or around EUR 400.

I've found some web sites in Germany, Switzerland and Austria that offer the small Sebenza for EUR 400 (or a little more). That would make it interesting to buy knives in Europe.

Can anyone confirm that in this case we don't have to pay additional sales taxes and import taxes? And do you know of reliable webshops in Europe that offer good prices?
 
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