TOPS Knives Website/pics

[LizardKing]

Anyone else noticed that there are no good pictures of TOPS knives on the net? Not even their dealers have good pictures of them, when buying over the web dont you think that pictures are very important?

If anyone from TOPS is listening it would be really nice if they would update their site with quality pictures of their blades.

Also some of their newer and more Exciting products are hard to find, if i didnt know that they existed it would have been easy to over look them.

Hopw critical do you think a website is to a knife manufacture? I seem to remember that the TOPS guys are not too keen on the web and thats their choice, but you would think that web dealers would want to fix this problem.

 

[Keith Montgomery]

I think a high quality web site is definitely a tremendous sales tool for a manufacturer. This site should have great pictures and all of the companies latest products. It should also have a section knives that will be coming soon. It seems that most of the manufacturer's web sites do not have the companies newest knives listed until they have been available for awhile and this has always ticked me off. It may take an effort to keep the information up to date, but I think that effort would pay off.

 

[AlphalphaPB]

One thing I hate is a memory-hogging and slow-to-load java applet interface. TOPS Knives, CQCKnives.com (retailing Greco knives), Cold Steel, and TADGear.com all use java applets gratuitously, for little visual effects that might impress a three year old kid. Wow, look, a little scrolling banner. Argh.

Someone should go make their webmasters actually use their own web interfaces.

And TOPS Knives is insane for having such a huge selection of products and not organizing them on their webpage. Cool as some of the designs might be, I'm not going to look through 100 little pictures to find one that might be right for me. Loading all of the linked pages for bigger pictures would take half a day on a modem connection.

 

[Sid Post]

Spyderco has in the past, had issues with dealers because they didn't have all the SKU's in stock. That wouldn't be too bad if they had a small number of knives. Now factor in handle colors, blade serration patterns, possibly steel variations, etc. and you have a huge inventory. In your market, there may be no interest for some of these knives.

TOPS has this issue even worse. I doubt they have dealers that have an entire line up in stock - there are just too many knife models in general and, too many highly specialized models to make that practical. I know, I used to sell TOPS knives out of a gun shop. These days, good digital photograph's are easier and cheaper to get but, it still takes time and you have to have the knife in stock. I rarely had someone say they wanted the knife in the display case, they always "wanted" one they heard about or saw on the website. Sometimes they even came back weeks or months later to see it - grrrr...

Mike and Helen are super people and make a great product but, they are not web savvy. I doubt their dealer network is active on the internet beyond the basics. This takes time, effort and, money away from the "real" store. If you were 'net based only, then you wouldn't have this issue. Until the marketing changes, I doubt a big internet presence will invest their money in that much inventory stock. If something hits big, will they be able to resupply a big internet presence quickly enough in the numbers they will need to make the line viable?

 

[shmoopiebear]

TOPS does have what they call their knives "in action" link / button. You can press to see the knife in a display scenario on the web site. Not all the knives have this feature although some of them do. TOPS has very nice looking knives and the variety to cater the customer is certainly appealing. Have fun.

 

[Terrill]

Give them hell boys! I think they all should have better pictures done. Not that I would be bias!