It is interesting, I remember seeing a show a few years ago about how Sam's club (Sam's or Costco, but I think Sams) picks Christmas toys, and it would not be uncommon for them to pick a toy but tell the manufacturer they need to find a way to make it 20% cheaper to meet the price they wanted to pay. What the result of that was is anyone's guess (cheaper materials, taking less profit margin, less QC etc.)
It CAN be worth it to cheapen a product up if there is enough volume. It's well documented that many products at "outlet malls" now are not overstock or clearance items they are items made to look like those sold in the normal stores, but cheaper. Nordstrom admitted that only 20% of what is sold in their outlet stores is actually from normal product lines, the other 80% is made specifically for the outlet stores at lower quality levels, but to look similar. None of GAP or Banana outlet store products are the same as in their normal stores, all made specifically just for the outlet store. So obviously in some cases it's clearly profitable to make similar products out of cheaper materials.
It's probably unlikely that's the case for a kershaw leek, but reducing QC is easy, you just widen the gap between the # of units you select for inspection. However, if you do a search on 1660BWWM it appears to be a product # unique to walmart. I'm always leery of products that have walmart only product numbers.
It CAN be worth it to cheapen a product up if there is enough volume. It's well documented that many products at "outlet malls" now are not overstock or clearance items they are items made to look like those sold in the normal stores, but cheaper. Nordstrom admitted that only 20% of what is sold in their outlet stores is actually from normal product lines, the other 80% is made specifically for the outlet stores at lower quality levels, but to look similar. None of GAP or Banana outlet store products are the same as in their normal stores, all made specifically just for the outlet store. So obviously in some cases it's clearly profitable to make similar products out of cheaper materials.
It's probably unlikely that's the case for a kershaw leek, but reducing QC is easy, you just widen the gap between the # of units you select for inspection. However, if you do a search on 1660BWWM it appears to be a product # unique to walmart. I'm always leery of products that have walmart only product numbers.