What has changed...

jeffsaul

jeffsaul

Joined
Jun 21, 2009
Messages
550
I've noticed over the past year or so that the numbers of new traditional folders has diminished, at least from my perspective.
When I first found this site there where new knives from many of the top makers literally every day, that has turned into a trickle.
Maybe it's me or is there a lessening of the number of new knives being produced simply because the demand no longer exists?

I had my initials engraved on the shield of a Keith Johnson BackPocket recently and the engraver told me the "bottom had dropped out",
his words, of the traditional market. This was the first inclination that has caused my focus to be drawn to the number of new knives being
posted here on a regular basis. It certainly could be the ebb and flow of trends, but not a trend I like.

I would like the perspective of some of the other collectors. Thanks for any comments.

Jeff
 
Money is tight for most people unless you are wealthy. Many working class have less disposable income. Go over to the custom area. They are selling like hotcakes. I am working class.
 
Is this in reference to custom makers, manufacturers or both? Case continues to sell knives like crazy, Queen and GEC are cranking them out. Maybe this engraver just didn't have the jobs and was lamenting his current state of affairs, which is not a reflection of the actual knives being sold. I bought my first real custom slipjoint over the summer, a very nice Zulu from J Oeser. I'm in the process of selling a large part of my collection to get another custom folder.

My tastes have changed, after forcing myself to carry my Case Tribal Spear for the past year, and I have really come to appreciate higher end knives. These include GEC and Queen in my collection. I cannot afford to get every knife that turns my head, and the high end Case collaborations and any custom folders that may come up down the pike. One or the other mentality dictated by the amount of $ in my pocket.
 
I'm not sure but it is interesting to hear you bring this up, Jeff.

I personally began cutting back on my own purchases of traditional knives before the end of 2012 and only had one purchase in 2013. I only have one or two traditional knife orders open at the moment.

For a variety of reasons I've been carrying more "modern" one-handers such as frame locks and liner locks of late, mostly because I need to walk my new rescue dog on a lead, (unlike my dearly departed Weimaraner), and thus prefer not to have to fumble around if I need to access a blade during our sojourns.

That said, I've not lost interest in traditional knives as a class of knives...though I have decided to rein in the spending. I think I just reached a saturation point where I couldn't decide what I wanted or "needed" and once that happened I could no longer justify the expense despite being able to afford the luxury. I'm sure that this state of affairs is subject to change at any moment without prior notice (from past experience).

Didn't know it was a trend, however...
 
Blues, you can still carry a traditional and a one hand opener at the same time. Might be overkill depending on the situation, but it is what I tend to do.
 
I thinned out my traditional knives some time ago yet find myself still buying them when they get my attention such as the micarta covered GEC Bull Nose knives. That said, I do not use traditional knives exclusively. I alway carry a modern one-hand knife when out and about and have given those as Christmas presents for the last couple years or so. I intend to do another purge of my traditional knives this spring.

We seem to have plenty of younger member here in the Traditional forum but it's been noticeable that quite a few of the regular members from past years aren't posting anymore. Whether that comes from lack of interest, or perhaps a journey to the other side is unknown but some of the old codgers are missing in action.
 
silenthunterstudios said:
Blues, you can still carry a traditional and a one hand opener at the same time. Might be overkill depending on the situation, but it is what I tend to do.
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Good grief Dan!! How is that overkill? I carry a traditional knife, a one hand knife, and a Leatherman multi-tool everyday and on a whim will add one more traditional to the traditional pocket just for the heck of it. Of course, you could call me crazy too.:rolleyes:
 
silenthunterstudios said:
Blues, you can still carry a traditional and a one hand opener at the same time. Might be overkill depending on the situation, but it is what I tend to do.
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I'm kind of surprised that you'd feel it necessary to suggest that to me. :confused:

Hell, I've been known (in the past while still gainfully employed) to carry a modern folder, a neck knife and traditional (as well as a firearm) contemporaneously.

I will admit, (shhh...don't tell anyone), to carrying one knife at a time for the most part these days.
 
Modoc ED said:
We seem to have plenty of younger member here in the Traditional forum but it's been noticeable that quite a few of the regular members from past years aren't posting anymore. Whether that comes from lack of interest, or perhaps a journey to the other side is unknown but some of the old codgers are missing in action.
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Speaking strictly for myself, as I haven't polled others about this, there are any number of reasons and dynamics involved. Some about knives, some about other issues.
Judging by the number of threads and the repetition of topics that abound, there's enough of a supply of new blood (and old hands) to keep the forum healthy well into the foreseeable future.
 
I was getting over the shock of you carrying a one handed folder ;), prior employment notwithstanding. :foot:

For a leisurely stroll, I would imagine one knife would be more than enough. However, I am a knife nut, so I carry usually about three knives when I take my pup for a mile walk in the neighborhood. Trying to keep an overeager bundle of energy labrador on point is tough, even moreso when you stop to tie your shoe. Retractable leashes are adhered to, but when you hear something rustle in the woods, you must investigate, regardless of whether you pull your human on his chin with you. Opening a traditional pocket knife one handed can be done, but, when you have a ball of furry fury at the end of a rope in the other, it does get kind of tricky.

Ed, you are right. :D
 
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Society itself has changed a huge amount in my lifetime. A knife is no longer a required niece of male pocket stuff. by the late 1960's and certainly the 70's, a pocket knife had become a maybe. By the year 2000 it was not seen very often. The cell phone and iPad or I whatever have become the new personal edc gear. I really think in most major cites and towns you will be hard put to stop a random 10 people and have one of them, if that, have a knife on them. The larger the city, the fewer the knives.

Most young people today would prefer a new toy from Apple rather than any knife. With the exceptions of some family members, and a few old friends, most people I meet think it strange that I carry a knife, let alone two. Even some of the family think "Uncle Carl has a weird thing for knives"

I believe that most of the knife companies have a hard core clientele that buys a large number of knives. Most knife nuts have a small to large collection, while most people these days don't even have one. No matter if it's the young guys who collect the tactical stuff and buys enough knives to last 10 other people a lifetime, or the collectors that have a zillion Case's from Elvis commemoratives to John Deer models, it's a relatively small number of people these days keeping the knife companies afloat.

I could be excessively pessimistic, I hope I am. But the very fact that few people in todays society carry a knife at all, combined with the fact that things are becoming more anti-knife, I don't see a real bright future for knives. The heyday is long passed, Camillus, a once giant of the industry is just a memory, as is Schrade, and a host of other grand old marques that modern collectors drool over. The customer demand to keep them going was just not there. Add in a bad economy, a lot of people looking for work and not finding it, a general feeling of the empire crumbling around the edges, and people are going to buy just what they need. Custom knives are going to appeal to fewer people than before. Look at the poor attendance at knife shows these days. Then look at history. Even Remington was driven out of the cutlery market by a depression.

In the end, it's the few, the afflicted and obsessed like us, the knife nuts who are buying new knives. Most of the other people out there on the street don't even bother to carry one, unless it's some lind of little keychain tool. Or a backpacker buying a SAK.

Carl.
 
...And many, (if not most), of the watch manufacturers are concerned that a great many young (and older) folks get the time off their phones these days...and so it goes...
 
jackknife said:
Even some of the family think "Uncle Carl has a weird thing for knives"
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Yep. I am lucky to have grown up in an extended family that loves the outdoors. One knife is considered mandatory. Two knives is considered hunting season ;). Three knives is considered pushing it, and four or more is considered insanity. One good folder and one good fixed blade, you're pretty much done forever. I gave my father two old Schrades for Christmas. One is a 108OT just like his tiny Schrade pen knives that vacationed in the washing machine when I was a kid. The other is some type of EO jack. I won both in a GAW here, and couldn't bring myself to carry them. He'll appreciate them, but he told me he has too many knives right now. The Schrades, a Buck single blade 37*, a Case peanut, his Schrade sharpfinger and a Leatherman garden tool I got him, he's done.

The people that do like knives get by fine with one or two at a time. Remove the casual everyday user, that uses his or her knife until the blade is gone, companies will take a big hit. Unless they think they can get a mint for them, most people just sell their fathers/brothers/uncles collection to the junk man, if they still come around anymore. Every Case with worn out springs and broken blades is worth a million bucks. I know a dealer that has a house full, according to him, of his fathers knives. He sees Marbles, Remington etc, and thinks he's sitting on a million bucks. Who knows, if there is someone there waiting to buy them. A lot of the old guard of collectors are passing on. They are lamenting the lack of new blood for old and custom bowies in the custom forum. Most people cannot afford to pay the premiums for high end custom cutlery, or watches ^, let alone get a few old beat up knives for their collections.

Are we a dying breed? All of my buddies that got into knives, for a spell, sold their collections at a loss, and put it back into guns or tools.
 
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It seems to me that most of the recent attention here at the forums has been directed to a single manufacturer. Does that reflect a interest in Buck, Canal Street, and others? I couldn't say.

Personally, my own purchases haven't slowed much. But I have been lazier about photographing knives and starting new discussions. :o

I'm certainly not seeing a decline in auction prices for rare and uncommon Old Timer knives. Sheesh!
 
I'm no collector, but to me it seems like traditional manufacturing has a good place in the market. With companies like GEC, Queen, and their subsidiaries there is a great dynamic of small production and high demand. Maybe it its diminished, but I only really knew of case and buck before coming on these forums, so it all seems lively to me. I think more people buy and carry case and buck etc type knives than we think as well. I know where I live it is not strange or unusual to see a pocket clip, and I can only assume traditional are hiding down in pockets as much or more often. Where I go to school out its certainly less usual, but I do see and great of people having knives.
 
I've always liked traditionals. I did later gravitate toward more modern folders, but I ended back here and don't think I'll leave again. I just like old fashioned stuff. Old cars, Wheelguns, Tube Amps, Lever Guns, Traditional Pocket Knives...... heck, I love my suspenders.

I think there are some young people looking back to the way things were. Elmer Keith, Henry David Thorough, George Washington Sears, Jack O'connor, Jack Black and jackknife all seem to be holding their own. ;)

That being said, we'll just have to see won't we.
 
Some words of wisdom...(I've posted them in this forum previously but it bears repeating for the new generation and those in need of a reminder).

From "On Your Own In The Wilderness" by Colonel Townsend Whelen and Bradford Angier (1958):

"The most indispensable tool for a hunter or fisherman or camper, and in fact for any outdoor man and boy anywhere, is the knife-a businesslike knife, sharp and keen. Mrs. Whelen's aunt, who taught high school Latin for thirty years in Nebraska, had the right idea. She asked every class, "Which boys have a jackknife in their pocket?" The ones who had none did not rate very high with her.

Her philosophy was that if a boy did not have a knife and know how to use it, he was not likely to grow up able to do many things for himself...I have had a knife like this in my back pants pocket ever since I was knee-high to a chopping block."
 
Woodrow F Call said:
That being said, we'll just have to see won't we.
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Amen. History shows us some unexpected twists and turns. That said, I would tentatively say that the knife sub-culture in general and traditional in particular is gradually shrinking. I think it will take awhile. When the last of the baby-boomers (I are one) go, the traditional genre will take a BIG hit. I feel safe in saying that it would be unwise to plan on any profits from selling your knives. Some folks will make a little; most won't. The good folks who frequent these halls tend to forget that they would ALL probably fit in one high school gymnasium. I have reached a turning point myself; I just finished my sixth year of knife accumulating and am faced with getting rid of maybe 3/4 of all that I own and continue in a more focused manner. A little irony: my interest began in December of 2007 when my son gave me an etched personalized... flipper! A good one, but not traditional. That set me thinking about all the knives I had used as tools over the years, and I was off and running. That original knife, along with a GEC auto (with an antique design) are the only two non-traditionals out of maybe a thousand knives I own, and the auto is actually a traditional. Anyway (ramble) times DO change, for individuals and nations, and we are yet to define those changes until we can do so retrospectively, but we can make some educated guesses. Think China. Damn!!!
 
When I started this thread, although not stated, my thrust was custom knives. I find these items to be the truest expression of not only the customer, but the craftsperson as well.

As a little boy, many moons ago, someone said to me don't trust a man that doesn't carry a pocket knife! This is embedded in my psyche and I have never forgotten
that comment. I have been very blessed to be able to collect from the best Bose, Lake, etc. etc. Consequently the knives from manufacturers have never really been an emphasis.

I find that the relationships built around a "hobby" to be very sound and greatly appreciated.

Jeff
 
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