when advice turns to criticism.......

buy all means i'd like to know.

I know my self i try hard to pay attention to every detail, scales uniform, everything flush, no waves, absolutley no scratches ect.... and though im limited in my creations these days, since the loss of the forge shop, i still put just as much effort into the simple knives i build.

When i sell a knife i ask the buyer apon notice that he recieved it, to leave feed back whether it be good or bad....to a point you risk the chance of selling a knife to one of those unpleasables :confused:(not sure thats a word)

anyway for the most part if your gonna stand behind your work, and accept payment for a knife you gotta be willing to accept the opinion of the buyer.
good or bad.

on example.....a little off topic but still related, i recently sold a knife, due to my own mishaps it wasn't mailed till over a week after it should have been. in order to make it right i went out today and overnighted it to the guy, hoping he would see i made an effort to make things right. i told him as well to leave feed back on this forum if he wished, and let him know to feel free to be honest.

worst case senerio he can say that i took a little long to ship time but I at least tried to remedy the situation buy dropping almost $30 to get it there tomorrow.


ok, im done thanks for hearing my ramblings.....:yawn:

andrew
 
hellgap said:
ryan my knives are crap but i just started .But my second knife is better than my first and i know this will be true for me from now on. I would talk to the guy and let him know.If i order a hot blonde from a escort service and ended up with a ugly fat whore think ide be happy. Call the man NOT the escort service lol kellyw
Click to expand...





wow-i hope that didn't happen to you!:eek::D......ryan
 
I'm just a beginner but, if I were to start selling knives I would make sure every one was as good as I could make it and if that wasn't good enough then I'd want someone to tell me so that I can try to improve. There's nothing mean or wrong about telling someone politely how they could improve their product...especially if you are the buyer.
 
i guess i kind of looked at it as sort of talking down to someone or putting them down at one point....plus i have run into a few makers that think there you know what don't stink.....that's where i ran into problems.....thanks fo rall the advice.....ryan
 
It’s not my knives your talking about is it? I don’t think I ever sold you a knife but if I had I would be a little concerned right now. I would be thinking dang I wish he would have said something to me instead of posting this question on a forum. Of course I would have no way of knowing for sure if it was me or not.:(

I have never had a customer complain. I would feel better if I had. Most of the time I get + feedback sometimes I hear nothing. Either way I expect to at some point have a customer not 100% happy. I have seen knives I have made resold, sometimes from someone I know I did not sell them to. I have to wonder why it’s moving around so much. I have thought about buying those knives I see for sale just to make sure their still in good shape.

I do my best but I will always have some doubt about my products. Why? I believe if you don’t question you stop growing. Most folks reach a plateau and stop growing maybe this maker has. The only way you will know is if you talk to the maker.

Finally if the knife was such a P.O.S. did you feel O.K. selling it?
I bet you knew already what you should have done but felt bad about doing it. If that’s the case I would assume you could have been gentle enough to have worked it out. :)
 
That may have been his good work in that knife. but for the price it wasn't worth it. This can easily happen. Perhaps if you had immediately on reseiving it had just said that as far as you were concerned it wasn't worth the price you paid and wanted to return it, he would have asked to have it back.There has to be a certain quality for amount paid.
However, there are a lot of makers who don't believe that what they make is anything but worth every dollar they ask . An example are some in our forums who ask for comments and criticizm but only want to hear the good things. There are many makers who make to sell who feel the same way. Those that know me wouldn't hesitate to tell me about what they saw as problems. They also know I would not hesitate to tell them it their's was a product I thought was less than what I thought the item was worth. frank
 
If it were me , I would want to know. I think just about every maker wants their customer to be happy and would be willing to take it back if it wasn't up to the customers expectations , sometimes it may be difficult if special materials were used , but I think the maker deserves to know.
 
In this day and age of modern custom knives and being at whatever level we happen to
be at for the money I find it very hard to beleive a knife leaves someones shop
with them not knowing what could be improved or not. If we are happy with a knife we sell someone for the work and material we have in it fine , if the customer is not happy
we can refund their money or offer to fix the problem. I will never make a perfect knife
but they do have to pass my standard for where I'm at and what I charge for them
anything less seems to be something less than the truth.
Ken.
 
Ryan- I don't think I've really got anything of great value to add to what all the folks have replied with.

I'll say that I can understand your conundrum though. It's easy for us to say we'd want to know (which I would as well!) but it's probably not so easy to approach a knifemaker with that kind of news.

I'll let you in on Wade Colter's take on makers. He says knifemakers are such a goofy bunch, because we all walk around in our own shops with our chests out saying "I make what I like and I don't care what anybody has to say or think about it. It's good work, I know I'm a good maker" But then we lay our stuff out on a table at a show and think, "Please like my stuff, please like my stuff, Oh God I hope they like my stuff!!!!"

:D

It's only funny because it's pretty true. It's much better when Wade delivers it in person though :) Erik Fritz could tell you :)

So while no maker worth his salt wants to have a bad knife out there, it would be a real zinger to find out you've got one.

It's a necessary evil though. If a maker is going to be worth a $hit, he needs to be making quality work. Period. I'm not saying perfect, because while there are guys like Russ Andrews that can very closely approach it, there are no "perfect" knives.

I think you do have to figure the ability level of the maker in as well. At any given day you can find pictures of knives online that clearly have mismatched and uneven things going on... and I suspect that more often than not, it's because that maker hasn't learned how to do it better yet, not that they don't care.

At the end of the day though, it's guys like you Ryan, that really help guys like me to continue to make knives. If us makers can't keep the buyers happy, then we will be forced to give all our knives away or have a huge collection of our own stuff. You are an experienced collector with an eye for what you like and for quality. Hearing what you had to say about that knife could have been a great education for that maker.


You might want to consult STeven Garsson on this one Ryan :D STeven will give it to a maker straight. :)
 
ryan9977 said:
thanks for all the info guys...i appreciate it....ryan

phil-i'd rather not go into the whole story....i don't want the name of the maker to come out in public....i did loose money on the deal and i was kinda ticked off about it but it was my fault for not bringing things up in a timely manner....i guess I'll leave it at that and lesson learned.....ryan
thanks again guys.....ryan:thumbup:
Click to expand...

You sound like an honorable man Ryan :)

As a maker myself I would want to know about a flaw(s) on a knife that I made. First, in the hope that you would return it to be fixed or replaced and also to learn from the mistake. Very Important ! :D

I would contact him in private, you and the knifemaker. Preferably face to face but if that's not possible, over the phone. Email would be my last preferred method to arrange the fix.

Most knifemakers I know likely would/should go out of their way to make you happy but you have to ask them if you think something isn't right.



:grumpy:
 
Last edited:
I want folks to be honest with me about all my knives. I did custom trim work, cabinetry, and building furniture pieces before I got into making knives. I try to use that same discriminating eye on each knife I build, and so far each one lends to teaching me something new everytime.
I will relate a story however about my first knife I built! I was talking at work one day and was talking about a new knife I just made and one of my co-workers said he would like to see it. It just happened that it was deer season and I had it out in my truck, so I went out and got it. He liked and suggested I show it to another co-worker, so I did. Little did I know this co-worker was a knifemaker,a masterbladesmith. His comment was, "yep that's a user". Well I thought that was a complimet, till I saw firsthand some of his work. Then I realized it was just the nicest thing he could say at the time!
I have always kept that comment in my mind as I build my knives nowdays. I want my knives to make you want to use them, but I also want the knife make you say, that's one damn fine knife I've got there!
If you get one of my knives and for any reason you don't like it, I will try to fix anything you don't like or you can choose to send it back, no problem, for a full refund, unless you custom ordered, and then the refund is based on what I feel I might be able to sell it to someone else for! After seeing Ed's post I think I will amend this to read for a period of seven days. That's the way I always done all of my custom carpentry and that policy served me well for a lot of years, before I got my back all messed up!
 
nick-i hope one day to meet wade to hear it in person:thumbup:......as far as asking STeven .....i don't wanna make any makers run off crying just yet:D.......ryan
 
Wow - good stuff here. I don't have much to add to what's been said; like everyone else I sure want honest criticism. My experience in the forum has been that folks manage to steer me in the right direction without being harsh about it.

I remember the one time I met Nick Wheeler at the Blade show. Scared as hell I showed him a couple of my knives. He looked them over, felt the places where things meet (didn't say anything, and he managed not to look right at me), checked the edge geometry and said something like, "The edge is pretty thin," meaning it was not quite thin enough. He was able to get his points across without hurting my ego, and to this day I strive to be as good as I can with those things specifically. That experience is probably one of the most instructive I've ever had. (Nick, by the way - the two I'm working on now are the first knives I've made that I am satisfied with their edge geometry. That's something like 45 knives later... I'm kinda slow. :D)

The only point is that despite how critical we are of our own work we all have blind spots. I've never made anything I thought was good enough, but I've sold a lot of my knives. It's a standing joke around here, the only knives I can show people that I've made are the ones I won't let leave the house because they suck. I too have a minimum standard for what I'll sell, and would always accept the return of a knife I'd sold that the customer had not inspected before the purchase. I sure would not want an unhappy customer!

Once a customer turned down a knife he'd ordered because it didn't meet his expectations. I was embarrassed as hell that I'd thought the work was acceptable, and became even more critical of my work. But for me at least, if a knife had to be flawless before I could sell it, I would never sell a knife. I think I know most of what's wrong with my knives when I finish them. I can point to all kinds of stuff that could have been better. But I believe my prices reflect my skill level; hopefully I'm just a little under-priced. That way I can feel okay about what I've sold. I don't want to be a hack, and I realize I'll never be a world-class maker. But I know what I should be able to do, and I work to do the best I can. I'm (slowly) getting better. ;)

Hopefully my customers and fellow makers will be honest with me and continue to help me to improve my craft. And if I let a piece of do-do out of here I deserve what I get. I suspect most makers - of anything - would feel the same way. Soon I'm going to display at my first knife show. That without doubt will open my eyes some more! Scary.

Cripes I went on a long time. Sorry. :o I just meant that whenever you go public you'd better be willing to learn from your mistakes. Gee, you should have just skipped to the end! :D
 
I think any criticism of my stuff is good. I also agree with the folks who say that they know most of the areas that they need work in. I am very aware of certain things that I simply don't know how to do better. I'll even give an example of something that I still don't know how to do "perfect" with the tools I have. The area where a flat grind blends into the spine at the top of the plunge is an issue with me. Not to say I can't make that area come out looking well but it is an area in which I spend the most time fixing and refixing until it is as good as I can get it. Another area for me is the plunges themselves. Try as I might, they never come out well initially. I have to go back to them over and over again until I can get them as close to perfect as my eyes can see. Now, if a buyer were to say "I don't think your plunges are very clean" I would ask them exactly what they mean. "Are they not symetrical? Are they rounded off? Are they too deep or too shallow? Etc." If it is something that I can fix I will.
 
I bet im not the only maker who very quickly did an orders search in a "Oh Sh*t I hope its not mine" moment.

You owe it to yourself and the maker to let them know. At best, it will make them a better maker and you happy about having said something. At worst, they will cry and you will feel sad, but you can bet your top dollar the next knife they sell will be flawless :)
 
So you took a horrible knife you bought and turned around and sold it to someone else rather than tell the maker it wasn't what you wanted.HMMMM.
I have no problem with a right of return and full refund. 7 days sounds about right.
I give most of my knives away. If someone doesn't like it they are more that welcome to give it back
Terms need to be set before or at time of purchase.
If a maker sells crappy knives he won't be around long
Take care
TJ
 
TJ Smith said:
So you took a horrible knife you bought and turned around and sold it to someone else rather than tell the maker it wasn't what you wanted.HMMMM.
I have no problem with a right of return and full refund. 7 days sounds about right.
I give most of my knives away. If someone doesn't like it they are more that welcome to give it back
Terms need to be set before or at time of purchase.
If a maker sells crappy knives he won't be around long
Take care
TJ
Click to expand...




i take a little offense to that....not evry maker turns out the most beautiful work....and one man's favorite knife is a piece of junk to another....i didn't wanna really go into the whole story on the boards here and i won't....i could NOT return the knife to the maker in this situation.....ryan
 
Man Dave, I feel bad now! I was REALLY impressed with your knives at the show, I'm sorry I came off as disapproving! :(

A lot of times when you meet someone in a situation like that you never know what they're going to show you. You handed me knives that were flowing with beautiful lines and first rate fit and finish. I certainly didn't have to struggle to find good things to say about them!!! :)

I thought I conveyed those thoughts, I apologize for not!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top