Where It's Made

It is my personal choice to not buy a knife that is not made in America. That is my choice and I will not tell anyone else that buying an overseas made Spyderco is bad. While I do like the look of some of the overseas made offering most of the Sage 1 I will stick to only buying those made in Golden.
 
PatrickKnight said:
It is my personal choice to not buy a knife that is not made in America. That is my choice and I will not tell anyone else that buying an overseas made Spyderco is bad. While I do like the look of some of the overseas made offering most of the Sage 1 I will stick to only buying those made in Golden.
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And there isn't a thing wrong with your personal choice.

I did like the Sage so much that I bought one, but that was MY choice.
We should all respect others buying choices, and quite frankly its getting old seeing others telling people how they should buy.

I often see others saying things like, " its your loss if your not buying Tawain Spydercos", or "you should only buy American".
All should be free to buy as they wish without others telling them things like that.
 
I dont know... It's awefully difficult in this day and age to "buy only American". It seems there aren't many folks who insist on this mantra, but when it comes to knives they're suddenly so patriotic. I mean, you go to Target, Costco, the car dealership, BestBuy... Everyday you are buying goods from clothes to computers to food made in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, etc. but when it comes to knives suddenly well hell oh no Im an American, no foreign knives for me... I am an American also and buy domestic any chance I can, but life is too short to get caught up in that mess. Jobs are going overseas for various reasons, one of them is that noone wants to work factory jobs. Tell me something, anyone of you want to work at a factory making Levi's jeans for 8 bucks an hour? Well, off that job goes to Honduras. Just saying...
 
The-Stig said:
I disagree. We could get into it, but I won't derail this topic. Although, if you ask me, this topic is inherently political, so arguing about politics is probably more relevant than talking about one's opinions on where knives are made.
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I think what he is saying, is you are not allowed to bring politics into this sub-forum. It is against forum rules.
 
Economics is not a zero sum game. Knives may be made overseas using US-produced steel shipped overseas by global transportation networks and combined with G10 made with US raw material fabricated in China and machined in Taiwan.

If a knife is fabricated in the US from raw goods produced overseas, is it really made in the USA? And if a knife is made overseas using US materials, is it really offshore junk? What if a knife is designed in the US and fabricated overseas using globally sourced materials and then sent back to the US for inspection? What jobs are lost, what jobs are gained, and what jobs gained overseas create gains domestically?

Not a zero sum game. No rhetoric to the contrary changes reality, and while I am empathetic enough to see the "domestic argument" it has never held true. Bastiat scuttled the false logic in the 1800s and yet with every generation the battle must be fought anew. Clearly logic is not the only determining factor here.
 
FCM415 said:
I dont know... It's awefully difficult in this day and age to "buy only American". It seems there aren't many folks who insist on this mantra, but when it comes to knives they're suddenly so patriotic.

I mean, you go to Target, Costco, the car dealership, BestBuy... Everyday you are buying goods from clothes to computers to food made in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, etc. but when it comes to knives suddenly well hell oh no Im an American, no foreign knives for me... I am an American also and buy domestic any chance I can, but life is too short to get caught up in that mess.

Jobs are going overseas for various reasons, one of them is that noone wants to work factory jobs. Tell me something, anyone of you want to work at a factory making Levi's jeans for 8 bucks an hour? Well, off that job goes to Honduras. Just saying...
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Thats it. The final straw for me. I can promise I will never buy another non American knife, and may give the ones I do have away:p ...But I will never tell anyone why, or how they should buy...

You seldom see people here say why we should buy only American, but there isn't a day that goes by here that I don't read something like the post above telling us why we should buy foreign if we buy other foreign made items.

I'll say it again. When it comes to knives we have many choices, and have some of the best knife manufactors, and the best custom makers right here in the US. We do not have that choice when it comes to most items, and especially electronics.

Just let people buy as they please, and don't tell them why they should buy a certain way.
 
Ken44 said:
Thats it. The final straw for me. I can promise I will never buy another non American knife, and may give the ones I do have away:p ...But I will never tell anyone why, or how they should buy...

You seldom see people here say why we should buy only American, but there isn't a day that goes by here that I don't read something like the post above telling us why we should buy foreign if we buy other foreign made items.

I'll say it again. When it comes to knives we have many choices, and have some of the best knife manufactors, and the best custom makers right here in the US. We do not have that choice when it comes to most items, and especially electronics.

Just let people buy as they please, and don't tell them why they should buy a certain way.
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Just to be clear, my post does not tell anyone to do anything. The observations I pointed out of course doesn't apply to everyone, perhaps only to a minority I am speaking on. Everyone's views are different even if the general idea is the same. You want to support local knifemakers, a noble cause indeed, I do also, plenty of my knives are made right here. I am speaking more to those who are hell bent on changing the world but are extremely selective in what they perceive as "supporting America". You either do or you don't and let everyone else decide for their own while we are at it.

With that being said, I am glad that people have the freedom to do as they please; the way it should be. But I have indeed seen post after post after post about how we should only buy American, and "I only buy American" and "you guys should also". Point being there are folks on both sides of the fence, let's not get carried away. It's good to make a conscious effort to support domestic, but like I said , it is the selective way they go about it which I feel is not logical. They'll say no to a Taiwan made American branded knife, but turn around and buy a Glock pistol from Austria for example. It might be a quality or trust issue that they'd go with the Austrian brand, but not Taiwan...But it certainly isn't "to support America".

You conveniently left out in your quote of me that I do buy domestic when I can... And the few foreign made knives I own is by American companies whose profits come back home. I wasn't here to tell anyone what they should do at all, but to those out to make others feel bad that they buy foreign made goods, look at yourselves first in other facets of your life. I can live with supporting American knifemakers for sure, but not everyone views it strictly in that way.

My comments were meant as a standalone, just commenting on what I see, it wasn't in response to anyone including you. I cannot fault American companies for moving production overseas, there are multitudes of reasons why this is happening. Speaking for myself, life is too short to further complicate it with the world's baggage. I suppose if the world does change in a sense where everything we sell at our stores are made right here at home, I'll be the first acknowledge those in the "fight", and that I missed the boat in not helping make a difference 100% of the time.
 
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FCM415 said:
I am speaking more to those who are hell bent on changing the world but are extremely selective in what they perceive as "supporting America".

But I have indeed seen post after post after post about how we should only buy American, and "I only buy American" and "you guys should also".
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I've been here awhile, and don't see many post like that. I have seen it, but not that often.
I do see people say "I only buy American" a good bit, but seldom see them telling others they should be that way.

Then I often see people reply, or post right behind them, about how they should not be this way if they buy other foreign items.
Then they start talking about how the new world economy works, etc, etc..

IMO if one sees someone say "I only buy American" they should not start in with all of that. I also don't think anyone should be telling others they should only buy American knives, but I don't see that nearly as much.
 
We're talking about the same thing in that people shouldn't tell others what they can and shouldn't buy. Just different roads traveled.
 
FCM415 said:
Jobs are going overseas for various reasons, one of them is that noone wants to work factory jobs. Tell me something, anyone of you want to work at a factory making Levi's jeans for 8 bucks an hour? Well, off that job goes to Honduras. Just saying...
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I do not think that I can agree with you on this. Certainly not based on my personal experience. I am working in manufacturing for last 20+ years. Like in any field, it is difficult to find a good help, but it was always possible, when was needed. What I saw, a lot of job lost due to much higher cost of labor, environmental regulations, real estate and so on.
 
bh49 said:
I do not think that I can agree with you on this. Certainly not based on my personal experience. I am working in manufacturing for last 20+ years. Like in any field, it is difficult to find a good help, but it was always possible, when was needed. What I saw, a lot of job lost due to much higher cost of labor, environmental regulations, real estate and so on.
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I agree. Some people think that people have changed their nature in the past 15-20 years. I'm not sure why they don't think that the massive amount of new regulations hasn't impacted employment though. That sure has changed in the last 15-20 years!
 
Now we are totally off topic lol. Back on it, anyone prefer the budget line? IMHO they have their place. I have all kinds as I said. I prefer quality, but if I am going somewhere my knife could become at risk, Ill carry a budget blade no questions asked. Fyi my current budget blades are a Cryo and G10 Cara Cara 2.
 
I only have 2, the spydero chinook 3 made in Golden. I also have the delica 3 stainless steel out of SEKI-CITY Japan. Both are excellent. Both are very different knives/steel but the fit and finish is the same on both. I'm not American and it really does not matter where the knife was made as long as it has been done right. From what I can tell Spyderco has done an excellent job and when making future purchases I will not even look at the country of orgin. I trust the brand and until I get sold a *$%# knife it will not make a difference to me.
 
Like I said, jobs are going overseas for various reasons I just threw an open question if anyone is willing to take that job here, really a meaningless example. I was trying to make a point that has nothing to do with what you are disagreeing with so disagree away Roman.
 
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