Wholesalers suck.

Shoki

Shoki

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Since moving to NH, I've been playing around with the idea of going brick-and-mortar with my business. There isn't a knife store in my town and I thought it might be worth a shot.

Here's the thing. About 65% of my business is from people who don't give a damn about quality and want something 'neat' and they want it now. No matter how hard I try to point them towards better manufacturers, they buy cheap chinese crap (CCC), break them, and buy more. It's really no problem as there is no shortage of garbage out there but I do run into issues with autos. I have police and military guys who want an auto, don't want to shell out the money for a Microtech or a Benchmade, but love the way they look :rolleyes:.

I have distributors who carry knock-offs but they generally charge a LOT more for them than the other garbage they carry. Normally, I'd buy them, tack on five dollars, and resell them but this poses a problem: If my wholesale cost, is let's say, $30. I would generally charge $35 and send them on their way. The problem is that they aren't worth $35 and I know that my wholesale distributor is getting them for a fraction of that price. So the distributor is ripping me off and I have to rip the customer off to make $5 on a knife that should be sold for $15. This gets even worse when you consider the costs of a brick and mortar business. I'll have to charge $60 for this crap to turn a decent profit.

Where the hell do these 'wholesale' outfits find the suppliers of these knives? I'd really like to cut them right out of the equation and go right to the source. Unfortunately, google searching 'cheap chinese knock-off automatic knife suppliers' gets one nowhere. I know the real solution is to somehow convince people to stop buying them in the first place but I've had no luck with that. Even if I outright refuse to sell them, it's only a matter of time before they find some place online that has them and send their money to them.

Any of you business owners have this kind of crap happening? Any advice?
 
while not a business owner i try not to buy the cheap stuff. my parents raised me with the notion that you should buy something good once (save up for it) and use it for a long time, maybe even a life time. theres a certain satisfaction with owning something like, say my gransfor bruks axes that are guaranteed a life time (well they say 25 years) and having worked hard and saved up for them. the quality is immediately present and of course it is rewarding.


i used to work in retail selling electronics and what not and i know what you're talking about. customers come in and buy the cheapest thing and come back maybe 6 months later and buy the same thing again because it broke. its almost like people have been programmed in our "consumer" society to buy things in excess. if it breaks you just buy a new one, kind of mentality.

a real shame i guess.

in regards to finding contacts for cheaper knives i dont know of any people personally but you might consider looking at the manufacturers? might want to try contacting some of them and ask if you can work out a deal.
 
It's true, that's the way it goes.

The only cheap knife I ever buy for myself is the occasional taiwanese butterfly. Even then, it's just to grind the edge off and play with without fear of messing up a nice knife.
Some people just can't be dissuaded and really just HAVE to have that Smith & Wesson HRT knockoff or a Microtech Scarab 'clone' (I use the term very loosely). It's just hard for me, in good conscience, to charge the prices they fetch.


Edit: Sorry for the wrong placement, thanks for the move.
 
I agree with everthing said but, the cheap cool looking knife stuff from china sells. It is cheap crud... however, for the casual knife buyer it has that appeal. My two boys buy that crud at gun shows all the time. I tried to tell them for about 20 bucks more they could get somthing decent instead but, it fell on deaf ears.
 
Your situation is rather unfortuate, but the only place I know to get them is usually on ebay. Just go to advanced search and type in knife for your search and put the location part for China. There are a massive number of knives for very cheap and are usually knock-offs of higher quality knife brands. It is scarey how close they look to the real thing you gotta look really hard to spot differences. They're quality is also quite good for the price, for the most part. Many of the sellers of these knives have stores in and outside of ebay. the downside is many of the have high shipping costs and they take a long time to arrive. there was also an american site that sold these knives and had great success with them I just csnnot remember the name. Hope I helped
 
If you are talking about autos, then you need to understand that it is a federal felony to import them. So people who are selling imported autos are probably trying to get compensated for what is a serious risk on their part. If they are importing parts for autos and assembling them here, then they really aren't CCC. They have expensive American labor included with the CCC parts. And, they aren't reducing their risk meaningfully.

If you are talking about manual knives, then It sounds like you have the wrong suppliers.

Our town doesn't have a knife store either but I'm sure not going to be the one who gives one to it.
 
jca21 said:
while not a business owner i try not to buy the cheap stuff. my parents raised me with the notion that you should buy something good once (save up for it) and use it for a long time, maybe even a life time. theres a certain satisfaction with owning something like, say my gransfor bruks axes that are guaranteed a life time (well they say 25 years) and having worked hard and saved up for them. the quality is immediately present and of course it is rewarding.
Click to expand...

Or as another knife nut once told me,

"Buy quality, and only cry once."
 
Knife Outlet said:
If you are talking about autos, then you need to understand that it is a federal felony to import them. So people who are selling imported autos are probably trying to get compensated for what is a serious risk on their part. If they are importing parts for autos and assembling them here, then they really aren't CCC. They have expensive American labor included with the CCC parts. And, they aren't reducing their risk meaningfully.

If you are talking about manual knives, then It sounds like you have the wrong suppliers.

Our town doesn't have a knife store either but I'm sure not going to be the one who gives one to it.
Click to expand...

I hadn't thought of it that way about the autos. Good point! I suppose if I did find a cheap source for them that source could potentially put me in jail. Maybe I'll pass this info along to my customers when I tell them the price!
 
Knife Outlet said:
If you are talking about autos, then you need to understand that it is a federal felony to import them. So people who are selling imported autos are probably trying to get compensated for what is a serious risk on their part. If they are importing parts for autos and assembling them here, then they really aren't CCC. They have expensive American labor included with the CCC parts. And, they aren't reducing their risk meaningfully.

If you are talking about manual knives, then It sounds like you have the wrong suppliers.

Our town doesn't have a knife store either but I'm sure not going to be the one who gives one to it.
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Agreed :o

I'd love to sell enough to have my own brick-n-mortar shop, but for a prime location where people would actually see it, it would be around $3000 a month just for the building/square footage :eek: If I actually made that much in sales I think it would be unwise to give it all away to a physical spot when online seems to take care of things just fine.....but one can wish :D
 
If I'm not mistaken, the number of specialty retail stores in the U.S. is declining, not growing. I'm not talking about the knife business, but retail in general.

What that says is that opening a specialty retail store is a risky proposition - even riskier than it was in the past. I had a very nice kitchenware store several years ago. I couldn't make a go of it. Our marketplace here just isn't strong enough to support something as specialized as what I did. I lost a lot of money in the venture. You might find the same thing to be true in NH.
 
Blais said:
I hadn't thought of it that way about the autos. Good point! I suppose if I did find a cheap source for them that source could potentially put me in jail. Maybe I'll pass this info along to my customers when I tell them the price!
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Not likely. You could go to jail for shipping an auto across state lines without an authorized purchase order. But a supplier isn't going to cause it. They would cause themselves the legal problems.
 
i believe thats been happening for ages, with the advent of big box retail and all. the little guys dont really stand a chance.
 
Knife Outlet said:
Not likely. You could go to jail for shipping an auto across state lines without an authorized purchase order. But a supplier isn't going to cause it. They would cause themselves the legal problems.
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So receiving them from overseas is ok? That sounds a little strange. I'm going to have to look up the federal guidelines.
 
Receiving them from overseas isn't legal either. A few larger guys have gotten caught over the years. With autos, most importers and sellers hope they can skirt the law enough as to not get noticed.
 
Hey, I will put my two cents in here. I am a former LEo and now manage shopping malls in NY, NJ and PA. First is it TOTALLY illegal to import switchblades into the US. It is illegal to send them accross state lines with very few exceptions. There have been many arrest and Customs is now Homeland Security and they will go after you. As far as small busniess goes, this is the wrong time to think about it. I manage 8 million square feet of space and we have alot of vacant units with more to come. Rent, taxes, insurance, store displays and upkeep, labor and busniess permits are all just the start....
 
Blais said:
So receiving them from overseas is ok? That sounds a little strange. I'm going to have to look up the federal guidelines.
Click to expand...

No, you misunderstand. The importer is the one who runs afoul of the law. It is legal for a dealer to receive an auto from a U.S. manufacturer or supplier.

I'll give you a quick synopsis of the Federal law. It is illegal to import an auto - illegal for anyone. It is illegal to ship an auto across state lines with 2 exceptions. The first is that an auto can be shipped to a dealer or manufacturer for autos. The second is that an auto can be shipped to an authorized recipient who provides the dealer with a written purchase order. No individual is an authorized recipient. Only government agencies are authorized recipients under Federal law. It matters not whether the individual is authorized by state law to carry an auto. It is a federal felony to ship an auto to an individual across state lines. That's the federal law.

There are also state laws that govern autos. In some states they are illegal for everyone. In some states they are legal for everyone. In yet others they are legal for some and illegal for others. The laws vary from state to state. It may be legal to sell autos to some individuals in New Hampshire as long as it is not an interstate shipment. I don't know. You will have to check the law there. but it is not legal for a dealer to ship autos across state lines to any individual in the United States - any individual - period.

Hope that helps clarify it for you.
 
Knife Outlet, FINALLY someone else who knows the law! Thanks! I have stated what you just said about 100 times in the law and auto section, and get all the BS comments about "how can that be everyone sells them".....I have linked the law and they still don't believe it! Syderco got slammed for a large fine last year, and there have been many arrest both by the Postal Inspectors, and Customs/ICE.
 
tom19176 said:
Knife Outlet, FINALLY someone else who knows the law! Thanks! I have stated what you just said about 100 times in the law and auto section, and get all the BS comments about "how can that be everyone sells them".....I have linked the law and they still don't believe it! Syderco got slammed for a large fine last year, and there have been many arrest both by the Postal Inspectors, and Customs/ICE.
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I listened to ya Tom! Very closely.
When i first got here i made the mistake of quoting the law in the auto section and got essentially flamed by a number of people. One of them being a very notable person who should know the law. I think you even posted in it several times, pretty much repeating what i had stated and they still just wanted to fight about it. What got me is, some of the posters stated on the public forums that they EDC them in states which forbid ownership or carry, which to me does the knife community nothing but harm and gives big brudda reason to restrict them even further.
 
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