Why aren't more of you guys selling in the kitchen knife forum here?

Nathan the Machinist

Nathan the Machinist

KnifeMaker / Machinist / Evil Genius
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Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
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Feb 13, 2007
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We have a "for sale by maker, kitchen knives" forum here. http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/forumdisplay.php/890-For-Sale-Kitchen-Knives

That area hit critical mass, buyers are there and things posted there sell pretty well but there aren't many of us posting there? I see that as a big untapped potential. Everybody owns and uses kitchen knives, we have an area for that, but I don't see many of you guys over there? Get some AEB-L, make some useful designs and people will put them to work. And the best part is you don't have to make a *censored* sheath!
 
That's the plan in the new year Nathan. I have many coworkers that are potential buyers as well.

My shop is all packed up for our move in mid January. Then I'm going to buy some thin stainless and get to work.
 
I'll be selling some knives there early next year. It looks like you do very well there Nathan. You stuff doesn't last but a day or two. Nice!
 
Brock47 said:
I'll be selling some knives there early next year. It looks like you do very well there Nathan. You stuff doesn't last but a day or two. Nice!
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his stuff doesn't last more than five minutes;)

I think a big reason is that kitchen knives a harder than then look(particularly grinding the blades, I can grind approximately three hunters in the time to grind a kitchen knife ) I have some that I'm finishing up to sell for christmas but I think your right that it's an underutilized sales area.
 
I have thought the same thing myself. I haven't been able to hang on to any finished ones long enough to do it. I'm about to up my membership so I can start selling knives in general. I really enjoy the kitchen knives and have had good success and feedback but they do take longer to make.
 
i hardly ever have any stock to sell as i have some retailers seling my kitchen stuffs and i have a subforum on another site dedicated to kitchen knives (alot of pro chefs and high end home cooks )
its really nice to order a whole sheet of XHP in and just take a few orders and then nest piles of "extras" on to the sheet to make it as full as i can (often 40-60 blades)
im in a pinch right now as i need to get 10 out the door by tue afternoon
 
I've tried selling in there, hardly ever sold anything. Maybe it's just my knives. :confused:

Nathan, your selling darn near perfect knives at bargain prices. I am sure they will continue to sell like hot cakes for you!
 
I've sold everything I make locally. I should put a few pieces up in the new year for name recognition.
 
Nate, I am not sure that a kitchen knife market has ever developed on here. No idea why as this is the biggest knife forum of them all by a fair margin as best as I can tell. From what I have heard and read, the place to be used to be the In the Kitchen forum on Knife Forums, Then someone got butthurt and started their own forum and everyone moved to that one. Then someone else got butthurt after Butthurt Forum 1 was sold and started another forum. Some people moved to that one. At some point one of the guys who had been a big vendor on the original forum and who was supposed to be some kind of villain who inflicted butthurt started a forum of their own. Some say that person is primarily responsible for blowing up the old ITK sub-forum. I have no knowledge regarding that. Most of the action on that one tends to revolve around the products sold by the forum owner, which is not surprising or wrong in any way. Some of the people on here are members/vendors are a couple of those forums.
I will say this. If you could figure out some way to drive people to this subforum, it would be a good thing. It would certainly be cheaper than trying to sell on some of those other forums. They charge a buttload for "access" to their members.
 
And yes, Nate, like Ben said, you do give your stuff away. You have been on the FRONT COVER of the Knives annual, for Pete's sake!!!! You need to GOUGE!!!!!:D
 
jdm61 said:
And yes, Nate, like Ben said, you do give your stuff away.
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I think we all know what the materials cost and how much time it takes. I think it's a fair price for a utilitarian knife. They're not perfect but they're pretty good. To me this is the perfect application for this place. It's not an art piece or a collectors piece. That's a forum where a competent maker (we have many here) can ply their trade and make a living making a useful object. That's perfect! And underutilized, methinks...
 
You know I love your knives Nathan. And I think you do great stuff for makers and collectors alike.
Your processes are quite a bit different than 95% of the guys here though.

For me, I am a one man shop, doing everything by hand. This is my only income and I simply can't sell a 6" chef knife for $150. I'd lose my shirt.
 
Plus Nate should be getting some kind of premium for being "Da Man!!!" Others do. We can call it the "jaw dropping how the hell did he do that" surcharge. :D
 
You are right about it being underutilized and that has the effect of not attracting the attention of people who like to buy kitchen knives. The don't even bother looking too often because in the past, the pickings have been rather thin. We do need to try and change that.
Nathan the Machinist said:
I think we all know what the materials cost and how much time it takes. I think it's a fair price for a utilitarian knife. They're not perfect but they're pretty good. To me this is the perfect application for this place. It's not an art piece or a collectors piece. That's a forum where a competent maker (we have many here) can ply their trade and make a living making a useful object. That's perfect! And underutilized, methinks...
Click to expand...
 
I am still in awe at those who can grind/ machine these thin blades. Just awesome set ups and skill.
 
BenR.T. said:
You know I love your knives Nathan. And I think you do great stuff for makers and collectors alike.
Your processes are quite a bit different than 95% of the guys here though.

For me, I am a one man shop, doing everything by hand. This is my only income and I simply can't sell a 6" chef knife for $150. I'd lose my shirt.
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I wish you could spend a week in my shop to see what CNC does and doesn't do. You'd see that machining and CNC allows me to reproduce tweaked out designs and make certain geometries, but even when you omit the increased setup complexity and programming etc, you're still not producing faster than a competent maker could simply do something similar by hand. It takes two days to make six knives (excluding HT). I'll bet any full time maker here can beat that, assuming they're simple designs, unadorned and with a utilitarian finish. I don't think it takes CNC for that, it takes a design, a plan and a process. *shrug*
 
Nathan, 70kg of 3mm AEB-L would be ok as start point with kitchen knives :D ?

Now prototyping 3 kitchen knives posted in other thread.

And I also noticed that on dedicated selling sub-forum here for kitchen knives is in state:
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When I selled there a kitchen knife , topic had very little views...
 
FWIW: The first handmade knife I ever bought, other than a mini, I just bought from the kitchen forum a couple months ago. Excellent craftsmanship, it will make a great christmas present. Yeah, I still haven't bought any of the handmade knives in my collection.
 
Ive been working with some pro chefs and home enthusiasts along with hands on studying of many of the top selling Japanese kitchen blades for the past 2 years. It is very hard/ impossible to compete with the Japanese smiths. Ive used some very fine performing knives in high quality steels that can be purchased for half of what most custom makers get and all the kitchen knife enthusiasts know this.
 
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