Why doesn't Victorinox/Wenger let their customers buy customized SAKs?

This is exactly what I've wondered ever since I got online myself. It can not be, in this day and age, that difficult for the companies to setup an area on their order form for 'customs'. They assemble the knives from bulk bins of parts anyway, so just setup a few benches off the main line, to just build custom orders. I bet a whole new area of business could be built upon it, and profitably at that IMO.:thumbup:

Radioactive said:
Is it not possible to have an option available to customers who want to buy SAKs to be able to pick and choose what tools they want to go into their item?

Is it just not logistically possible or is it too expensive to individually cater to each customer?
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They already make a custom model for me. It's called the Soldier. :)
As was already said, if you can't find what you want in their catalog, well, you have a problem.
 
I understand why it wouldn’t be practical to offer a “custom shop” but it would sure be nice if they did.
 
One possible business model would be to license a small shop, possibly managed/owned by an experienced shop employee, to produce custom SAK configurations. The usual contract controls around quality, advertising and output would have to be in place. The factory would supply the parts needed of course at cost or slightly above. Distribution would be for direct orders only and be managed by the licensee via whatever system they would develop. I don't see any significant downside to this kind of business relationship, and probably similar to the relationship between Smith and Wesson and their custom shop and Buck and their custom shop. Probably profitable also.

Heck, I'd even do a few weeks of programming for a couple dozen SAK's (not for resale, of course).
 
While stationed in Germany in the early sixties, my father took us on a vacation to Switzerland. We visited Lucerne, and on the church square, the local tourist shop had a Swiss Army knife bench where you could pick out any accessory you wanted and they would assemble the knife. Behind the bench was a wall display filled with every known accessory I had never before seen - about 15 feet or so.

It has and can be done. American prepacked marketing prohibits it - so few people would buy into the system it would never make money. Next time you go to an auto parts chain store, really look around - the spools of bulk hose, fittings, and boxes of bulbs are all disappearing for blister packs on pegboard display.

Vic and Wenger can't turn American habits around that keep accelerating over the past decades. How many of you buy your pickles out of a 35 gallon barrel?
 
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