The Ohio Classic Knife Show ground to a halt Saturday and I do mean ground. This isn’t a knife edge judgment that could go either way. The show flopped.
From Saturday noon to 5:00 pm there were always more vendors than shoppers and if you sold a custom knife, well, you were lucky. I didn’t take any pictures, but if you want to know what it was like I have two mental images for you.
Imagine a silver picture frame and now fill it with inky blackness. That’s what the show looked like. If that still leaves you confused, picture a vacuum cleaner.
Why is a good question. In sales, it’s a number game. It’s simple. The more attendees present, the larger the fraction of potential customers. The more potential customers, more chances you have to make a sale. Empty isles mean no sales.
Where was everyone?
I don’t know. Days in late autumn that beautiful are gems to be enjoyed. OSU played Purdue (they won 49-zip - - doesn’t sound like it was a good game) and Cambridge is OSU land. Cambridge is kind of in the middle of nowhere (I’m sorry, I love Salt Folk State Park and the area is lovely, but it’s a destination.) Maybe the knife makers were not national draws and maybe the show wasn’t advertised enough. Maybe it was the free admission to last year’s buyers that had the same saturated customers coming back because it was free and something to fill the day.
A new regime is taking over. We need this show to be a success. It is one of the very few opportunities for purchasers and purveyors to meet in the market place.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
Classic Knife Show - - Cambridge Ohio
Today was the opening of the Cambridge Knife Show, or as it is properly known, the Ohio Classic Knife Show.
The show is Friday and Saturday and it was explained to me that Friday was selected for a large group of older, retired folks who want to attend an upscale knife show without the younger, more energetic crowd. Sunday was deselected as the hosting community has a deep religious and family orientation and would prevent attendance on Sunday until at least 2:00 pm. That leaves Saturday.
I believe this explanation based on theold mature crowd we had today. But in all honesty, crowd is not the right descriptive word for the attendees. Sprinkling of, or dusting of people might be the best term.
Here are a few images:
The show had a lot of custom knives. The typical commercial collector knives were present, Buck, Case and such. Not too many current factory produced knives were represented.
One treat was Andrew Denko, the inventor of Cold Steel’s Tri-Ad lock and one of their designers. This mechanism is reported to be one of the strongest locks in the commercial market. He had several of his own knives on display. They are simple but well made, elegant folders designed for hard use over long hours. Keep an eye on him. He’s going do interesting things in the knife world.
If you could find a knife you liked, well you didn’t look very hard.
Tomorrow is the last day. the weather reports warm, but rain and cloudy. It could be perfect knife show weather. More later!
The show is Friday and Saturday and it was explained to me that Friday was selected for a large group of older, retired folks who want to attend an upscale knife show without the younger, more energetic crowd. Sunday was deselected as the hosting community has a deep religious and family orientation and would prevent attendance on Sunday until at least 2:00 pm. That leaves Saturday.
I believe this explanation based on the
Here are a few images:
 |
| My Favorite Table - All we need is customers |
 |
| Vendors setting up and trading among themselves |
 |
| Whats missing from this picture? -- You. |
One treat was Andrew Denko, the inventor of Cold Steel’s Tri-Ad lock and one of their designers. This mechanism is reported to be one of the strongest locks in the commercial market. He had several of his own knives on display. They are simple but well made, elegant folders designed for hard use over long hours. Keep an eye on him. He’s going do interesting things in the knife world.
If you could find a knife you liked, well you didn’t look very hard.
 |
| Something for just about everyone. |
Tomorrow is the last day. the weather reports warm, but rain and cloudy. It could be perfect knife show weather. More later!
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Bridge Day, Fayetteville WV
It’s a knife edge that separates you from free fall. You lean out and know without looking the river is 876 feet below. You stuff the demon screaming “I want to live!” into an unoccupied corner of your mind, lean out and give in to gravity.
Gravity takes over. You have less than 7 seconds to live. You don’t have to worry about reaching terminal velocity, 161 mph. Your out-spread legs and arms grab the wind knifing by you and slow you to 120 mph. Still too fast! To survive a water landing you need to get your speed down to at least 60 mph. Slower would be better. The odds don’t look good.
Still, you brought the right equipment and you used it to survive last year’s BASE jump at the New River Gorge Bridge, so it should work again.
My name is Knife Guy and on the third Saturday of October my beat is the DLZ.
Preparation starts early. Some say it starts the day after last year's event. National Park Service, Sheriff, State Police, Secret Service, US Marshals, WV National Guard, Rope Rescue Services, Water Rescue, Jan Care (emergency 1st aid and transport), several raft companies, the Governor’s office and Vertical Visions start with an after action report and the paper work builds.
Down in the gorge we wait for the emergency vehicles to arrive.
This year the water is low and moving slowly. Fayette Station rapids are showing more rock than I’ve ever seen. And water rescue places an orange cone on an exposed rock in the water landing zone.
The landing area is taped off…
And the Drop Landing Zone is marked.
Up on the bridge, the platform and diving board are extended.
It’s a long way up, but two rappellers start jumaring their way up to the bridge’s under structure. The climb is noteworthy. One is towing an American flag. The other brings a West Virginia state flag and what might be a club flag.
And at 9 o’clock, they jump.
Some landings are:
Wet!
Mystical!
And some not without risk.
I had a chance to talk knives with the professional water rescue people. What kind of knife would you carry on a rubber raft if you needed to cut the chute away? Water landing has some risk involved. Lines could get tangled; the chute snags on rocks; the river pulls you under. The rescuers better have knives.
The boss lends out orange Spyderco Rescue knives (C45OR) and Benchmade model 5 Rescue Hooks. Oh, yes, there were other personal knives, but he wants everyone on the river to have a good knife. Study the professionals I always say.
It is an incredible experience. Each jumper lives on the knife edge. A slip the wrong way and tragedy waits. Just to hammer the message home, the last jumper of the day does a head stand on the platform and cannonballs out into space. He straightens out and deploys his chute. It’s a skydiving rig.
Five exits before him three jumpers simultaneously exit and deploy their skydiving chutes and they land safely in the river. The boats fish them out.
The last jumper deploys, but skydiving rigs don’t open as fast as BASE rigs, those rectangular flying wings. His chute takes too long to fill.
The water rescue team takes him out of the river on a backboard and put a cervical collar on him. Everyone is silent and grim as they scurry to get him in the ambulance and to the hospital. I still don’t know his condition.
Life is a knife edge and we are all on it.
Gravity takes over. You have less than 7 seconds to live. You don’t have to worry about reaching terminal velocity, 161 mph. Your out-spread legs and arms grab the wind knifing by you and slow you to 120 mph. Still too fast! To survive a water landing you need to get your speed down to at least 60 mph. Slower would be better. The odds don’t look good.
Still, you brought the right equipment and you used it to survive last year’s BASE jump at the New River Gorge Bridge, so it should work again.
My name is Knife Guy and on the third Saturday of October my beat is the DLZ.
Preparation starts early. Some say it starts the day after last year's event. National Park Service, Sheriff, State Police, Secret Service, US Marshals, WV National Guard, Rope Rescue Services, Water Rescue, Jan Care (emergency 1st aid and transport), several raft companies, the Governor’s office and Vertical Visions start with an after action report and the paper work builds.
Down in the gorge we wait for the emergency vehicles to arrive.
This year the water is low and moving slowly. Fayette Station rapids are showing more rock than I’ve ever seen. And water rescue places an orange cone on an exposed rock in the water landing zone.
The landing area is taped off…
And the Drop Landing Zone is marked.
Up on the bridge, the platform and diving board are extended.
 |
| Look up 876 feet |
It’s a long way up, but two rappellers start jumaring their way up to the bridge’s under structure. The climb is noteworthy. One is towing an American flag. The other brings a West Virginia state flag and what might be a club flag.
Some landings are:
 |
| OUCH!!!!!!!! |
Hard!
And some not without risk.
I had a chance to talk knives with the professional water rescue people. What kind of knife would you carry on a rubber raft if you needed to cut the chute away? Water landing has some risk involved. Lines could get tangled; the chute snags on rocks; the river pulls you under. The rescuers better have knives.
The boss lends out orange Spyderco Rescue knives (C45OR) and Benchmade model 5 Rescue Hooks. Oh, yes, there were other personal knives, but he wants everyone on the river to have a good knife. Study the professionals I always say.
It is an incredible experience. Each jumper lives on the knife edge. A slip the wrong way and tragedy waits. Just to hammer the message home, the last jumper of the day does a head stand on the platform and cannonballs out into space. He straightens out and deploys his chute. It’s a skydiving rig.
Five exits before him three jumpers simultaneously exit and deploy their skydiving chutes and they land safely in the river. The boats fish them out.
The last jumper deploys, but skydiving rigs don’t open as fast as BASE rigs, those rectangular flying wings. His chute takes too long to fill.
The water rescue team takes him out of the river on a backboard and put a cervical collar on him. Everyone is silent and grim as they scurry to get him in the ambulance and to the hospital. I still don’t know his condition.
Life is a knife edge and we are all on it.
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