October 2015 – Knife Blog: Pocket Knives With Your Logo

The History of Engraved Leatherman Tools

We went on our yearly tour of the Leatherman plant in Portland Oregon this year. It’s amazing how fast this company is growing. They had to increase the production area. To do this, they had to move the shipping department to another building 3 miles away. That new location is rented, and it houses the warehouse of the tools, the shipping area, customer service, and the custom laser engraving area.

Back to the main building, the small Leatherman museum is in the front office

Early Leatherman Prototype2

and open to the public. Here are a few pictures of the prototypes that Tim Leatherman made in his garage during the birth of his brilliant idea.

Early Leatherman Prototype

You know, necessity is the mother of invention. The Leatherman idea started when Tim and his wife toured Europe in the 1970’s, using a used car he bought there. It kept breaking down, and Tim would fix it himself. He really needed some pliers, but didn’t have any. It would have been nice if he had something like a Leatherman tool. Many months later, Tim perfected some prototypes

Early Leatherman Prototype3

in his garage, and started a very successful company. Too bad Gerber Knives turned down his proposal to produce his tools. Too bad for Gerber, but not for Tim.

Here are 2 stories of how a Leatherman tool came to the rescue.

True Story1

True Story2

So that’s how a tiny tool company developed into a world renown producer of engraved Leatherman tools with your company logo. Tim has done a lot for the future of personalized pocket knives and tools.

The Best Pocket Knives At The Ohio Classic Knife Show 2015

The best knife show in Ohio 2015 had the best pocket knives this year. The Ohio Classic Knife Show was put on by Battle Horse Knives. It was held at the Pritchard Laughlin Civic Center, 7033 Glenn Hwy, Cambridge, Ohio 43725. The best pocket knife that I saw was one of the Buck knives. Buck has always been one of my favorites, because of the durability and its reputation.

Ohio Classic Knife Show 2015

Here are some highlights of the show. Among the 90 tables were unique displays from “aroundthecabin.com/campfire“. These guys put on an entertaining live program 6 nights a week.

Kip from aroundthecabin.com

The “Best Display” award went to “Hair of the Bear” owner Moon Munjas from Marietta OH. Moon makes custom knives, sometimes 5 or 6 at a time. His display was colorful and attractive.

Moon Munjas of Hair of the Bear

Hair of the Bear

Yurco Handcrafted Knives owner Mickey Yurco, is from Canfield Ohio.

Mickey Yurco and wife

He makes custom designs, specializing in self defense knives. He is a member of The Knifemakers’ Guild. Mickey is accompanied by his wife in the picture.

Tim Roddy

Mickey’s buddy, Tim Roddy, from neighboring Youngstown, Ohio also had a nice display of

Tim and Mickey

custom knives that he made from the finest stainless steel. He specializes in quality fixed blade knives.

Woodlab Outdoors, LLC

Michael J. Balaskovitz, the director of the 2016 knife show, has “Woodlab Outdoors, LLC”, Premium Materials & Servicing. He sells various knife handle materials.

Greg Gottschalk

The award winner for “Best Value” in the show was Greg Gottschalk of Carnegie PA. Greg does a beautiful job making hand crafted knives, and is a member of The Knifemakers’ Guild and ABS Mastersmith. Of course, all the custom-made knives at the show are made in the USA.

Vallerie Hibbard

Valerie Hibbard, of Plain And Practical LLC (Scales & Grip Blanks & More) had a huge display of various hardwoods that she sells to knife makers. She is from Hilliard Ohio, and travels around looking for unique specimens of hardwood which she can bring into her store.

Plain and Practical LLC

Wayne G. Hensley, and his business, Custom MadeCutlery, had an interesting table. Wayne’s motto is: Materials by God, Crafted by Hensley. Wayne is a member of The Knifemakers’ Guild, Professional Knifemakers Association, and Georgia Custom Knifemakers’ Guild. He is also the vice president of The Knifemakers’ Guild. His picture is missing here.

My nephew, Tim Pike (a camo knife connoisseur) and I had a great day looking at some of the country’s best pocket knives.

How Engraved Gerber Knives Will Strike Your Customers

Your customers will love a gift of a Gerber Knife. Here are 3 ways it will “strike” them……

The famous brand of “Gerber”. This fine company has a history going way back to 1939 with a mini order of handmade knife sets that were only given as Christmas gifts. Then thousands of retail stores started selling them all over the United States. Then in just 21 years, 1960, this knife company became very trusted as a manufacturer of “collectible legends”. Today, the Gerber name is well known in the knife world, even being sold in our nation’s Walmart stores. For business gifts, engraved Gerber knives with your company logo are available on the internet.
Gerber Titanium Nitride Paraframe 8446
The variety of knives and multi-tools. Gerber not only makes folding pocket knives. They make multi-tools, in the fashion of Leatherman Tools. Key chain multi-tools are the newest addition to their line, with the Gerber Shard Key Chain Tool.
Gerber® Shard Key Chain Tool 1769
The economical price of Gerber knives. Their knives are reasonably-priced, in the 20 to 30 dollar range. This is due to their global sourcing of raw materials and finished materials. Some assembly is being done in the Gerber Portland Oregon plant.
Gerber Ultralight Lockback 6050

How To Solve The Biggest Gift Problems With Engraved Kershaw Knives

Do you need some gift ideas for Christmas? You have male employees or customers who already have everything? There’s always room for engraved Kershaw knives in your employee’s or client’s pocket or drawer. I’ve never seen a man turn down a gift knife, even if he has a collection of them. Kershaw knives are USA-made, and some are imported. But even the imported ones are done to the specifications and strict guidelines of KAI-USA Kershaw Knives.

Some new models are the Scallion Camo Knife 1620.

Scallion Camo 1620 knife

A new color in the Scallion line is the “Olive”, which replaces the green handle color.

Kershaw Scallion 1620 Olive Color Handle

A favorite knife is the Kershaw “Leek” 1660 CKT in black handle and blade.

Kershaw Leek Knife, Black CKT

More models, like the Shuffle, Ember, and Select Fire are available now, and will be added to the website soon.