EP 95: All about Knives with Outdoor Edge Knives, David Bloch. In this episode of the Epic Outdoors Podcast we talk to David Bloch about his company, Outdoor Edge. David started Outdoor Edge as a young college graduate and pursued his dream of making knives. David talks about blade care, sharpening, and replaceable blades.
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Speaker 1: You don’t wanna sharpen the whole shoulder of it, ’cause it, it just, it’s a lot more metal to remove,
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Speaker 2: Go to get my knife outta my pack. And I realize it’s an old knife that has not been sharpened in a long time. And
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Speaker 3: Anything to do with Western big Games.
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Speaker 4: Welcome
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Speaker 2: To the Epic Outdoors Podcast,
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Speaker 5: Powered
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Speaker 2: By Under Armour. Hey everybody. Welcome to the Epic Outdoors Podcast for this week. Today we’re gonna be talking all about knives, and we’ve got Mr. David Block on the line and he is the founder and president of Outdoor Edge Knives. So we’re looking forward to that. But before we get into it, we’d like to thank Under Armour, our title sponsor of the podcast. Appreciate all that they do for us. They’ve got some amazing products. They’ve just released their new line of clothing for this year. If you haven’t tried any of that, get on their website and get your hands on some, that’s one that we tested out earlier this year. Jeff and I here in the office, took a bunch of the new Raider gear, we took it out to the car wash, tested it out, and it was pretty incredible how that performed. I was definitely impressed. So big shout out to Under Armour for bringing you this podcast. Also, there’s one thing I am super jealous of right now. John just got a brand new spotting scope and I, I’m like, ah, I wish I was driving up to get one tomorrow. And I was actually contemplating driving up to Tremont to pick up a scope in the next couple days.
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Speaker 5: Well, I called Kent’s Optics and they got such a good selection, but I didn’t know exactly what I wanted, but I did know a price range, and so I just talked to him and it said, Hey, here’s what I wanna spend. What are my options? And so he went through a bunch of different options. I ended up getting Swarovski 80 millimeter spotting scope. I didn’t get the inter, you know, the B the one that accepts the B T X I piece. I’ve been asked after I posted on Instagram, Hey, no, B T X, but that’s not in the budget this year. But we did find this other one that, that was wasn’t my budget. And I, for me, it’s like Christmas, man, that thing came and you know, I’m setting it up, looking out in the parking lot, you know, already.
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Speaker 2: So tell me about the process of getting that scope. I mean, I, I heard you were getting one and then all of a sudden it was here, so
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Speaker 5: Oh, yeah, I called him on Wednesday. It was here Friday, so it, you know, and I don’t know, I didn’t do a lot of, so I knew I, I wanted a Swarovski, I’ve, I’ve got Swarovski binoculars and I wanted a scope and, and so I just called him and said, Hey, what do you got? And I did consider some others. There were a couple of Zy scopes I was looking at. I mean, he’s got every brand there is. And, but anyway, I was looking at, had my eye on, on the Swarovski and so I got that and yeah, he had it in stock. Everything we talked about he had in stock. Yeah. So every scope that I was interested in or wanted, he was like, yeah, I’ll put it in right now. Wow. And anyway, and, and I was gonna get a tripod from him. He had the scope in the mail before I could, I could call him back and say, Hey, you know, let’s throw a tripod in there. I need to get a tripod from you too. So he’s like, oh, that already shipped. Wow. So it was awesome. But yeah, if you want to go check him out, kent’s optics.com. Chris, give us the phone number.
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Speaker 2: The phone number for those guys is 4 3 5 2 5 7 7 0 1 4. And like we’ve said, they’ve got one of the biggest in-store collections of optics that you’ve ever seen. Anything from Swarovski’s Eyes, night, forests, SIG, sour, black Diamond, the Vortex, just pretty much anything you can think of. They’ve got it. Huge selection. If you don’t have time to go into the store, give ’em a call check online. And like, like we
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Speaker 5: Just said, yeah, most of their business is not, they’re in northern Utah and most of their businesses is just, you know, guys calling in and ordering over the phone and then getting, getting them shipped out. So the nice thing is they’re awesome guys. They’re just fanatical shed collectors and shed hunters.
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Speaker 2: Well, and if you have any questions, you can shoot ’em by those guys and they can answer ’em knowledgeably because they, they’re out using those optics. So definitely give those guys a call if you’re in the market. Anyway, let’s dive into the podcast today with our guest, David Block from Outdoor
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Speaker 5: Edge. David, how you doing? Good,
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Speaker 1: Thanks for having me on the show.
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Speaker 5: So we’d just like to start by letting our listeners get, get to know you a little bit more. What’s your background? Where’d you grow up? Tell us a little bit about yourself.
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Speaker 1: So I grew up, grew up in Paramus, New Jersey, and grew up back east. And basically our family was a skiing family, and my dad was a doctor. He decided he always loved Colorado and, and learned to ski in Colorado when he was an intern. He basically packed us all up when I was 17 years old and whole family moved out west and sail in Colorado and live outside the Denver area in, in Morrison, Colorado. And here to stay. Love Colorado, love the outdoors. And yeah, Colorado is, is very much home to me. So was it
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Speaker 2: A big change for you going from the east to Colorado or?
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Speaker 1: When I moved out west, it was 1977 and it was, you know, den the Denver area wasn’t quite as developed as it is now, so it was different landscape. It was, I I like to refer it as Denver was called a cow town back, back then. And, and it’s really changed and become very, very cosmopolitan. But back then it was, it was, you know, family wasn’t quite quite as tight. It was, people were kind of moving in from different areas and it was, it was, it was a different, different vibe. But you know, as far as the outdoors and the mountains and, and Colorado, that’s why we moved out here. So there, no, no looking back. So I was 17 at the time and it was culturally was a change, but I ended up fitting, fitting right in and, and again, no looking back, I just love being here.
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Speaker 2: So you, you kind of mentioned hunting a little bit. Did so, so did you grow up hunting or was that, at what point did you get into more of the outdoor lifestyle?
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Speaker 1: So that’s no, great, great question. And I actually did not grow up in a, in a hunting family. Grew up now loving the outdoors. I, as a kid, I went through all the Cub Scouts and Wee Blows and Boy Scouts and, and my love of that was going on a camping trip every month during the summer months and getting to, you know, learn responsibly as a, as a little kid, how to handle a knife and how to open a knife, close it hand the knife to another person when it’s open and how to use a hatchet. So all this kind of basic, basic camp skills and, and etiquette of, of a knife knife faceting me as a young boy, have an older brother. Two years older. We, we collected knives as kids. My, my grandfather also was a big influence. He was a big knife collector and a big out outdoorsman.
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More of a fisherman than a, than a hunter. He, his, all his buddies hunted and he actually shot his, his first and only buck and decided it wasn’t for him. But he was a, a big saltwater fisherman, so he didn’t really take to the big game hunting, you know, tried it once, gave it up, but, but just the love of the outdoors has always been, been, been in our family, just not a, not a hunting family. So I didn’t know anybody that hunted and never was influenced by anybody that hunted. After I moved to Colorado, I’m sorry, before I moved to Colorado, I did a lot of summer camps too with the, with the scouts and whatnot. And, and at 10 years old I learned how to shoot my first 22 at this summer camp. And it was a real sports oriented camp and he had free time and they took us to the, took us to the rifle range one day and I just fell in love with shooting a gun.
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And at free time, I spent every single day of my free time at that rifle range so other kids would go play basketball, I would go to the rifle range and shoot. And at 10 years old, i I, I was the first 10 year old at the camp to reach the n r a status of marksman first class, which is basically a 22 target rating system and hit that level. So it was, it was kind of a cool accomplishment for, for a young kid. I, I just loved it and just shot a lot. And then the next year I went to another camp that they charged you for the bullets, didn’t have the money to, to buy the bullets, so I went to the RY range every day. So just fell in love with shooting guns and, and Bose. So, so where this, where this ties in is, I think it was 20, 21 years old and a buddy of mine, you know, looked, choked me this ad for a compound bow like, oh, this guy’s selling his bow.
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And it’s like, yeah, bows have really changed a lot over the years and I used to love shooting a bow as a kid. So I went and bought this compound bow. I I got some bow hunting magazines and basically looked at all the products in these magazines and always loved knives. And I was working with, actually my brother was working with a martial artist that made handmade push daggers. And I looked at that T handle knife and I said, you know, that that’s something that probably could be used as a, as a honey knife. So that was really the, the start of outdoor edge. That was kind of the brainchild for me, not ever skinning an animal or using a knife, combining something that was used for self-defense and applying that as a skinny knife. And I actually met with some taxidermists and hunters and kind of developed the design and I always, I always had the entrepreneurial spirit, I would say always wanted to design or invent something that had never been done before and it ended up being a knife.
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So my background through college was I went to Colorado School of Mines for engineering, studied mechanical engineering and metallurgy. And this knife design that I came up with was basically my senior design project in school. So it was really a different approach for a, a hunting knife, skinny knife, and something that I had never really used. I just got, you know, feedback from, from, you know, hunters and taxidermists on this knife. And to explain that knife, it’s, it’s the first product that outage launched. It was called the Game Skinner, and still, still in our line 30 years later, basically a T handle. So the idea is that you, you have a pistol grip, so it allows you to cut with a straight wrist and then so you don’t have to bend your wrist. Also, it nice features, it, it cradles in between your fingers so you can open your hand, you know, with the normal knife you’re always think of all the times you set down your knife to feel the hide and use both hands with this you can basically use both hands without, without sending the knife down.
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And then went to a sports show, there was a, a custom knife maker made gut hook Skinners, and he was at the show cutting leather with this gut hook. And then I like looked at that and said, wow, let’s put a gut hook on top of it. So combining the kind of Alaskan Hulu, the T handle push knife and the gut hook together in one came up with a new knife design that really no one had done before. Filed a patent on it, made it my senior design project and graduated college with without a job and, and basically decided, well let’s, let’s start outdoor edge. So that’s kind of kind of the story of how I, I got into the knife business. That’s
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Speaker 2: That’s pretty amazing that this was your first business venture. I I respect that a lot. That’s pretty cool.
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Speaker 5: Yeah. And 30 years later you’ve still got that same knife in your, in your lineup. That’s that’s amazing as well.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I really, really feel, you know, really fortunate how the stars aligned and, and if you ask me now, did I think where I started, I’d end up where we are now. Never had a clue, just, just didn’t know any better. I started the business when I was 24 and didn’t know really about business. You know, I always, always enjoyed sales and marketing and, and whatnot. Studied engineering formally in school, but just started out as kind of a one man band, you know, classic, you know, startup company. And, you know, to tell you the story, I I went to school in Golden, which is the, the home base of spider co knives. And I drove by Spider Co every day home from school and also in long month was Western cutlery. So there were a couple knife companies close by. So as I developed the design, I looked into US sources to make the knife and, and that, that really didn’t, didn’t work out.
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I, I reached out to a company outcast at the time, and they said, they, they basically, well, okay, we’ll make your knife for you, but we’ll make it in the summer when we’re slow and we won’t be able to make the knife at any other time of the year for you. And it’s like, okay, well, that, that doesn’t, doesn’t, doesn’t work work. And, and the tooling costs was expensive and the min minimum quantities were, were high. So, so one day I walked into Spider Co met with Sal Glasser, the president of Spider Co. And he really mentored me. He really opened the door for me to come into the production knife business. He basically kind of, kind of a father figure to me and, and asked me like, so you want to get in the knife business? And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me how, tell tell me how.
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And it’s like, well, how are you gonna market it? Well, I go, well, I take pictures of the knife and send it out to magazines and send out press releases. It’s like, it’s like, well, pictures cost $5 each and you know, this costs this and this, this is that. And it’s like, okay, yeah, yeah, tell me, tell me how to do it. Just, just, just, just send, refer me to the factory to make the knives. So long story short, he, he, it was a really interesting conversation and him like just trying to impart in me how hard it was to do. And he, he did refer me to very competent manufacturer in Seki City, Japan. And, and basically started the development process and debuted the Game Skinner in 1988 at the Shot Show in Las Vegas. So Oh. Went to the show with, with four prototypes and the 10 foot booth and, and the rest, the rest is kind of history.
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I’ll share another kind of funny story is, is my first retail show was the Minnesota Deer Classic. That was basically a month after the shot show in, in 1988. And I went, went up to, to Minneapolis to the sports show, and I set up a booth and had the game Skinner for sale. And this guy comes up and goes, well, what do you, what do you do? And I go, what do you, what do you mean? He goes, what, what do you do for a living? I said, well, I, I have this knife that, that I’m selling and you know, I have Dr. Edge and I’m, I’m selling his knife. And he goes, let me tell you, you can’t make a living at that. And it’s like I said, okay, well I think I’m done talking to you.
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Speaker 5: That’s kind of what I’m doing right now. I
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Speaker 1: Quietly, yeah, I kind of quietly said, well, I, okay, what I wanna talk to you anymore. You know, you’re like crushing my dream. So, and, and, and you know, in all, in all fairness, he was right. I, I couldn’t make a living selling one knife. So, so I made another model and another model after that. And it’s all, it’s all about product development and design and, and you know, here we are 30 years later with, with 140 different unique models in our, in our line. So it’s, it’s been a very fun and and exciting ride since those early days of, of the startup.
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Speaker 5: So did you file your first patent before you started your company and before you were graduated?
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Speaker 1: I, I did. Wow. I did, I, I basically developed the design as a senior design project from all the technical parts of the strength and the materials, the stress analysis of the metal where it came to a narrow t post, like when, when that metal would break, you know, how thick we had to make it. So it kind of tied in basic engineering principles into, into the school project and also in the meantime worked with the Japanese to, to put it into production and then also worked with a local patent attorney to file a utility patent on it.
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Speaker 5: Yeah. And that’s, I mean, that’s amazing. We’ve been a part of, you know, a couple of, of, you know, registering trademarks and things like that and just that process can be overwhelming. Sometimes it’s better if you don’t know what you’re getting into, you know, before you do it. Yeah. Some of them it’s taken, you know, years to get done. So kind of, yeah.
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Speaker 1: Inte intellectual, inte intellectual property is a very deep and and costly process. And as we all know, attorneys are don’t come cheap. And if they do come cheap, they’re probably not good attorneys. So, and I’ve worked with great ones, I gotta say are current IP attorneys are, are some of the best attorneys I’ve ever worked with and, and gone down that road with, you know, less than, less than excellent attorneys. And, and, and you don’t get, don’t get what you’re after, you know? Yeah. So, but, but yeah, trademarks, patents, it’s, it’s all a very interesting process and it’s really, it’s really tough. It’s one thing getting a patent, the biggest thing is, is is enforcing them. It’s like very expensive to litigate against someone that infringes your patent. So, so it’s really all goes against itself where as you’re trying with limited resources to start up a company and try to protect yourself from people stealing your design. And then if they do, can you, do you have the muscle, you know, to go after to to to, yeah. To to, to stand up for it. So, and you know, with the way patents work is if you don’t enforce your patents, if you know, know of an infringer and you don’t, you know, get them pursue, if you, if you know of it and you don’t pursue for them to cease and desist you, it can invalidate your patent. Oh, you gotta, you gotta go after ’em.
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Speaker 5: So if you don’t do anything and you know about it, you said it invalidates your patent is that
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Speaker 1: It, it dilutes the patent. It could potentially invalidate it if Wow, over time, if, if if there’s a known infringer and you’re not enforcing it, it’s, you know, I, I’ve never gone through that legal process, but yeah. You know, it’s basically, well we’ve been making this copy for five years and you never said anything, did you know about it? It’s like, yes, we did. We just didn’t wanna fight you on it. It’s like, well, your patent, it does weaken the patent itself. So
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Speaker 5: What you talked about being a collector, what other, you know, knives were you into or what, you know, what are some of the that your prize, you know, knives in your collection?
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Speaker 1: Oh boy, I, I, I love ’em all. I really do. So I, so I started out collecting more production knives and, and more, more designs. You know, that’s a cool thing about knives. There’s, they never end. There’s thousands and thousands of knife designs and, and it’s a very easy kind of industry to enter. So there’s so many different brands. I mean, there’s the major players, but knives are, they’re just so open-ended. They’ve gotten so specially. Like, there’s one knife show a year in Atlanta called the Blade Show. It’s put on by Blade Magazine and you have no idea all the knives and makers and, and as, as knives evolve, there’s brands that, I mean, I’ve been doing knives for 30 years. I, I’m amazed at the newcomers in the market and the new designs and, you know, more, more aficionado type knives, more like a knife nut type designs. So different handle, different, different blade. They’re not, they’re not all that functional, but they’re cool. It’s, it’s more the cool, almost
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Speaker 5: Like little piece of art.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. Some of them, some of ’em aren’t truly art where you don’t use them, but there’s, the word is really mid tech and mid tech refers to someone with a machine shop, with a CNC machine, you know, being able to con computerly, computer control, computer machine, you know, different geometry and, and the designs are just, they, they never end. It’s, it’s, there’s some really crazy stuff out there. And that’s kinda like small batch runs where, you know, having something unique and, and different. Whereas, you know, we’re a production knife house and we, we do things that are very mainstream for everybody, whereas the mid tech market is trying to come up with something unique and different that has its own flavor.
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Speaker 5: Wow. But it’s kind of a cool, anyway,
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Speaker 1: Don’t really follow, don’t really follow that trend.
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Speaker 5: So I’ve got a couple other just geeky stuff to ask you, but you know, of like the, I I’ve done a little bit of collecting of, of the case knives and, and you know, those type of pocket knives. What, tell me if, you know, on, on that kind of, you know, the collector stuff, what, you know, what are some things to look for if, if you like, if you’re into that and what are some of the top brands that you think are collectible and that, you know, it’s if you want to get into a hobby that way.
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Speaker 1: You know, very, very good question that, you know, really it’s, it’s, I think when it comes to knife collecting, it’s really what, what floats your, floats your boat. So I know a case is really a, a knife line that’s, you know, it’s a me American classic. They’re still made in Bradford, Pennsylvania, and they, they basically, their business model is to put out short run limited run productions with different, different blade shapes, different handle materials. And you know, that’s a, that’s a whole thing in itself, the, the case collectors. So, so for, for me it’s really uniqueness and variety, you know, collecting knives for, for over over 40 years anymore. I have so many knives in my collection that it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s really gotta be something truly unique that I haven’t seen before. So yeah, so I’ve kind of slowed, slowed down over the years from, you know, picking up new knives.
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I know when I started in the business when I was younger, I would, I would go crazy buying knives. And now it’s really looking, looking for uniqueness. So it’s really, there’s no, there’s no answer. There’s no correct answer to what, what you should collect and, and, and whatnot. There. When you get to the custom handmade market, there are very desirable makers that become quite popular and, and they create their own market and their own resale market. There’s some makers that are so popular that if you buy, you know, bought the knife at this time, they, they do appreciate and value. So, you know, for me, a collector’s item is something that I, I buy it because I love it and I don’t resell it. But there is, there is a resale market with, with certain makers and certain certain knife designs. So, so just, just like anything, just like collecting coins or stamps, like some, some appreciate and some don’t, but it’s all, it’s only enjoyment for the individual of what, what really excites you and what’s really fun to to own and own and collect. Yeah.
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Speaker 5: Well, and for me it’s like, you know, something that I think, I mean, I’ve got a knife from my grandpa and that, you know, that means something to me. And so I think, well, that’s something that I can pass on. And it’s, it’s not, you know, depending on which end you’re on, you know, it’s, it’s not huge investment, but, you know, I can hold in my hand something that he, you know, gutted a fish with. Absolutely. Or, or, or, you know, gutted a deer with. It’s kind of cool.
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Speaker 1: It’s, it’s, you know, you know, the stories that that knife has to tell, has to tell. I, I agree with you, you fully, it’s, I have some knives, I think before you ask me what, what are my favorite knives to collect and Yeah. Or use and whatnot. I, I have a lot of knives in my collection. They’re very simple, simple knives. But the story behind it, you know, really makes that very special to me. And then I have some, you know, more expensive knives that, that don’t quite have the same meaning as a, as a much more simple knife that that really tells a story. Like you said, like your grandfather’s knife.
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Speaker 2: How about like an teak knives? Is, is that, do you have anything of, of that that’s like old in your collection? I
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Speaker 1: Have some, some, yeah, some old, old military knives. I have a French sword bayonet, which is from the 18 hundreds. That’s, that’s really super cool. And I kind of, kind of get excited about the old, old military knives. So not a, not a whole lot of antiques in my collection, but, but yeah, that’s, those are the ones that I do have are generally old, old military knives and, and daggers and ettes type type knives.
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Speaker 5: Well cool. Thanks, thanks for answering my, my geeky questions on that. But I don’t, it’s just fun. It’s another hobby, you know, and something you can share with, with your kids and your, your family and whatnot. And so
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Speaker 1: Yeah, no, like, and again, it’s just going through phases, you know, like I, I went through a switchblade period where I was collecting switchblades, so then I accumulated so many, so many different switch blades and I move on to some something else. Yeah. There was a time where I was really into mother pearl handle knives. So basically, you know, mother pearl, like from the seashell, the white, white pearl and knives that had that on the handle scale. And so I was collecting mother pearl handle knives for a while and, and yeah, it’s, it’s called
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Speaker 5: What are some other niche? All good fun that, you know, that maybe phases you went through?
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Speaker 1: Good question. I’m trying to, trying to think of a
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Speaker 2: Answer. It could be a long list.
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Speaker 5: Yeah.
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Speaker 1: You know, it’s really, it’s, it’s really uniqueness. I was always looking for a knife to
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Speaker 5: Something that’s different, a
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Speaker 1: Unique design for unique function. So it’s not really, you know, I mentioned pearl handle knives and switchblades as, as categories, so it’s more like, you know, what is unique about that knife that, that makes it different.
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Speaker 5: And that’s probably comes from, you know, your engineer type background too, you know? Yeah. Actually you’re looking for something that’s different, innovative and, you know. Yeah. That’s cool.
02;38;17;04 –> 02;38;28;12
Speaker 1: Yeah. And, and really it comes down to, to function, you know, there’s a lot of really cool recognized if, if it’s not really a useful tool, it’s, it takes some of the sizzle out of it for me. So yeah.
02;38;28;28 –> 02;38;54;19
Speaker 2: So I’ve fallen into that trap. I went to this custom knife maker at one of the big rodeos last year and it just, it was full of these beautiful knives that had these custom handles and the Damascus blades. And so I end up buying two ’cause they just look so cool and I get home and they’re basically worthless. Just, just that won’t hold an edge. And, you know, they look cool, but I learned my lesson.
02;38;55;25 –> 02;39;01;09
Speaker 1: Yeah. I call ’em, I call a true collector’s item is something, you know what it collects, it collects dust because you take it
02;39;01;09 –> 02;39;01;13
Speaker 5: Home
02;39;01;22 –> 02;39;05;08
Speaker 1: There and you never use it. And that’s what it collects. It collects dust.
02;39;05;20 –> 02;39;10;29
Speaker 2: I got, I got a few of ’em sitting at home. You, you need both. The only use is cutting open
02;39;11;17 –> 02;39;12;03
Speaker 5: Bells of hay.
02;39;13;18 –> 02;39;15;05
Speaker 1: Exactly. Exactly.
02;39;15;19 –> 02;39;30;25
Speaker 5: So if you talk about, it looks like you’re, you’ve, you’ve got several other products that are not, you know, not knives. What’s your favorite? And talk about the, you know, the process of getting into something that was kind of outside of your wheelhouse if you just started with knives.
02;39;33;08 –> 02;40;33;04
Speaker 1: So, so knives are always my, my passion and it really comes down to, again, innovation and building a better mousetrap. You know, as, as an engineer, I say engineers aren’t really inventors. We kind of take what’s out there and we, we make it better. So I, I don’t really call myself an inventor, although if I hold a number of patents and, and you know, really have unique designs, I’m just, just really trying to, to innovate and try to come up with the best solution possible for, for outdoorsmen to, you know, they’re gonna make their job easier. And so as far as a favorite knife, I have to say our razor series are currently my, my favorite in that I kind of mentioned before that when you get into an animal and your knife goes dull, it’s, it’s no fun at all. And so, so with a replacement razor blade knives, you have a, a knife that that truly cuts like a razor blade, but is also strong.
02;40;33;05 –> 02;41;24;29
You can use it hard like a regular knife, but yet you have this thin razor blade, cutting edge that one of the things that makes a razor knife cut so well is, is it’s thinness. Like anyone out there that’s ever taken a fle knife with them hunting for, for deboning or, or skinning and whatnot, everyone knows that a fle knife cuts so well because it’s thin. So that’s the benefit of a, a razor blade knife. You have that thinness and, and then, you know, with our razor razor light series, we sandwich it and in between a, a stainless steel holder so that holder gives support to the blade. So, you know, razor blade is sharp and it’s thin, but it’s not all that strong. So we kind of combine the both by taking a razor blade and sandwich in, in a supporting holder. So you kind of get the best of, best of both worlds.
02;41;24;29 –> 02;42;12;14
So, and you know, a unique thing is if the knife goes dull, you can just swap in a new blade. Another thing is, you know, I, I like sharpening. So sharpening is, they call it a lost lost art. But I, I take my replacement razor blade knives and I bring a little draw through sharpener with me in the field. And it’s kind of the mindset of a, of a, a meat processor. So if you look at butchers, they, they sharpen their knives once a day, but they have a steel on their, on their, their scabit or their hip that they’re constantly stealing the knife. So the, the story is it never let a knife get to the point where it is dull. So a a butcher is gonna gonna basically cut and stop every five minutes and steal the knife. And by stealing, you’re not removing metal from the, from the edge, you’re basically straightening the edge.
02;42;13;03 –> 02;43;00;04
So steel is a, is a, I guess the, the technical is a ductile material. It bends and that thin fine cutting edge is, it moves around. So it’s made up of, you know, the, the edge is made up of grains and those grains can kind of fold over. I know everyone’s heard the word of a, a wire a, you know, a rolled edge or, or a wire edge. And it’s very easy to take a razor sharpp knife. And because it’s so thin, you get a little side force on the blade, you kind of bend that final edge over and the knife isn’t dull, it’s just, it’s just bent over at that edge. So if you take a steel, what you do is you’re straightening that geometry and it goes back to razor sharp with just a couple licks on the steel. So you’re not, you’re not actually removing metal and sharpening, you’re more straightening.
02;43;01;03 –> 02;43;42;24
And after time and, and continued use, you do, you do lose geometry from that edge. So that’s where if you take a knife, like I’ve, I’ve heard a lot of hunters go where like, oh man, this knife was awesome, my skinned four deer and I did two elk with it and I didn’t sharpen it. Well, well don’t, don’t do that even though it did it. By the time you get to that, you really do have a dull knife and you have a knife that’s really hard to sharpen because you let it go so dull. Now, when a knife is razor sharp, you know that, you know, when you, when you do a skinny stroke and it just, it just peels, it goes. So when the knife razor sharp, you’re, you’re actually separating the material, you’re using very little, little pressure at all. And then the, the high just peels away.
02;43;42;26 –> 02;44;21;15
Well, as it starts to go dull, you’re using more and more force. So as you continue to use force and use the knife harder, the the knife is going getting dull and dull each time. Whereas if you stopped and just hit it on a steel or a very fine light ceramic, you’re straightening that edge and you’re maintaining that razor sharp edge. So if you do that, your knife will just hold an edge twice as long gu guaranteed by, by touching it up in between, you know, in between not skinny strips. Again, every my rule is kind of every five minutes just touch the blade, even though it’s sharp and it’s working, touch that blade and you’ll be amazed how much longer the knife will hold up. So
02;44;21;15 –> 02;44;37;02
Speaker 2: That’s, that’s something new I learned today is that these replaceable blade knives, I had no idea that you were still sharpening those. So I mean, I guess that would cause them to last quite a bit longer. If you, if you maintain that blade that’s already on there. Is that correct?
02;44;37;15 –> 02;45;45;24
Speaker 1: If you Yeah, if you look at the blade we use, you know, one of the reasons they’re so sharp out of the box, we use a more acute angle on the final cutting edge, it’s basically a 17 degree angle, which is much more narrow and acute than a a standard knife. Most standard knives use about a 2022 degree angle. But with the thin razor, you’re, it’s much easier to grind a more acute angle. And because of that more acute angle, it can, it can, you know, roll the edge or, or bend that much easier. So if you just touch it up, it, it really, it’s, it’s so thin that it’s so easy to sharpen is my point. So, so you kinda have both choices. If you want to just put a new blade, put the new blade in, and you gotta raise a sharp blade. If you, if you do touch ’em up, you, you’ll find that you’ll hardly ever re replace, replace the blade. So, so might be losing some spare blade sales by this. But I do, I do en encourage people to try and touch up your blades and at least doing ’em, you know, carry a little stick sharpener or draw through sharpener with you and, and you just use the fine, the fine ceramic and just touch ’em up and, and you really will hardly ever replace your blades. One
02;45;45;24 –> 02;45;57;27
Speaker 5: Of the things I’ve always kind of wondered is how do you get that angle just right when you are sharpening in the field, how do you know you’ve got the right angle on that to maintain your knife?
02;45;59;07 –> 02;46;57;10
Speaker 1: So the, so the, I think I said before that sharpening really is a lost art. So, so there’s three rules of, of sharpening, and the three rules are angle, angle and angle. So, so my point there is it’s, it’s all about the angle and it does take, it does take technique to learn how to maintain that angle. So, you know, in a podcast kind of kind of tough to explain the sharpening angle, it’s, it’s basically a 20 degree is generally a 2022 degree works really well. The fact that our razor blades are, our ground is 17 by putting a 20 or 22 degree on there, it’s kind of an offset. So you’re just touching the very outside edge. So you’re just taking off a very little amount of metal by, by making the edge a little wider. And that’s generally how sharpening works. You don’t want to, you don’t wanna sharpen the whole shoulder of it ’cause it, it just, it just takes that much more effort.
02;46;57;10 –> 02;47;39;23
It’s a lot more metal to remove, but you know, no one has a protractor with them or, you know, an angle guide for free hand sharpening. So, so what I suggest if, if you’re not really skilled in sharpening is, is get a kind of preset angle sharpener. So we, we make one called the sharp X and it’s basically two sticks set at a preset 22 degree angle and you basically just draw it through the sharpener. So there’s, there really are a number of sharpening devices out there with a preset angle that kind of take all the, all the guesswork out of it for you. But to do it, do it yourself in the field, it’s just, just a technique you need to develop over time.
02;47;40;25 –> 02;48;38;07
Speaker 5: Well that, that razor light is, is my favorite knife. In fact, I carry one on my, on my pocket. I gotta tell you a funny story. I had, I, I was a scout leader as well for, for years and years. And one of my old scouts is, you know, graduated from high school getting into college and trying to raise a little bit of money and he was a knife salesman, you know, that’s he what he started to do. So anyway, hit me up to, to do a presentation and I was like, sure, come on by. You know, and, and part of his presentation was he would take, took out a huge rope and put it out on the table, you know, and he said, okay, do you have a knife? Pull it out. I just, I just happened to have that razor light and, and I just switched the blade. And so he goes, okay, cut through this. And it was like one smooth, but you know, it was like going through butter and nice. He just, he was like, oh, well that’s a pretty sharp knife.
02;48;40;06 –> 02;48;41;03
Speaker 2: Took the wind out of his
02;48;41;03 –> 02;48;43;20
Speaker 5: Cell, it totally stole his thunder. And I, I kind of felt,
02;48;44;14 –> 02;48;44;21
Speaker 2: I love it,
02;48;45;28 –> 02;48;57;26
Speaker 5: I love it. So, and, and his knives were great, but you know, for a set of six it was like $400 and I was like, yeah, pretty quality, huh? And he just, he didn’t even know what to say. Funny.
02;48;58;13 –> 02;49;21;00
Speaker 1: That’s funny. Yeah, no, there, there’s basically with our razor blade knives with that thin razor in the, in the, you know, the sandwich holder construction, it cuts unlike any other knife out there. It’s, it, it really is amazing. You know, one, one thing for cutting, cutting up games, skinning and, and processing game is one thing, but just as a general everyday carrier utility knife, it’s, it’s just a great knife. It, it cuts so well.
02;49;21;12 –> 02;49;22;28
Speaker 2: Yeah, all kinds of, my
02;49;23;06 –> 02;49;23;11
Speaker 5: Favorite
02;49;23;16 –> 02;50;22;09
Speaker 2: Part about it is the durability, the, the strength of it. Because when I first got around these razor blade knives, they were these super thin and awkward connecting blades and we’d get cut in an elk and of course I’m the camera guy and I’m always off to the side and every single time we cut up an elk without fail, we’d have a blade break and it would fly toward me. And it was just to, it got to the point where I, I hated replaceable blade knives and I, I didn’t like to stand around anybody that was even using one. And then last year Jeff pulled out the outdoor edge and it was a, a totally different story because all of a sudden you’ve got a blade that’s not gonna break on you. So that, that to me was a big deal and I was immediately sold on the knife. And I don’t know if that went into the design when you actually designed the knife. Was that one of the main factors is like, how do we keep this from breaking?
02;50;23;08 –> 02;51;17;20
Speaker 1: Yeah, it ab it absolutely did. So, so, and, and you know, with that being said, I just want to give, give credit to, to valon for, for really launching replaceable blade knives and, and popularized ’em with hunters. You know, Valon makes a great product, it just does, does have some limitations. Basically Valon is their, their background is, is they’re a medical supply company and they basically came into the market with, with scalpel, you know, surgical scalpel blades and made it into a folding knife. And I know the founders of the country, they, they weren’t hunters, but they, they came up with this product that the hunters just, just kind of went crazy over. So we were at a time in our company where we noticed a little bit of flatness in our, in our sales and valon came on the seed and kind of changed the rules and, and introduced this basically scalpel blade.
02;51;17;21 –> 02;52;14;24
I looked at it at first and I said, oh, that’s, that’d probably work good for, for caping and detail work, but it’s, it’s not enough substance there to really go to work and, and you know, keep around a burr on an, on an on an elk and go in and twist and try and really work, work hard. So, so, so over the years we basically saw their line grow and as we, as our sales went, went somewhat flat, Valon made a big deal. Like I’d go to Sportsman’s Warehouse or Cabela’s and, and, and I noticed their assortment kept growing with more and more models and more and more space on the shelf. And I’d go into hunting camp and guys would have Avalon’s with them and I said, well, this is something that we need to, to get into. And again, I kind of told you about me too, it would’ve been really easy for me to come up with a, a scalpel blade and, and you know, one of the, the two criticisms that I really heard most from hunters is I got two problems with the have on one.
02;52;15;00 –> 02;53;01;18
It’s, it’s dangerous and it’s dangerous to change the blade. You basically need to flex the blade to, to get it off the holder. And then two is they break easily. So, you know, we talked about, you know, once, once you get an animal down, you usually shoot your animal at dusk and it’s getting dark and you want to get it done. You want to get out there as quick as you can. So when you’re working and your blade breaks, like you said it, you had blades fly at you or, or it flies into the body cavity and you haven’t finished gunning the animal. Where, where is that razor blade? You gotta reach in there and pull the guts out and are you gonna run into a razor sharp scalpel blade? So, so really the comments I heard from hunters is they showed me their battle scars, they showed me the times that they got cut changing a blade or trying to, trying to find the, the lost broken blade inside the cavity where they got cut.
02;53;02;11 –> 02;54;09;02
And, but then they said they loved him. They said, we love this knife, but it breaks easily and it’s, it’s hard to change the blade. So that was really the brainchild of the razor light was can we make a, make a knife that was strong that wouldn’t break and two was safe and easy to, to replace the blade. So the first problem we addressed by the sandwich blade holder by, by having the sandwiched stainless steel support around the razor blade, you basically have all the strength of a regular knife, but the sharpness of, of the razor blade. And then two, I came up with a lock release mechanism where you could push a button in the handle and the blade came right out. So, so really those were the two major design criteria that went into the razor light and, you know, really put us on the map for, for coming out with a truly functional and, and, and, you know, great quality replacement razor blade system. And again, I give all the credit to Valon for what they came up with. We just came up with something that was new and, and improved that addresses addressed the, the problems with their product.
02;54;11;19 –> 02;54;29;03
Speaker 5: Well, like we said, that’s our favorite knife now. And just your functionality, you know, with the clip on the side. Fantastic. Love it. And, and so that’s patented your, your sandwich, your sandwich design is the part that’s patented, right?
02;54;30;20 –> 02;54;40;24
Speaker 1: Yeah, basically the lock mechanism and and the and the sandwich blade holder. Yeah. The fact that you can push the button in the handle to release the blade and combine with the sandwich blade holder.
02;54;42;01 –> 02;54;54;05
Speaker 5: Cool. And so, and to, to, if you want to, you know, listeners wanna go out and look at that knife, just go to outdoor edge.com, look up that razor light and you’ll see my favorite knife right there.
02;54;54;22 –> 02;55;41;11
Speaker 1: So yeah, we’re, you know, talking about my favorite knife being the razor light. I think the one version that I really do like the the most is the new Razor Pro. We came out with that just a couple years ago and, and some of the listeners out there might be familiar with the swing blade. And the swing blade is, it was our bestselling hunting knife before we came out with the razor light. The razor light is taken over the swing blade, but the swing blade was a rotating blade knife with drop point skinny blade on one side and then a unique gut blade on the other. It’s kind of a, kind of a banana shaped curve blade. And the beauty of that blade is, is that it cuts under the skin. So, so it makes it so much easier to, to cut the hide open, slit down the legs, slit down the body cavity to open the animal.
02;55;42;03 –> 02;56;13;01
And one of the benefits there is that you are using one blade to open the animal and your other knife to, to skin with and, and cut with. So using both blades, it, it holds an edge longer. So with the Razor Pro, we took that, that curved gutting blade from the swing blade and, and made a double blade folder with razor blade knife on one side and, and gutting blade on the other. So that’s, that’s really the what makes up the razor pro and just, just really the best of both worlds. So that’s, that really is truly my favorite honey knife that we make these days. And
02;56;13;01 –> 02;56;23;26
Speaker 5: I imagine that having the going underneath the skin, you’re, you’re not cutting all that hair that’s probably saving you a lot too. I I imagine that, you know, the hair cutting through that hair dulls you pretty quick.
02;56;25;06 –> 02;56;41;07
Speaker 1: Exactly. It dulls your knife and, and it’s also, you know, what elk do during the rutt, they pee all over themselves. So, so you have urine covered hair getting all, all over your meat, so the less hair you got, the, the cleaner your animal is. So that’s another benefit to, to not cutting the hair.
02;56;42;06 –> 02;56;43;22
Speaker 5: Yeah, I used one of those blades once
02;56;43;24 –> 02;56;58;23
Speaker 2: And it just amazed me how much faster it was to, to do your main cuts on the, on the hide. It just goes under and slides right up and man, I think it saved me 20 minutes on, on one animal, just a lot less cutting.
02;57;00;14 –> 02;57;10;19
Speaker 1: You bet. A real, real time saver. And you get a nice clean, straight cut. So if you get a nice trophy animal, just you get a clean cleaner, cleaner straighter cuts to take your cape into the taxi. Just does
02;57;10;19 –> 02;57;18;18
Speaker 5: That. Yeah, I’m sure Taxidermist love that. They did a cleaner job of it. Yeah, you bet. They deal with more, with more shoddy work than anybody.
02;57;19;18 –> 02;57;47;26
Speaker 2: I can think of a few that I did myself. There’s been a time or two I’ve been out and I, I’ll I’ll get the animal down and I’ll get up there and go to get my knife outta my pack and I realize it’s an old knife that has not been sharpened in a long time and conveniently I’ve always forgotten my sharpener and just things like that. So I I’m sure those taxi dermis appreciate when you, when they get one in that’s got good clean cuts and straight, they’re, they’re cleaned up. Good.
02;57;48;12 –> 02;58;07;25
Speaker 5: Well let’s, let’s get into a little bit of, of fun stuff. I’m sure you know, you’re, you’re heavily into the hunting industry now. What kind of opportunities, you know, have you’ve been able to enjoy being in the industry and are there any, any memorable hunts or favorite things that you’ve done?
02;58;09;25 –> 02;58;55;04
Speaker 1: Absolutely. I mean, it’s been such a, such a great run over the years and just feel really fortunate to be in the outdoor industry. It’s definitely a dream job and one that I’ve, I’ve, you know, enjoyed really good success in. And yeah, I just feel really fortunate for that. So I kind of shared early in the podcast that I didn’t grow up in a hunting family. I didn’t grow up hunting and, and basically developed this new hunting knife without ever using it. Well, when I came out with the game Skinner 1988, I figured well I better, better learn how to use this knife. And I, I have to say I was always interested in hunting and I just never had anyone to mentor me in into doing it. And after moving to Colorado and, and developing this knife, I, I did get actively involved in, in hunting, hunting, deer, elk, antelope.
02;58;55;06 –> 02;59;47;13
And, and you know, since then I’ve been, been to many, many hunts around the world. I’ve been to up to the northwest territories, been to the northern slope of Alaska, you know, chasing caribou with my bow, you know, watching the Northern Lights and being at the northern end, end of the hemisphere is really, really just an amazing, amazing journey. Just, you know, we all as hunters, you know, we love we love the outdoors, we love that outdoor experience and, you know, the, the kill and the harvest is the culmination of that. But I, I have to say there’s been so many amazing hunts over the years that were unsuccessful. But it was just the process, the being out in the outdoors and, and getting close to game. You know, I’ve, I’ve basically become a, a evolved as a bow hunter over the years. I did some rifle lining over in the past, but I’m pretty much a hundred percent bow hunter.
02;59;47;14 –> 03;00;45;14
And for me it’s, it’s that, it’s that kid-like joy. Like when I was a kid I was, I was always camping and enjoying the outdoors. And as we, you know, as we grow up and become adults, you know what really what really excites you And, and for me, just watching the sunrise and hearing an elk bugle just makes the hair on the back of your head just stand on that and just just brings that kid back in you. And you know, again, it’s great when you, you do take an animal, but just that whole outdoor experience and, and you know, nothing comes easy, you know, hunting, we don’t hunt for instant gratification. We hunting’s hard and you, you put your time in, you put your effort in and, and it’s just, it’s just the whole experience comes full circle when you do harvest the animal and you, you cut it up and you pack that meat off the hill and then you sit down with your family and you know, you this meat that you’ve processed yourself, you’ve harvested to yourself, you’ve prepared for the hunt and you sit down and you enjoy this delicious natural adv venison with your family.
03;00;45;17 –> 03;01;32;23
It just, to me it comes, comes full circle and it’s what it’s, it’s what it’s all about. There’s, there’s just nothing better. Also been, been to Africa a couple times, you know, just amazing part of the world, amazing species, amazing animals. And you know, I have to say going to Africa is if, if it’s something that if anyone that hasn’t done it’s interested in it, you should go. I, I gotta say the drawback of it is you can’t bring the meat home. So I I I’m not, I myself am not, I don’t call myself a trophy hunter. I love the process of the hunt. So I’m not after the, the biggest rack. Of course, if, if you get a trophy animal, it’s a, it’s a great, it’s a great, it’s very gratifying. But you know, when you go to Africa, you truly are trophy hunting.
03;01;32;23 –> 03;01;59;07
You’re going there to take animals that you’re gonna bring back and hang on your wall with. Nothing, nothing wrong with that. But I think the thing about going to Africa, I’d like the least, is that you, you can’t bring the meat home, but so when you’re there, eat as much meat as you can. ’cause I think that was one of the coolest things, the South African tradition of the barbecue in the boma and, you know, shooting animals and then eating ’em a couple days later at the barbecue. It was just, just awesome. Just love it.
03;02;00;09 –> 03;03;00;27
Speaker 5: That’s so cool. Well thanks for taking, taking the time to visit with us today. And tell us a little bit about your company and the knives. Just looking through your, your website and your catalog. I mean, we’ve just scratched the surface on, on the different knives that you have, you know, not, and not just hunting, but you have fishing knives and, and bone saws and sharpeners like we talked about, but whole processing kits and you know, if you really wanna do it right, man, you guys got it covered. Yeah, I think we could do a whole nother podcast on game care and things like that. And we’ll probably do that here in the future. But yeah, we appreciate your time today. Oh, I did have a question on that. Yeah. On that para claw for anybody who doesn’t know. Yeah, it’s a really cool idea where you got the paracord bracelet and it’s got a little knife inside the clasp. And I was just gonna say, have you heard of anybody who forgets to take that off to for, to get on the airplane? Because I could see myself doing that.
03;03;02;06 –> 03;03;05;17
Speaker 1: It, it comes up in probably every conversation about
03;03;05;17 –> 03;03;05;25
Speaker 5: That
03;03;05;25 –> 03;03;10;27
Speaker 1: Knife is, well, can, can, can you take this on an airplane? It’s like, you can, but you’re breaking the law, so
03;03;11;01 –> 03;03;12;05
Speaker 5: Don’t, but
03;03;12;13 –> 03;03;41;25
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, we actually took that para law bracelet knife and now we make the para claw watch. So it’s, wow. It’s a watch with your knife, with a knife in, in, in the band. So we started very much with our roots in the hunting market and it’s, it’s been a fun run. We’ve really stepped outside the box and as you mentioned, jumped into different markets. We, we make an excellent line of filet eyes. We, we have barbecue tools, we have barbecue knife sets. I think one of our coolest new products is the Chow Pal. Have you Oh,
03;03;41;25 –> 03;03;45;17
Speaker 5: Chance. Look at that. I did see that. It looks phenomenal. So,
03;03;45;19 –> 03;03;54;07
Speaker 1: You know, and that’s something with I think a lot of the listeners here, anyone that’s into remote hunting, packing, hunting, yeah. You know, it really takes your eating utensil to the next level.
03;03;54;14 –> 03;04;11;28
Speaker 5: Explain, explain, explain how that, you know, the whole product for those who haven’t seen it. I saw, actually I haven’t seen, you know, a post-production version, the one that I saw was, you know, I, I think it was a test model or something like that, you know, before you’d, you’d actually started production on it, but explain that. Yeah. You,
03;04;12;19 –> 03;04;59;06
Speaker 1: You bet. Yeah. We, I, we met this year in January at the Shot Show, and it was in the prototype stage, and we’ve had ’em in since July. And it’s basically my, my goal there was, you know, as again, as a scout, you know, we always had the chow kits and the Swiss Army knives, whatnot. So my goal with, with the Chow Pal was to take a knife and a fork that they would nest together. They would join together as one unit and then come apart. So you truly had a, a, a functional knife and a functional fork to eat with. So there’s also, you know, a spoon there on the other end of the knife. So, so you have basically a, a complete utensil set that’s super, super thin, super lightweight, all stainless steel construction. There’s also, we made it a bit of a multi-tool.
03;04;59;06 –> 03;05;35;02
There’s a flathead screwdriver on it. There’s a, a can opener, there’s a bottle opener, there’s a wrench inside the handle. So, so, you know, multi tools are always a popular, popular item for outdoor use and, and, and, you know, handyman work use. But with the Chow Pal want to have something that, you know, all in one, taking the outdoors and be a full, fully functional knife, fork, spoon, eating utensil that again, comes together but then comes apart. So you have your whole, whole leading set and it comes with a little nylon carry pouch to keep it clean. And just a very cool, very functional product.
03;05;36;16 –> 03;05;41;17
Speaker 5: As an engineer, you’ve gotta be proud of that thing. ’cause it looks like a transformer. It’s pretty cool.
03;05;44;05 –> 03;05;59;01
Speaker 1: It, it, it’s definitely one of the, the funnest and most universal products we’ve, we’ve come out with in our history. You know, as I say, not everybody’s skin is deer and elk, but everybody eats. So it’s, yeah. It’s, it’s allowed us to reach a much, much larger, wider, wider audience.
03;05;59;11 –> 03;06;11;03
Speaker 2: Yeah. We just pulled that up on the website. Looking at it. If, if you haven’t seen that, go check it out. That’s, I, I have, I can think of a bunch of hunts that I went on, backpack hunts that I wish I would’ve had that product right there.
03;06;11;14 –> 03;06;25;26
Speaker 1: Cool thing about it’s you, you do have a functional knife on you at all times. I mean, it’s an eating utensil, but it’s a great stainless steel knife blade that if you need to take out and use your knife, it, it functions as a, a really, really quality, quality knife blade as well.
03;06;26;05 –> 03;06;45;07
Speaker 5: Yeah. Those who haven’t seen it, it’s not like a butter knife. It’s, it’s a tool, it’s a knife, a real knife. Pretty cool and lightweight and just any really cool, probably it’s one that you see it and you, you know, instantly you’re like, that’s brilliant. Anyway, awesome product. No, I appreciate
03;06;45;07 –> 03;06;45;11
Speaker 1: It.
03;06;46;14 –> 03;07;02;09
Speaker 5: Well, thanks for your time. We really appreciate it. And once again, we’ll share the website, outdoor edge.com. I think you’re also available on, at, at several re retail outlets and, and other online stores. You wanna give us any of those?
03;07;04;03 –> 03;07;57;10
Speaker 1: Yeah, we sell to, to, you know, some, I would say some 6,000 different retail outlets around the country. So all the majors, Sportsman’s warehouse, Cabela’s, bass Pro shops, online retailers such as Amazon, you know, local sporting goods stores. You know, as we’ve expanded the line into different markets, there’s, there’s more, more retailers carrying on now, now than than ever. You know, an interesting thing too is the razor light. Great, great hunting knife, but also a great work utility knife. So we got that into the hardware chain, Lowe’s. So you can go to a, go to any Lowe’s location, I think there’s some 1400 Lowe’s locations around the country, and you can pick up a razor light at, at Lowe’s they carry our razor light, E d c and also our, the replacement blades and, and our sharpener.
03;07;57;11 –> 03;08;09;29
Speaker 5: Awesome. Okay. Well, and we’d like to, for those of you who don’t know, we’ve also got custom Epic Outdoors knife that Outdoors is made for us. All right, well thanks David. Very cool. Great talking to you. Yeah, appre
03;08;10;12 –> 03;08;26;25
Speaker 1: Yeah, appreciate partnering with, with Epic Outdoors and it’s, it’s been really, really cool for you guys to, to get with us and, and really enjoyed putting the epic outdoor razor light together and that’s been been a neat deal for, for us as well to partner with you guys. So appreciate everything.
03;08;27;11 –> 03;08;28;20
Speaker 5: Okay, thanks. We’ll talk to you later.
03;08;29;17 –> 03;08;30;26
Speaker 1: Sounds good. Take care. Thanks.
03;08;30;26 –> 03;08;44;06
Speaker 2: Thank you. One of the things we love here at the office is new gear, checking out new gear, finding the things that work the best for us in the field, and definitely one of the new things that we’ve come across. Well,
03;08;44;08 –> 03;08;45;15
Speaker 5: I just bought a new pack.
03;08;45;25 –> 03;08;46;18
Speaker 2: Oh, there you go.
03;08;47;07 –> 03;09;07;18
Speaker 5: So I went with the, the icon Pro 7,200 from q u. The cool thing about it is, is I can get different sizes to go on my frame. So if I don’t need that large of a pack, then, you know, I can get the, the, the 5,500, the 5200, 3200. So it’s pretty versatile.
03;09;08;02 –> 03;09;13;03
Speaker 2: So it’s a, you’re buying the frame and then you can attach different bags onto the frame, right.
03;09;13;03 –> 03;09;31;02
Speaker 5: Depending on what you want. So it’s, it’s kind of a modular type system and just awesome. If you don’t fill it all the way, the thing just ches down. Awesome. And so you can get it balanced, right. And, and, and tighten out that extra space. Yeah.
03;09;31;10 –> 03;09;53;16
Speaker 2: Built on a carbon frame, one of the coolest packs, if you haven’t seen it, check it out. Super lightweight. I remember back, I don’t know, actually it wasn’t that long ago, probably five, 10 years ago, we’re carrying around these packs and they just weigh an extreme amount empty. And so you, you’re walking around the mountain and it fatigues you a lot more
03;09;54;04 –> 03;10;20;14
Speaker 5: That, that southern Utah desert sheep hunt that Jason had. Yeah, I think my pack was 12 pounds, you know, dry. Yeah. And then we were packing camera gear. Mm. So I had a tripod that was 10 pounds. Yeah. And a tent. My tent was, I think it was only five pounds. So the tent was light. But you start stacking all that stuff together and you start with a pack that’s 12 to 15 pounds and you know, you’re getting above 50 pounds pretty quick.
03;10;20;24 –> 03;10;39;03
Speaker 2: Well, and on those kind of hunts, every pound is significant. And, and so by making a carbon frame, you eliminate a lot of that extra weight that’s not needed. And they’ve had years to actually perfect this pack. And I love it. I had one of the first models and it was awesome.
03;10;39;25 –> 03;10;52;13
Speaker 5: That, and I, they’ve got one that’s even lighter than that icon, bro. It’s called the ultra Pack system. That’s the lightest one they’ve got. So I kind of went with the medium one. It’s still super light. Yeah. But,
03;10;52;27 –> 03;10;53;22
Speaker 2: And kus rep
03;10;53;24 –> 03;10;54;14
Speaker 5: Reputation
03;10;54;18 –> 03;11;16;13
Speaker 2: Obviously is very well known. They, they make great products top of the line. They use the best materials available and only the best in manufacturing and just great products. I think they speak for themselves and they have for, for years. So if you’re out looking for a pack, definitely take a look at those packs from ku.
03;11;16;17 –> 03;11;19;18
So check ’em out, ku iu.com.
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