Benchmade is in trouble

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Wellll, how a knife company gets involved with this sort of mess and how they extricate themselves from it is of interest to this sub-community.

The furor has probably died out mostly and won't go on much longer, though.
 
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hso said:
BM is getting a beating in their own forum at Bladeforums. https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/see-official-statement-below.1644457/page-2

They've also issued a video statement from Les DeAsis the owner in attempt to address some of the questions about donations.


The last 48 hours have been busy fielding calls from our customers and speaking with media. We appreciate all those who have reached out to us seeking further information or in support of the Benchmade team. It was important for owner Les de Asis to address our community directly, and to deliver the Benchmade stance first hand. When asked specifically, Les stated, “Our recent political contributions have been in favor of state-level legislation supporting a strong manufacturing and business environment here in Oregon while protecting knife owners across the United States in the form of the Interstate Transport Act.” The Interstate Transport Act would have created a federal protection for knife owners, to learn more, see comments. Thank you to our loyal customers for your continued support. We hope this brings clarity to the situation, and we look forward to serving you. The Interstate Transport Act would have created a federal protection for knife owners, allowing legal interstate travel with knives, provided the knives are transported to and from states where the law allows possession of said knives, and they are transported in locked containers. This is an act we’ve been trying to see into law over the last five years. While it did not pass in 2018, we hope to see it through into law when it is reintroduced this year. https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-c...
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I'm starting to see this whole issue in the same light as the furor created subsequent to the Coventry Catholic HS and J. Smollett events ... Folks impetuously spouting off before knowing the facts.
 
Matt Elliott, director of marketing at Benchmade, talks with Tom Gresham on the Gun Talk radio show.

https://guntalk.libsyn.com/benchmad...trict-gun-control-bill-gun-talk-radio-22419-a

Elliott doesn't even realize that the proposed Interstate Protection Act that Benchmade has been supporting is horribly flawed in that it does not include the "right of action" for anyone charged in a state that has laws contrary to the federal IPA law if passed in its current form.

In other words, if the law passed and someone transported a state illegal knife through NYS and was charged with doing so, that person would have no recourse to fight the charges even though the federal law allowed legal transport through the state.

It should also be noted that the courts did not order OCPD to destroy the guns in this instance and many others. It is the policy of the OCPD, whose police chief is known to be anti-gun according to locals familiar with him.

Benchmade has been helping them destroy guns for several years.

I had been contemplating purchasing a third Benchmade (already have a 3300 and 3550) for every day carry, but I will no longer consider buying any Benchmade products in the future. I am done with them.
 
This is so sickening I am highly tempted to off load the benchmades on ebay or something I inherented from my dad just to further flood the market and drop their price and cause loss of sales on new merg.
Death by thousands of non sales, if everyone does their part we can make them bleed money.
My dad would have probably given them away as gifts.
 
I am pretty sure the company is more than a little worried about their stupidity. The owner's son took over operations 4 months ago. He apparently has a great deal to learn about the comany's customer base. So does Dad. I do feel sorry for the employees though - they had nothing to do with this. I read several employees commenting on working for Benchmade and they said it was a horrible place to work and employee turnover was constant. The company has always had a strict policy of "no cameras allowed in the plant - period" but when the Police showed up it was suddenly "Sure, come on in and bring your camera!" Oooops.
 
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Here is the actual Benchmade Gresham interview cut from the longer podcast. It is very telling.
Tom Gresham is a longtime Benchmade supporter but asks very direct questions of Matt Elliot Benchmades director of marketing. This goes deeper than donations, cutting up guns, and new proposed laws that may or may not be in the best interests of gun and knife owners. Listen to the full interview and decide for yourself.
http://guntalk.libsyn.com/webpage/t...ons-and-ita-failures-gun-talk-radio-spotlight

My thanks to the moderator as this is a very sensitive but important topic.
 
Great interview. The BM guy was not prepared for that discussion regarding the law. I live in a blue state where I think we have one legislator who is not a Democrat and I understand his point about having to work with that party. Still, I am beginning to think that this is a real come-to-Jesus moment for Benchmade. Those guys seem to have some misguided notion that the knife community and the gun community do not have much intersection and this may serve to wake them up on that point.
 
This issues isn't going to influence me one way or the other on buying Benchmade products, but I have to say it does seem to demonstrate a certain level of blindness to the potential bad press of their taking part in this activity.
 
hso said:
Wellll, how a knife company gets involved with this sort of mess and how they extricate themselves from it is of interest to this sub-community.

The furor has probably died out mostly and won't go on much longer, though.
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You are correct, it will go away for some but others will refuse to purchase any Benchmade product in the future. Ask me about Dick's Sporting Goods or Gander Outdoors who could not get me in one of their stores if they offered me a free gun. My 943 Osborne will be returned to Benchmade in the factory box.
 
340PD said:
You are correct, it will go away for some but others will refuse to purchase any Benchmade product in the future. Ask me about Dick's Sporting Goods or Gander Outdoors who could not get me in one of their stores if they offered me a free gun. My 943 Osborne will be returned to Benchmade in the factory box.
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I think that depends on how desperately someone needs a particular knife, and if something very similar is available from a competitor. (And, let's be honest, there is no certainty that said competitor isn't doing exactly the same thing.

For example, I own exactly ONE BM knife. I only could afford it because someone gave me a Cabela's employee discount coupon. Said knife has a gut hook.The only reason I bought it. I'm fairly sure I could have bought a Case & Sons (my preferred brand-my other preferred brand is Victorinox) with a gut hook, but Cabela's doesn't carry much of their line. If I were buying today, I'd prbably spend the extra cash on the Case and toss the discount coupon.

For a counter example (is that a real thing?) Springfield Armory just went through a similar blow up and I "swore them off." Fast forward to 2 months ago and I was looking for a small lightweight 9mm with a manual safety. Not too many of those in the marketplace, but one is a Springfield XDE. Guess what I bought? After having swore them off a year or so earlier.

Probably the only boycott I've stuck with has been REI.

So I think a lot of this "I'll never buy bla bla bla again!" is purely situational and subject to change over time.
 
I think BM's awareness has been raised. What they do in the future is yet to be seen and I hope they do better. I am not ready to completely destroy an American company that employees American workers and produces really fine products.
 
This is where BM's donations have been for. They've spent their money on advancing the Interstate Transportation Act (Kind of a knife FOPA)
https://www.akti.org/news/enzi-wyde...w3oj6-5OGOToS3krf_xRVYDbdcS2UZ81hZQD_pRYb3YwY

Enzi, Wyden introduce bill to protect law-abiding knife owners
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senators Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., introduced bipartisan legislation today to ensure that those traveling with a properly secured knife are not prosecuted under local or state laws which ban certain knives.

“I understand that knives are an essential tool for many folks in Wyoming and around the country,” Enzi said. “This common-sense legislation would ensure that if you’re traveling from point A to point C with a knife that is legal in both locations, you should not have to worry about going through point B. Knife owners should not be charged with a crime for simply passing through.”

“Traveling across this country can be stressful and time-consuming enough,” Wyden said.“Folks shouldn’t have to go through the ringer just to transport legal and securely stowed knives to their destination.”

The Interstate Transport Act would provide safe harbor to Americans traveling with a knife where it is lawful for the knife to be possessed at both the points of origin and destination, so long as the knife is transported in a closed container. This legislation is based on the Firearms Owner Protection Act of 1986, which provides the same protection to law-abiding gun owners.

Other cosponsors of the legislation include U.S. Senators Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, Martin Heinrich, D-N.M, Joe Manchin, D-W.V., Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and Jim Risch, R-Idaho.
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I'm done with BM for many reasons. They had a chance with the interview but they just dug the hole deeper for themselves.

And yes, I stick to these things. Haven't bought Levi's since their MMM donations and only to into Dick's now to let the kids try on shoes so I know their size, or to use the bathroom there.

I carried a Benchmade through about a decade of my career, good knife but I won't buy anything else from them. The market place is a LOT more crowded now than it was 20 or so years ago when I bought that CQB (think that is the model) and this isn't going to help them any.
 
Yep, KOPA is a better piece of legislation, but the point is that BM is AKTI and supported the AKTI effort by donating to the politicians people have been citing(even though it involves all the weaknesses of FOPA). This is the messy and cynical side of politics. It isn't always comfortable learning how the sausage is made.
 
I would look at that PD for publicly throwing Benchmade under the bus with that public photo post. Does that Chief also not like civilians with knives?
I have two Benchmade knives, a Resistor and an Auto Striker, both gifts, (one from an unknown person who left it behind for me to find), and I will not be getting rid of them, as I lack funds to buy equal quality knives elsewhere.
 
Whiterook808 said:
I am not ready to completely destroy an American company that employees American workers and produces really fine products.
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Levi also employees American workers and produces fine products ... But I will never buy another product from them.

It's a free country and I like voting with my wallet, I kinda see it as an extension of 1st Amendment.

And you won't destroy the company. The people who run Benchmade will destroy the company. If Benchmade doesn't like the sentiment from gun/knife owners, they can always make a business decision and start making kitchen and butter knives. If they choose to keep making knives they have been making, a wise business decision is for them to re-evaluate their approach to gun/knife owners' sentiment, which won't be changing.
 
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bds said:
Levi also employees American workers and produces fine products ... But I will never buy another product from them.

It's a free country and I like voting with my wallet, I kinda see it as an extension of 1st Amendment.
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Yep, and Levi's also still sells more jeans than any other company. They don't care that you don't buy 'em, and no one knows. You're not voting, you're just making a statement that no one hears … (Reminds me of the old joke: if a man speaks in the woods, and there's no woman around to hear him, is he still wrong?)

Levi's jeans are mostly made in China now. Anyway, I seriously doubt Benchmade sales will go down the toilet as a result of this whole situation; American consumers have short memories. Both S&W (the Clinton lawyer lock) and Ruger (the Bill Ruger mag capacity statement) survived their respective debacles and sell more guns in the U.S. than everyone else.
 
Old Dog said:
You're not voting, you're just making a statement that no one hears.

Levi's jeans are mostly made in China now. Anyway, I seriously doubt Benchmade sales will go down the toilet as a result of this whole situation
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True.

But at 52, I no longer live my life by what others do or think but rather by core principles I have come to appreciate during my short lifetime.

By choice, I have decided some time back to support American companies that still manufactured in the USA - https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...g-components-made.577067/page-4#post-10297475

Now, I will be filtering that list of American companies (whenever applicable) by those that support the Second Amendment.

Will my single voice matter? Likely no. But perhaps if enough of "us" vote with our wallets, it may. At the very least, I can go to my grave knowing I did something that mattered to me.
 
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