CuTco ?

[19-3Ben]

From a safety perspective, if someone allows their knives to go stupid dull before either sharpening or replacing, they are going to injure themselves. I think the root cause of this is they develop bad habits such as using more physical brute force to cut rather than less force and allowing the edge of the knife to do most of the work.

Yup. A dull knife is a dangerous knife.

 

[Citadel99]

We use this one for cutting the throats out on snapper. Quickly cuts through some serious bone.

https://www.cutco.com/products/product.jsp?item=clip-point-outdoor-knife

They work great and when they get dull you get a new one from them as they don't sharpen them. Not a bad deal. As far as the rest of the knives...I dunno.

Mark

 

[The Alaskan]

Wow. Cutco Knives. Bring back some memories. I was a Scoutmaster about ..12 years ago, and one of my Eagle Scouts got his first job selling Cutco knives. He came over to my house and did the sales pitch. Everything you guys have already talked about here. One of my high school students about 5 years back was doing the same thing. They made him buy his demo set out of his own pocket. He actually LOST money at that job. Going back even further, my girlfriend at tje time, later my son's mom, later my ex, got her first job selling Cutco. They assigned her to the worst neighborhood in Jacksonville. A young white college girl selling knives door to door at crack houses. I didn't let her work her first day. I once answered a job ad in the newspaper for "no experience needed" and "thousand dollars per week salary." It turned out to be a job selling Cutco knives. The only interview I ever walked out on.

Oh PS: the knives are way over priced, even if they ARE great knives, which I don't think they are. I heard they offshored their production facilities, too.

 

[The Alaskan]

Pakistani Buck 110

I almost forgot, thanks for posting about the Pakistani knock off Buck 110. My Dad gave me one when I was a Boy Scout, and I thought it was awesome. Bought it from one of those ads in the back of Boys' Life magazine. I carried it everywhere and it eventually disappeared-lost on some camping trip I assumed. I found it in my Dad's tool box a decade after his passing. He kept it all those years. (Man that knife is a POS LOL)

Thanks for bringing that memory back. =)

 

[VanGoghComplex]

Cutco knives are overpriced, their sales tactics are shifty, and their treatment of their sales force sucks.

The knives themselves are awesome, though. About ten years ago I did a stint for them, and my story as a Cutco salesman ended quickly and like most do: the fizzle. I kept my demo set, of course, and later found that my father in law sold cutco as a college kid too. He's in his early 60s now, and he's still got his Cutco demo kit; they use it daily in the kitchen.

I side-by-sided the knives on the demo materials we had; tough leather swatches, nylon rope, heavy burlap, pennies for the kitchen scissors. His knives were still every bit as sharp as mine, almost 30 years old and used daily. He'd never had them sharpened.

 

[The Alaskan]

...About ten years ago I did a stint for them, and my story as a Cutco salesman ended quickly and like most do: the fizzle. I kept my demo set, of course, and later found that my father in law sold cutco as a college kid too. He's in his early 60s now, and he's still got his Cutco demo kit; they use it daily in the kitchen...

You know, I'm starting to wonder if Cutco's best customers aren't their employees.

 

[19-3Ben]

I almost forgot, thanks for posting about the Pakistani knock off Buck 110. My Dad gave me one when I was a Boy Scout, and I thought it was awesome. Bought it from one of those ads in the back of Boys' Life magazine. I carried it everywhere and it eventually disappeared-lost on some camping trip I assumed. I found it in my Dad's tool box a decade after his passing. He kept it all those years. (Man that knife is a POS LOL)

Ha. The lock broke on mine while using it in the woods. Shocked the hell out of me when all of a sudden the blade swung backward toward the top of my thumb! Since it no longer stayed in the locked position, and no longer stayed folded it became a very serious safety risk. I buried it right there in the woods where it broke.

 

[danez71]

You know, I'm starting to wonder if Cutco's best customers aren't their employees.

Thats exactly it.

My daughter went to their Sales Person Seminar.

They wanted her to buy her own demo set and set up a sales pitch with 5 families and friends.

That's an almost guaranteed sale of 6 sets of knives.

The seminar was a cattle herd of about 30 - 40 people. That's about 200 sets of knives.

IIRC, the set was around $180. Let's use $150.

$150x200 sets = $30,000.00 per "Sales Seminar"

Thier real Sales force is the people that sucker the kids into doing it.

 

[Zeke/PA]

I think that most people are really mislead as far as kitchen cutlery goes.
First of all, the average Joe doesn't need a set of knives costing $75,to $100 dollars per knife.
Usually no re- sharpening is ever done and the knives always wind up in the dishwasher.
I like Chicago Cutlery stuff, and I maintain the blades with a ceramic rod, NEVER a butcher's "steel" !
My favorite knife in our kitchen is one that my grandfather made from a saw blade.
Don't be taken in by cutlery advertised as "secret German steel" either.

 

[kBob]

Our most used kitchen knives are an old Old Hickory and a couple of Spyderco. The Spyderco are about ready to retire as they have been sharpened a few times too many I think. I have another Spyderco that the handle died on and when removing the remains I found that the tang is very short. I actually prefer the Old Hickory which I found in 1980 and have used since. Remarkably I have not yet seriously altered its shape, but unlike my grandfather the butcher do not sharpen mine every night.

Interesting that I paid the same thing for my Old Hickory in 1980 that I paid for the Cutco folder that started this thread. Found them both.

-kBob

 

[The Alaskan]

Their real Sales force is the people that sucker the kids into doing it.

Not unlike Amway.

 

[cambeul41]

I have never owned a Cutco knife, but I did once endure the sales pitch in about 1973. I was enormously annoyed by the attitude of the couple doing the selling. When it came to the part where they asked me to compare the cutting ability of their knives with one of mine, I produced my EDC pocket knife — which was considerably sharper. They still would not quit trying to sell. They finally left after I explained that they had their choice: believe me when I said, "Not at this time" or be physically removed from the building. I supposed that I should be grateful that I was irritated by their attitude. I was quite tempted, but a set or even one knife would have put a real strain on the budget.

 

[cdk8]

You know, I'm starting to wonder if Cutco's best customers aren't their employees.

It absolutely has to be.

This $170 Cutco chef knife,

does NOT perform as well as the $35 Victorinox,

and it gets trampled by this $38 forged Mercer,

and yet it is priced as high as this Kikuichi Elite, which is 100 times the knife that the CutCo will ever be.

Literally, it is selling a High Point blaster for the same price as a Les Baer Custom.

 

[CZ9shooter]

They appear to be big fans of the "put a high price on it and people will assume it is high quality" game.

 

[Zeke/PA]

They appear to be big fans of the "put a high price on it and people will assume it is high quality" game.

Truer words were never spoken and it seems like it is VERY true in the kitchen cutlery domain!

 

[Bama Drifter]

Cutco... 'Murican Quality'

Wow, Cutco! Reading through this thread brought back a flood of memories and quite a few posts made me chuckle. For someone who sold Cutco in college, I never imagined it to be such a polarizing product.

Yes, it is expensive (probably a little more than what it is worth). No, you won't lose money on it even if you fail to earn a single commission as the "demo set" is purchased at way below retail. IIRC it is something like 40% off, so you could turn around and sell it by itself and still profit from the experience.

I sold Cutco in the summer of my sophomore year, 3-4 years after becoming an Eagle Scout. Both institutions stress the fact that "a dull knife is a dangerous knife" and also encourage goal setting and budgeting. Is it kinda like Amway? Probably true. Was it fun and did I have a prosperous summer doing it? Heck yeah! Do I think it is for everyone? Definitely no.

FWIW, like some poster mentioned, I still enjoy using two of my Cutco knives (I split up my set giving most to my mom) the trimmer and chef's knife. Most of the other knives on our kitchen magnet are Old Hickory yard sale finds and one Alaskan Ulu. I actually use the Ulu most in cooking and prefer the Old Hickory paring knife over my Cutco steak knife. But I keep ALL the knives in my house sharp. My in-laws are always nervous that they'll cut themselves in my kitchen
That's my $0.02, YMMV.

 

[kBob]

Bama,

Someone gave me a tourist junk Ulu. Their boss went to Alaska and apparently picked it up in an airport trip on the way back. I had tossed this genuine souviner of Alaska (made in China) in the back of the gun closet and forgotten it until last month.

I had just found it and was wondering what possible use It might have when the wife called out "Pizza is ready and needs cutting!" Actually I like it better than the rolling blade pizza knives now, not as fast but less frustrating.

....and no its not a Costco but this is my thread, dag nab it.

-kBob

 

[The Alaskan]

Oh man, Ulus. I've given away quite a few of those as a gifts on trips to the lower 48 over the years.

I believe they're intended to be used for vegetable cutting/chopping, etc. The commercially made one (the ones made in Alaska with the "Made In Alaska" Polar Bear logo on them) are good tools, but the Alaska Native folks, out in the village, typically make their own, often from used circular saw blades, or old carpenter saw blades, by grinding them to a thin, beveled edge.

Go hit you-tube for some videos of Native women processing game and fish with home made Ulu, it's quite the site to see.

 

[jeepnik]

The old saying, "you get what you pay for" is true. However with Cutco "you pay more for what you get".

They aren't junk, but they are mass produced.

 

[Smokey Joe]

Cutco...

My wife suckered for a Cutco cheese knife @ a sports show. Seems good but, as other posters have said, overpriced. I don't imagine I'll ever dull it, on Swiss and cheddar, enough to need re-sharpening. If it ever does dull, you bet I'll send it back to them. It's a typical cheese knife, the blade skeletonized, and it does work well on cheese.

@ the Cutco booth, the sales people held up a swatch of heavy leather--"How does your knife compare?" My Buck 110 (which I sharpen--I'm good at that if I do say so myself) went through the leather like it wasn't there, of course. The sales people didn't say much about that...

I must say that I'm disappointed to learn that Cutco has bought out Ka-Bar--The Cutco page available off one of the above posters' threads, has the Cutco Ka-Bar priced at $199, I believe. GEE WHIZ--Last time I looked at a pre-Cutco Ka-Bar, in a LGS, it was about $79 IIRC. And this was some time earlier this year. Um, can you say "over-priced???"

 

[Caseless]

The pair of kitchen shears I bought 20+ yrs ago is pretty good. It still shears everything from bones to soft metal effortlessly.