When I was in the military I carried a Kershaw when Kershaw was a higher end knife and Gerber multitool. Now that I'm in law enforcement I started with another Kershaw, a lower end one, and a Leatherman pocketknife thing with a flip out screwdriver with some bits. Then I upgraded to Benchmade, found out the one I had sucked, figured it was was a fluke, bought another one for myself, one for my dad, and one for wife at the same time. I found they all sucked, started researching the hell out of why my knives sucked when the Kershaws and even the crappy Leatherman knife was better, found the hype about ZT, bought about six over a decent amount of time. of those I ended up keeping two because the other four sucked. During that time i tried a very well known midtech maker that markets to military and law enforcement and found certain things that are absolutely unsafe for a first responder type knife.
Now for the good part. The two ZTs I kept are outstanding but didn't like the odds, 2 good, 4 bad. I tried some small batch handmade type knives, found out that, IMO, they're not worth what I had to pay for them. I figured that I'd give spyderco a shot even though I thought they were kind of ugly. I figured why not, I'd tried everything else. I found out they are very, very well done, very well thought out, very functional, and very comfortable, at least every one I've had. So in my journey, I found, for my work, I liked the older Kershaws, at least a couple ZTs, none of the benchmades, and Spyderco. The midtechs are questionable and small batch "handmade" knives could very well be outstanding of you're willing to drop the coin.
