Cutco

B

bingo

Joined
Jul 29, 2004
Messages
43
Hello everyone, I've been gone for a while.
I would like to know if Cutco is associated with Schrade, Imperial, or any of the earlier companies.
I have seen tang (et.al.) stamps with SWCutco.
A very nice skinner was presented to me yesterday at a local flea market.
It was clearly stamped CUTCO on the curved butcher styled blade, with swirled bakilite handles, which had a patent # pressed into the plastic handle, along with an initial in script on the other side of the handle.
Is(was) Cutco a separate company, or an off-shoot brand of another company?
Thanks, Jerry:)
 
Welcome back Jerry! There is/was no affiliation with Imperial Schrade companies. CUTCO was owned by Alcas, a CASE-ALCOA company. Levine explains it briefly here:
bernard_levine said:
Cutco is the household cutlery brand of Alcas, in Olean NY. Alcas also now owns the Ka-Bar brand. This is a "typical" Alcas folder, made by Alcas for sale by Cutco salespersons. You will also encounter similar knives marked AURUM, made by Alcas for Aurum Etchings.

There has not been a separate Ka-Bar factory since 1977. From 1977 to 1996 Ka-Bar knives were made by various contractors for Cole National Corp of Cleveland OH -- one of those contractors was Alcas. So, when Alcas bought the Ka-Bar brand from Cole in 1996, they were already tooled up to make Ka-Bar knives.

BRL...
Click to expand...

bernard_levine said:
...Alcas of Olean NY began in 1941 as a joint venture between Alcoa (The Aluminum Company of America) and W. R. Case & Sons, to make and market kitchen knives. Their brands were CUTCO for home sales, and WearEver for commercial sales. Case dropped out of the partnership in 1972. Alcas became independent of its other parent, Alcoa, in 1984.

Increasingly the company got into private brand contracting and limited edition marketing. One of its customers was Aurum Etchings. For many years Alcas made Kabar fixed blade knives for Cole National Corporation (some Alcas employees had worked for Ka-Bar/Union while it was still in Olean). In 1996 Alcas bought the Ka-Bar / Kabar brands from Cole National, and it now both makes and markets these knives.

BRL...
Click to expand...




Michael
 
this is a little confusing. older Schrade knives may be stamped "Schrade/Cut Co/Walden N.Y. so SWCutco could be assumed Schrade Walden Cut CO. what does the SW stand for in this case ? roland
 
Roland,
It's a little confusing, Cutco by itself is the Alcas knife, Schrade Cut.Co. and SW(Schrade Walden)Cut.Co. are the Schrade knives. These are just abreviations for cutlery company, whereas Cutco is a word unto itself.

Eric
 
thanks Eric, part of the fun with Schrade is that it takes awhile to learn about the history, variations and connections. and every knife is a teacher, especially when experienced collectors like yourself help out. i have a copy of Goins' Encyclopedia on it's way, so that will help. roland
 
I found Cutco in Levines under Alcas. It must be very diffucult research to find the associations of so many different company names, etc.
Michael, Eric, thanks again for your info.
Jerry
 
I don't recollect the initials. I will look for the knife at next weeks flea market and try to get a picture as well.
Jerry
 
I did not see the fellow this time at the flea market. WIll keep trying...
Jerry
 
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