Is CS going to start some form of "MAP" price control ?!? ?

I'm not a huge CS fan but they do have some models I've owned and really liked. MAP does not really protect the customer it protects the middle man. I buy from knife companies for different reasons and typically stay away from Amazon for knife purchases. MAP always makes a product less attractive especially when the middleman can't offer a competitive price.

I would think that most knife companies are believers in capitalism and the free market. I'm just not sure how this really helps the customer at all. When a customer buys a knife from Amazon or Ebay at a much lower price they understand they're taking a risk to save $10 rather than buy from Bladehq, etc. I just don't get how stifling competition is a good thing from a consumer perspective.
 
In the short term this announced MAP policy is probably going to boost sales as people scramble to buy before the price increases. And then sales are going to fall off a cliff. I wonder how CS will weather that.
 
I doubt it will impact CS as much as people seem to state as it doesn't seem to have had a significant impact on BM or Spyderco since they implemented it. CS marketing is still aimed at mall ninja wannabes who are unlikely to pick up on the change or even speculate they change in pricing is anything more than inflation.
 
BMCGear said:
I'm not a huge CS fan but they do have some models I've owned and really liked. MAP does not really protect the customer it protects the middle man. I buy from knife companies for different reasons and typically stay away from Amazon for knife purchases. MAP always makes a product less attractive especially when the middleman can't offer a competitive price.

I would think that most knife companies are believers in capitalism and the free market. I'm just not sure how this really helps the customer at all. When a customer buys a knife from Amazon or Ebay at a much lower price they understand they're taking a risk to save $10 rather than buy from Bladehq, etc. I just don't get how stifling competition is a good thing from a consumer perspective.
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In theory (we won't get into whether it actually works), MAP prices ensures that knife dealers have a slightly more level playing field. It prevents larger knife dealers from leveraging volume to offer deep, deep discounts with which smaller dealers can't compete. If we disregard Amazon (who may or may not play by the rules) and think of larger dealers as being the BladeHQs of the world, this decreases the gap in price between them and the smaller internet dealers and the brick and mortar shops. Whether you're for, against, or indifferent to MAP, it's an attempt on the part of knife manufacturers to prevent the monopolization of the retail sale of their product. I can't speak for Cold Steel on this, but Spyderco implemented MAP because many of their dealers were asking for it. While knife companies should care about the end line users of their knives, selling to the ELU is not how they make their money. Orders from dealers are where they make their money. Once the product it sold to the dealers, it is up to the dealer to move it on to the consumer. Based on the prevalence of MAP in the market, it seems like it is increasing demand for their product from the dealers, plain and simple.
 
MaxFisher said:
In theory (we won't get into whether it actually works), MAP prices ensures that knife dealers have a slightly more level playing field. It prevents larger knife dealers from leveraging volume to offer deep, deep discounts with which smaller dealers can't compete. If we disregard Amazon (who may or may not play by the rules) and think of larger dealers as being the BladeHQs of the world, this decreases the gap in price between them and the smaller internet dealers and the brick and mortar shops. Whether you're for, against, or indifferent to MAP, it's an attempt on the part of knife manufacturers to prevent the monopolization of the retail sale of their product. I can't speak for Cold Steel on this, but Spyderco implemented MAP because many of their dealers were asking for it. While knife companies should care about the end line users of their knives, selling to the ELU is not how they make their money. Orders from dealers are where they make their money. Once the product it sold to the dealers, it is up to the dealer to move it on to the consumer. Based on the prevalence of MAP in the market, it seems like it is increasing demand for their product from the dealers, plain and simple.
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I understand this - I do not buy from the large knife shops unless they have something that I want that I can't get from where I normally buy from. In my opinion though the smaller shops typically have the better prices as well.

DLT offers a point system and Cutlery Shoppe had the best prices on Spyderco. Bladehq and KnifeCenter were always higher and do phony promotions.
 
PirateSeulb said:
I doubt it will impact CS as much as people seem to state as it doesn't seem to have had a significant impact on BM or Spyderco since they implemented it. CS marketing is still aimed at mall ninja wannabes who are unlikely to pick up on the change or even speculate they change in pricing is anything more than inflation.
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Cold Steel had an enviable market position a few months ago. They sold pocket knives that had a superior standard premium steel steel to that of Spyderco or Benchmade or Zero Tolerance. Their knives were equally well made compared to those brands and were probably stronger than knives of those brands. And without map, one could let competition among vendors provide the occasional outstanding value purchase. Cold Steel was unquestionably the best value brand.
Now, they got rid of their premium steel and joined the pack with the standard premium steel used by many others. And they ve joined the group with map pricing.
Maybe they ll continue to supply knives to the vendors and sell product. But the knowledgeable buyers will know better.
 
There must be some advantage for the manufacturers with map that I m not appreciating. But the consumers are paying for it.
What ever happened to the concept "take care of the customers and the business will take care of itself"? Maybe map businesses feel the vendors are their customers, not the consumers.
 
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From my experience dealing with companies who mass produce items for resale. The reason they start implementing and enforcing MAP pricing and authorized resellers/retailers programs is because of the uptick in fakes being returned for warranty replacement.

I purchase gray market items all the time, but as an example of items or class of items I will never ever ever ever purchase via Amazon is sd cards and usb drives.

Too many fakes and some of them will flat out brick or seriously damage your device. For me personally it’s not worth it with my phone or dslr or switch to have an sd card melt inside it because it was a fake. And that has happened to many consumers within the last 3 years.

Maybe the knife market is different than the sd card/usb drive market. Or the rechargeable battery market (yikes). Which is another cluster bleep at times. Headphones is another genre of items that have many forgeries of products floating around.


It sucks when you spend your hard earned dollars on an item and when it’s time for a warranty replacement you get told sorry but this isn’t a authentic item and there is nothing they can do but destroy the item due to it being a forgery.

Just another perspective from someone who works just as hard as everyone else for their $$$$ and is looking for deals on the cool stuff.
 
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Grifter9931 said:
From my experience dealing with companies who mass produce items for resale. The reason they start implementing and enforcing MAP pricing and authorized resellers/retailers programs is because of the uptick in fakes being returned for warranty replacement.

I purchase gray market items all the time, but as an example of items or class of items I will never ever ever ever purchase via Amazon is sd cards and usb drives.

Too many fakes and some of them will flat out brick or seriously damage your device. For me personally it’s not worth it with my phone or dslr or switch to have an sd card melt inside it because it was a fake. And that has happened to many consumers within the last 3 years.

Maybe the knife market is different than the sd card/usb drive market. Or the rechargeable battery market (yikes). Which is another cluster bleep at times. Headphones is another genre of items that have many forgeries of products floating around.


It sucks when you spend your hard earned dollars on an item and when it’s time for a warranty replacement you get told sorry but this isn’t a authentic item and there is nothing they can do but destroy the item due to it being a forgery.

Just another perspective from someone who works just as hard as everyone else for their $$$$ and is looking for deals on the cool stuff.
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MAP doesn't have any positive effect on fakes or there would be fewer Spyderco clones available . Opposite may be true !
 
All MAP does is make the consumer aware that this sale item is well below what this particular product sells or should sell for, you’re correct is stating that it doesn’t prevent the availability of fakes.


But then you start getting into gray markets sellers and companies not honoring warranties because the item wasn’t purchased throw the proper channel.

YMMV with how this may or may not affect you personally. If you stop purchasing cold steel products because of that particular practice then it’s your right and your wallet.

For me it maybe different outcome. Let’s be honest for a minute. The majority of people out there will never understand the logic behind a pocket knife costing $150.

And in this particular hobby that’s a baseline price for a decent knife.

Once you start getting into the ZT, Hinderer. CRK, and exotic makers you’re starting to look at knives in the $4-700 price range easily. Even collectors in other hobbies may have the same reaction to a pocket knife costing that much.

Understanding the reasoning behind a direction in which a company chooses to go in terms of pricing doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them or the practice.


The good thing is there are lots of quality makers/manufacturers out there for everyone to procure quality knives from at whatever price point you deem reasonable.


Last week it was Spyderco, todays it’s Cold Steel, tomorrow it’s company Xxxxx
 
I have never had much of a chance to check out Cold Steel, but I had started to research on different models they made.

What has stopped me though, has been a general increase on prices as well as the swap away from CTS HXP. Prices jumped up for what I believe is an inferior steel. Too bad to hear about the MAP, as I have seen prices up even more than normal.

I have had to limit my spyderco purchases because of their prices, I believe that this will prevent a new cold steel, as they are no longer a good deal like they used to be.

Sorry cold steel, I was going to give you a try, but this is disheartening.
 
BMCGear said:
DLT offers a point system and Cutlery Shoppe had the best prices on Spyderco. Bladehq and KnifeCenter were always higher and do phony promotions.
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Knicecenter has a point system too, and theirs is better than DLT's. At knife center, $1k spent gets you a $50 gift card. To get a $50 gift card at DLT, you have to spend $1333. And Knifecenter frequently offers double points on their items as well. As for prices, I just compared prices on a number of items at DLT, BHQ, and KC. Prices on every single one of them varied by, at most, $.02, with Knifecenter being the "cheapest".
 
DShiflet said:
Knicecenter has a point system too, and theirs is better than DLT's. At knife center, $1k spent gets you a $50 gift card. To get a $50 gift card at DLT, you have to spend $1333. And Knifecenter frequently offers double points on their items as well. As for prices, I just compared prices on a number of items at DLT, BHQ, and KC. Prices on every single one of them varied by, at most, $.02, with Knifecenter being the "cheapest".
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Thanks for crunching the numbers. I wasn't aware the KC has a point system. I sometimes get emails on "sales" and they aren't near the sale they say they are. Bladehq does the same thing with MSRP vs MAP.
 
BMCGear said:
Thanks for crunching the numbers. I wasn't aware the KC has a point system. I sometimes get emails on "sales" and they aren't near the sale they say they are. Bladehq does the same thing with MSRP vs MAP.
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A lot of the dealers call it a "sale" when they sell below the MSRP. For me, it is NOT A "SALE" unless a retailer sells something for less than their regular selling price.
 
MaxFisher said:
While knife companies should care about the end line users of their knives, selling to the ELU is not how they make their money. Orders from dealers are where they make their money. Once the product it sold to the dealers, it is up to the dealer to move it on to the consumer. Based on the prevalence of MAP in the market, it seems like it is increasing demand for their product from the dealers, plain and simple.
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Good point. I just heard about Cold Steel MAP. Suffice it to say I'm not a happy camper. No ads for less than 25% of MSRP? But you can contact a dealer and possibly negotiate, haggle a lower price?

Part of the internet experience of buying a production knife from these large dealers was that you didn't have to haggle, you could just shop around from the comfort of your living room to find the lowest price. Now it would be an extra step, perhaps several emails going back and forth. For a production knife, I don't know if I want to go through that hassle. I'm certainly not paying MSRP less 25% for a Cold Steel knife. Everybody knows their MSRP values are ridiculously inflated, not even within ballpark range of reasonable. It's really discouraging news. I'll have to take my business elsewhere.

One other thing I thought of, what happens with the competition between ltspecpro and Cold Steel's dealers? If the special projects site charges the same prices as the dealers, would that increase ltspecpro's sales? Or will special projects raise its prices even higher to avoid competing with the dealers?
 
Daniel said:
A lot of the dealers call it a "sale" when they sell below the MSRP. For me, it is NOT A "SALE" unless a retailer sells something for less than their regular selling price.
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This is one of the new retail tactics that's become prevalent in the past few years. Not just for knives, but for all kinds of consumer goods. If you don't know the market, you could get fleeced. They're trying to take advantage of the uninformed.
 
DShiflet said:
Knicecenter has a point system too, and theirs is better than DLT's. At knife center, $1k spent gets you a $50 gift card. To get a $50 gift card at DLT, you have to spend $1333. And Knifecenter frequently offers double points on their items as well.
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I don't know about you guys, but I'd prefer a solid deal on my current purchase instead of all these stupid incentives to buy a ton of overpriced knives just so I can get a $50 knife at some point in the future.
 
deadzonepatrol said:
One other thing I thought of, what happens with the competition between ltspecpro and Cold Steel's dealers? If the special projects site charges the same prices as the dealers, would that increase ltspecpro's sales? Or will special projects raise its prices even higher to avoid competing with the dealers?
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I'm guessing that Special Projects will not undercut dealer prices except maybe in rare occasions when they're overloaded with inventory.
But their sales could still increase if the spread narrows between their selling price and dealers.
 
I will say that MAP kills sales now instead we get things like double rewards points and free junk like shirts, socks, or towels. I wonder if vendors can still offer sales that are XX% off any order of $X.XX or more while it would be an advertised discount it would not be for any specific product or manufacturer. I would suspect even that wouldn't fly so I do hate MAP for killing sales but in terms of negatives on standard pricing I don't see it being so bad I will never buy again.
 
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