Scoopy Loops Precision Laynard Beads?????$$$$$$????

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dzlvs8

Joined
Jun 13, 2013
Messages
948
I hope I don't get smacked for this but, WHY are Scoopy Loops bead so freaking expensive. Granted, they are fairly nice beads, but I don't understand the high price at all.
 
Simple answer: because there are folks who will pay it, and gladly. I don't understand the whole pocket prybar/bottle opener at $400+ fad, but again, if people will pay it, they're going to charge it.
 
Limited Availability

If it's a limited quantity with a high demand, people will pay top dollar to have something no one else can have.

Status Symbol

John Brown is "Scoopy Loops" and he has blown up on Instagram. The popular custom knife pages advertise his work, so everyone wants to be one of the cool kids. He is also buddies with the guy who started making Key-Bars. So, that helped him a good bit.

Anodized Titanium

It's anodized titanium, not ordinary plastic, pewter, or steel. It goes along with the Status Symbol. He also makes them out of Brass, Copper, Timascus/Moku-Ti, and I believe some were Stainless way back when. I could be wrong though.

The Moku-Ti beads were running around $220. I don't care for jewelry, so I would never buy one, but I also don't knock him and think he's done an excellent job with his business ventures.
 
Simple answer: the "Wieners and Steel" hype train. Same thing with Chaves Knives and Rob Carter as well. They made the demand for their stuff explode.
 
dzlvs8 said:
I hope I don't get smacked for this but, WHY are Scoopy Loops bead so freaking expensive. Granted, they are fairly nice beads, but I don't understand the high price at all.
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And this has to do with knives how? Are the beads knives or something?
 
OK. Good. I just wanted to make sure that I wasn't crazy. I live in an apartment, I don't even own a lathe, and I made this out of a stainless steel nut. Took me about a half hour, if that. Since there are only three of them in the world, does anyone want to pay me $1000 for it? (it's not actually for sale.) How about if I add more loops and some scoops!?

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dzlvs8 said:
OK. Good. I just wanted to make sure that I wasn't crazy. I live in an apartment, I don't even own a lathe, and I made this out of a stainless steel nut. Took me about a half hour, if that. Since there are only three of them in the world, does anyone want to pay me $1000 for it? (it's not actually for sale.) How about if I add more loops and some scoops!?
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That's absolutely fantastic work for a DIY project. However, there is no need to bash anyone. Yes, their prices are high, but their product has a high demand and low supply. John Brown is doing very well for a "small business," but it is a niche market and absolutely not a necessity.

My knife will still cut without a lanyard. So there is no reason to pee in the cheerios of others. :cool:
 
I've always wondered the same thing. I like that DIY bead better honestly, same with the copper ferrule, just taste IMO
 
To clarify, I'm not hating on the guys work at all. I was just trying to figure out why people quickly buy up his beads for insane prices. I was curious if they maybe came with a free knife or something.
 
dzlvs8 said:
To clarify, I'm not hating on the guys work at all. I was just trying to figure out why people quickly buy up his beads for insane prices. I was curious if they maybe came with a free knife or something.
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One could ask the same about Steel Flame & Starlingear, but people love them and will support their business.

If I made lanyard beads/jewelry, sold them for $20 each, and sold out in 5 minutes on a Social Media account, I'd be raising my prices too.
 
I have thought many times of making similar beads to all these high dollar things, out of the same high end materials, and selling them for around 4 bucks, just to show people what the real cost should be. We could probably turn around a thousand in a day out of one of our lathes. Same thing with all these knucks for 400.00! You can tell they are waterjet or laser cut for no more than 15 bucks. I jetted 20 sets out around Christmas, very similar to one companies design and just gave them out to my buddies as gifts. I really think people are paying loads of money for crap with the right name on them.
 
We went to the USN meeting at Steel Flame and were given dog tags that were basically copper with an image pressed into them. Went online and was absolutely shocked to see them selling for $75-150. Same with many of the knives we saw with pivots and screws made by them. So many people there had huge keyrings loaded with these things and all their knives had every screw and pivot replaced with Steel Flame products that cost $150 a piece. It was insane. Dont get me wrong, I really liked my free dog tag, but its just stamped copper. The members there with all this stuff obviously love it tho, so I suppose to each his own - but I dont get it either. I honestly really liked the first pic of that home made bead lol. Luckily there are more reasonable options out there for titanium beads. You'd think some of this stuff was cut from gold and platinum.
 
I think it starts off with quality and then shifts to branding. When I got my Atwood prybaby, they were like $25. Very high quality and then people wanted them and demand outran supply and prices shot up.
 
Quiet said:
Simple answer: because there are folks who will pay it, and gladly. I don't understand the whole pocket prybar/bottle opener at $400+ fad, but again, if people will pay it, they're going to charge it.
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Gonna have to say I haven't figured it out either. Been hanging out a lot on other edc forums lately and never knew half this stuff existed. I looked at the little Vox things for 5 minutes trying to figure out what they do exactly to be $500. Then I realized it's a bottle opener...or maybe a paperweight. Really. Hell, my little pry bar was $10 from CountyComm and I thought that was excessive (used to be $5) and my Leatherman Juice and Alox Cadet have very useful bottle openers. To each his own.
 
I have a buddy who is a bit of a painter /sketch artist. He's quite good. Probably not going to make millions, but he sells work. A few years back someone told him to bump up the prices on his work, and make every painting a different price, not based on size, just scramble them and make them bigger. He sold more than when a large painting was more than a small one, and pocket change priced. Sometimes people look at a price and think, if its expensive, it must be good, or desirable. So they buy it. I figure anyone who can come up with a product and make a dollar deserves it, no matter how silly, provided they are not ripping off another maker. They can rip off their customers all they want, at cost of their own longevity. Artificial scarcity has been a part of marketing since DeBeers figured it out, and while I may not like it, the fact is that it works.

Branding is a fact of life, some are good at it, some not so much, the trick as a consumer is to figure out who is who, and decide how much you are willing to pay for a thing. From there its just a matter of finding someone who will sell at that price. I see no difference between the beads and every company selling a water-jet cut, CNC ground slab of steel. Sure some of them are good, some less so, but by looking at price and availability, you'd never be able to tell who was who.
 
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