Hey everyone - a huge shoutout to all the Snarf backers who were able to pop by the booth at the Texas Blade Show and handle our Snarf prototypes! It was so cool getting to meet some of you folks in person and we hope we'll be able to do the same at Blade Show Atlanta. If you've never been, I highly recommend attending Blade Show not only to see a gagillion amazing knives, but more importantly to meet the amazing folks behind the knives. Hands down, our favorite thing about the knife community is the people, and that's on full display at the Blade Show events.
We got this shot just before going to the ER - We totally forgot to get any photos at our booth during the event! 🤘😅
This was me at the ER after the metal tabs on our display lights sliced my finger wide open!
So in short, if you can make a Blade Show, we encourage you to do so. We'd love to meet you and we promise that most Blade Show evenings don't end with an ER trip!
Speaking of Snarf at Blade Show, I've been in talks with Laura at Scikio (our OEM) and we're still cooking on Snarf production. Currently Frank and his team at DreamTech (the factory Scikio is working with to make Snarf) are working on the Blade Grabblers (yes, that's the actual name of what holds the blades). Man that was a lot of parenthetical statements. Anyone else think primarily in footnotes? 🤘😅
So things are moving along, but Laura did mention to me today that there might be some value in taking the extra step to get some production samples since we have so many models this time around. In the past the most models we've ever done at one time was two, and now we have 12 Snarf variants. So I'm asking her to find out how much time that might add to production because I'm of the mind that we only get to make it right once and there's no going back, so if it's not going to slow things down too much it would probably be worth getting some production samples in hand. So I'll let you know more on that once I hear back from her.
If you've got any thoughts on the matter we're open for suggestions as well. We're also looking for a platform to allow us to get feedback on designs prior to us releasing them via preorders, so if you'd be interested in being part of the R&D team for AKT, we're all ears about that as well!
We'll keep you in the loop as we get closer to the finish line, but in the meantime thank you all so much for helping bring Snarf to life!
Hey everybody sorry it's taken me so long to put this together but I was finally able to get survey for Snarf finalized!
We've just sent out a handful to make sure there's nothing set up incorrectly, so expect the rest to be sent out sometime today or tomorrow. So be on the lookout!
Thanks so much for your patience while I worked on this! Let me know if you have any questions!
-Michael
PS - Several of you asked for the option to be able to help offset the loss we're incurring from a pricing misquote for Snarf. So we added an item called "Misquote Offset" and here's the details from that item. Thanks again!
"I am altering the deal, pray I don't alter it any further" may be Darth Vader's motto, but it isn't ours, so when we found out a misquote from our factory was going to inflate prices $7-12 per knife, we in no way wanted our Snarf backers to pay towards these additional costs.
That said, because we were raising our prices for late backers, we wanted to explain the price change to our original backers.
When we did, we inadvertently created a bit of a firestorm.
Our backers came out of the woodworks asking for a way to help offset the price change, so here it is. But first, some ground rules:
1. First and foremost, don't feel any pressure to chip in, especially if it puts any undue pressure on you. We'll be okay, so put you and your family first.
2. Just know we have a solid relationship with Scikio, our manufacturer, and the additional cost we now have to cover reflects only half of the total misquote. They're covering the other half.
3. In the interest of transparency, (not intending to influence whether or not you give), here are the additional prices per knife over and above our original quote.
Again, please don't feel any pressure to contribute to this. We just appreciate you being a part of bringing Snarf to life!
-Michael and Melody, AKT
PS - for the folks who want the full scoop, the misquote came down to several factors. We originally had a different version of the utility blade locking mechanism and didn't have milling, so the first quote reflected a different level of manufacturing. Once we had upgraded to the Jab Lock and added milling, Michael reached out to Laura at Scikio and asked if the first quote was still good or if we needed to wait for a different quote. Laura said "yes," meaning we needed to wait for a different quote, but Michael interpreted "yes" to mean the first quote was good. We only realized the miscommunication a month or so after the campaign closed once we were making the down payment. Both parties felt they dropped the ball and we decided to meet down the middle with them covering half the added expense and us covering the other. So there you have it, and lesson learned for next time!
Hey everyone - hope you had an excellent holiday season. We spent Christmas with our extended family, then spent New Year's in Branson with Melody, the kiddos, and my parents. I landed back in town on 1/3 ready to hit the ground running...and then spent the next seven days in bed with one of the worst colds I've had in a while!
I'm finally up and running and trying to get caught up, but I wanted to take a second to give everyone an update on Snarf. I placed the order and paid the deposit just before the holidays, so we've got the ball rolling there and are currently on track for a June delivery.
We did hit one pretty significant financial snag that I wanted you to be aware of. It turns out there was a misunderstanding regarding the quote that we received from the manufacturer, so once we actually went to place the order we discovered that each knife is actually going to cost us about $6 more than we had planned. That doesn't sound like much, but based on our minimum order quantity per colorway, that's $20K more than we had budgeted for.
Although we are still stoked about the record-breaking $118K we raised for this project, the amount we actually received after taxes and fees was $94K, so that extra $20K was quite the gut punch. In the interest of transparency, everyone involved really shoulders some of the burden here. When the first ballpark quote was received the knife was not completely finalized. When I received the prototypes I reached out to Laura (my direct contact at Scikio) to ask about a new quote from Frank (the factory owner) the communication led Laura to believe she had communicated that we were still waiting on a quote from Frank and led me to believe the ballpark quote was the final quote. Then Frank didn't get around to sending Laura an updated quote until after I placed the order, so it wasn't until then that we all realized the mistake.
Crazy as it may seem, the $6 increase represents a pretty serious discount that Frank is giving us for the mistake, and although it amounts to a huge chunk of change, I've worked with Laura and Frank enough (and met with them personally enough) to know that they're doing their best to produce the knives at the best price without losing money on their end.
Of course all of this won't have any impact on the amount you paid for Snarf. But once I get the late backer site set up, there will be an increase on the price for Snarf for late backers, and another increase once we have all the preorders shipped and we start selling them in stock. I just didn't want you to see those price increases and thing we were getting greedy - just trying to make up for a major miscommunication/miscalculation!
Melody and I are heading to Vegas this weekend to celebrate our 21st anniversary and meet with Laura while she's in town for SHOT Show, so we'll likely have more updates once we return. I actually met Laura originally at SHOT Show back in 2023 when she introduced me to what would eventually be known as the Roundhouse Lock. So she's basically been a part of AKT from the beginning so it'll be nice to reconnect with her in person and plan out more designs for 2026. It helps that she's about as crazy as Melody and I are as demonstrated in the photo of a company retreat she sent me (she's the horizontal one)!
I hope to get the late backer site up and running in the next few weeks. This will give you the opportunity to finalize your order, add anything new, and give us your shipping info. So keep a lookout for that coming soon!
As always, thank you so much for backing Snarf. I went full-time with AKT just before we launched Snarf, so I definitely waited with bated breath to see if Snarf was going to be my first failure or success now that AKT is my main day job. So thank you so much for bringing Snarf to life and signaling to us that you want to see more of what's in store for AKT!
I've been watching Metal Complex since way back when (circa 2019), so when MC reviews one of my knives...it feels like coming full circle.
I haven't watched it yet (waiting for Melody to get home to watch it with her) but honestly it's enough just knowing Snarf was reviewed by the man, the myth, the legend!
