KnivesShipFree says that they’re an online retailer specializing in friendly service, fast free shipping, and in-stock selection.
I had a stellar experience with them today that I wanted to share about.
In my experience, KnivesShipFree has a good selection of premium knives, cutlery, and accessories, and decent customer service.
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I returned a knife once, and they were great about it.
To start at the beginning, I purchased a kitchen knife from them back in September 2020. It was a Bark River Petty-Z with wood handle, not too different from what you see above.
That knife was spectacular. I started using it for everything, and eventually wanted another. There are times when I’m processing very different things and could benefit from having two.
The Petty-Z is not an inexpensive knife – mine was under $200 at the time and a bit more now – and I saw it as a “buy it for life” type of purchase.
In November 2021, after waiting to buy a second one and not finding the knife available anywhere, I contacted Bark River Knives. They said to check their Facebook group and keep an eye on the production calendar. I did that a few times, and it still wasn’t active.
More than 3 YEARS later, KnivesShipFree and select other dealers have the Petty-Z back in stock.
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I saved up and put cash aside for this! It cost a little more, and the steel is tougher with lower edge retention, but I’m not going to pass this up. I’ve waited years to be able to buy another Petty-Z.
The one shown above caught my eye. This is also going to be a “buy it for life” type of purchase, and so aesthetics matter a little bit.
It also has a different handle material than I’m familiar with (stabilized dyed maple burl??), and a different blade steel than my earlier purchase. This gives it “ToolGuyd potential.”
The price is eye-popping if you’re not familiar with Bark River Knives. I have tried other stubby-style kitchen knives, and the Petty-Z is my favorite, with 3+ years of hard use cementing in my mind that it’s a great knife and worth the money – to me.
My older knife is ready to be resharpened again, but it has years of life left in it.
There’s one catch. Bark River Knives sometimes shows both sides of the handle, and also the spine if there are different colored liners. For this one, KnivesShipFree only had the one image, shown above.
I wanted to see both sides of the handle, to ensure there were no voids or surprise patterns.
The blue version appealed to me, and I emailed their customer service, asking if they have an image of the opposite side of the knife. I figured that maybe they had a folder with images from Bark River Knives – or something like that – where could quickly look up if there was an image they didn’t add to the product page.
Or, I’d get a “sorry, we don’t have more images.”
Here’s their reply, which arrived 22 minutes later:
Hey Stuart,
Great to hear from you today!
I actually had some time this afternoon to take some additional shots of that particular knife for you.
You will find all the images attached to this email. It gives a pretty good look at the knife all around, so I hope it helps in the decision making.
Just let me know if you have any questions, and have an awesome weekend!
Sincerely,
[Redacted] Customer Service
Indeed, the customer service agent included 6 images he took of the knife.
Here’s one of the images he shared with me.
Perfect!
Bark River Knives describes itself as making “semi-production cutlery,” which means that there’s a level of customization with each one. The knife blade is the same – at least for a given batch – but the handle material, color, and even the pins can be different.
For each of the Petty-Z knives, and others like it, KnivesShipFree has an image for each individual knife.
Their customer service agent could have said “sorry, this is the only image we have available.” I have had nothing but great experiences with the company, and would have accepted that.
But they took the time to pull the knife from inventory, photograph it, edit and label the images, and then respond to me.
Again, this is what it says in KnivesShipFree’s social media profile:
Welcome to KnivesShipFree! We’re an online knife retailer specializing in friendly service, fast free shipping, and in-stock selection.
This was definitely friendly service, and in my opinion above and beyond.
Yes, they want the sale. Yes, they probably realize that most people shopping for premium knives are going to be particular, and that a customer service interaction could impact the potential for future sales. But this is true for most companies.
I have ordered premium flashlights, knives, and tools, on ToolGuyd’s dime and my own. Not all retailers give a hoot about their customers, and this tends to be especially true for premium knife and tool makers and dealers.
Online forums and communities are full of testimonials about terrible customer service, and far fewer about stellar experiences.
KnivesShipFree is also one of ToolGuyd’s affiliate retailers, where we earn a small referral commission anytime a purchase is placed through a specially tagged link (you’ll see an example of this below). I test affiliate partners on occasion, to ensure they are meeting my expectations. If a retailer – affiliate or not – isn’t good enough for me, I can’t recommend them to readers.
I don’t think I have ever interacted with KnivesShipFree in an affiliate context. Meaning, I don’t think they saw me as anything other than a customer. In other words, I don’t believe I received special treatment.
There were a lot of acceptable responses that would have satisfied me as a customer, and from a ToolGuyd standpoint.
I really didn’t expect for their customer service to take fresh images, let alone 6 of them.
It wasn’t lost on me that the customer service agent knew what features and angles more… differentiating and demanding knife buyers would want to see if they couldn’t examine one in person.
I have perhaps grown so accustomed to truly terrible chatbots and unhelpful service reps in far-away call and chat centers, that this was beyond a refreshing experience.
The Bark River Knives Petty-Z starts at a little under $200. Bark River is a family-owned company that makes their products in the USA.
I purchased a couple of different Bark River knives over the years, exploring different steels and handle materials. I use some as shop and EDC knives, but they’re really made for outdoors and field use, except for the Petty-Z, which is a kitchen knife.
Some of you are going to be shocked at the $200+ price tag for these knives.
I can recommend inexpensive paring knives, chef’s knives, and utility kitchen knives, but have yet to find anything else in this size that I like. Most smaller knives – the Petty-Z has a 4.7″ blade length – are sized for very small and precise work.
It’s worth it – to me – rather than getting an imported knife with different blade shape that doesn’t work as well. As I said, I see it as “buy it for life.” I’ve also been saving for my second Petty-Z for a few years now.
We can talk more about the Petty-Z or other kitchen knives, but for this post I wanted to share more about my KnivesShipFree experience while it was still fresh.
KnivesShipFree has a wide range of offering, including for under $50, so don’t think they only offer very expensive knives. They carry Spyderco, Kershaw, Case, ESEE, Begg, Bradford, Case, and more.
Rob G Mann
I am glad you shared a positive experience. Not too many do nowadays. I’m not currently in the market for such a knife, but when I am it’s good to know that there are companies out there that still care about their customers.
eddiesky
I’ve gotten knife sets as gifts for friends/family. I also make a custom knife block for them.
One company I get knives from is Made In. (not gonna link since I don’t want to offend Stu). While not cheap, after visiting the site here, holy $1500 knife, Batman! I thought Cy Swan’s knives were pricey.
Anyway, Made In also has great customer service, and their knives come packaged nicely, as the box has magnetic lid, and there is a bandaid with each knife. Because, you know, they are sharp.
PSA: never, ever put good chef/kitchen cutlery in a dishwasher- always wash by hand.
Another Bob
Great to hear a company exceeds expectations. Sadly it’s not the norm.
As far as premium knives these look pretty nice. Not too much more than the typical high end kitchen knives from solingen like henckles or wusthof but petty-z has better steel looks like. Not to familiar with that a lot. I wonder about corrosion resistance? Curious if the petty-z handle is dishwasher safe?
I know! It’s sacrilege to put a good knife in the dish washer! Don’t be a lazy bum like me. To be fair all my wusthof’s get tossed in the washer. It’s easy and I just sharpen them once or twice a year. 20 years later still going strong.
If your not looking to break the bank on a chef knife try the victorinox fibrox 8” chef knife. Apparently they’re around 40 bucks on Amazon now. I remember when they used to be $15. Excellent German steel that holds an edge, plastic handle that is dishwasher safe and relatively easy to hand sharpen. Hard to beat.
Jared
No knives are dishwasher safe. 😛
If you’re dead set on doing that, you’ll want a very stable handle material. Plastic, G10, etc. Not stabilized dyed maple burl.
James
Except Cutco, baby. Been putting mine in the dishwasher for 25 years now (man I’m old) and they look and act like new.
That Petty-Z is pretty!
Jared
I understand knives can “survive” the dishwasher. My wife does it to our main set all the time. I object, but she can’t be stopped! I’ve actually resorted to keeping a couple premium knives aside for my own use and just quickly re-sharpening the others on a diamond stone when I want to use them.
The thing is, even though nothing cracks or warps and the myth that the heat cycle will effect your temper is a complete fabrication – the knives aren’t unaffected.
Things rattle around in the dishwasher, they get quite hot, there’s long exposure to soap. When I look at those dishwashered knives now, I can feel a slight misalignment between the scales and the exposed tang. Neither the scales nor the blade have that nice factory polish.
Worst of all – the knives don’t keep their hair-popping edge after a couple dishwasher cycles.
I suspect people don’t notice that because they quickly forget what a sharp knife feels like. Food isn’t particularly difficult to cut – blade geometry does most of the work, meaning you can continue working with a knife that lost it’s edge a long time ago.
Here’s an eye-opening video on the topic for reference: https://youtu.be/VibBSIh-CXI?si=SoKObnlvwRwYmZ8B
You could just use the dishwasher, sand the tang and scales back flush, polish the blade when it gets hazy and regularly sharpen your knife – but is that easier than the 10 seconds it takes to soap it up and rinse it off when you’re done?
Robert Adkins
When I saw the YT link, I quickly guessed it would be OUTDOORS55, and I was right. He takes the voodoo out of knife sharpening and care, steel, stones, etc.
Scott K
Dishwashers can definitely wreak havoc on knives for a number of reasons. We toss our junky knives in but none of our nicer ones. Although Victorinox suggests handwashing, they do say Fibrox handles are dishwasher safe. They often are well reviewed for the price point. I had my eye on a paring knife and ordered one from Amazon – it was super thin, flimsy, and definitely stamped which wasn’t what I expected so I sent it back. We have a few shucking knives with that handle and they’re very comfortable to use and easy to keep clean. I had a good experience ordering them from The Knife Merchant.
Kentucky fan
The vast majority of commercial kitchens use either Dexter Mercer or victorinox. I worked in that industry for years and can tell you that you have to spend a lot of money to outdo them on performance.
Robert Adkins
Same thoughts! Had my Victorinox for years, and they’re hard to beat. I have always hand washed mine, but many pros use them in large busy restaurants. If they weren’t dishwasher safe, they wouldn’t be so popular with the pros.
Another Bob
Oh you’re not wrong you definitely shouldn’t throw a knife in the dishwasher. But I do 🙂 I like the fact I can sterilize them in my dishwasher. Probably overkill but I go a little overboard on cleaning when preparing wild game.
Wusthof has a resin handle. It’s triple riveted to the full tang. So no moisture gets between handle and blade. I’m pretty sure it’s some kind of plastic. If you pay enough plastic is now a boutique resin lol. It definitely exacerbates wear but a few minutes on a stone 2x a year and it’s fine.
I wasn’t sure if stabilized dyed maple was a wood product or one of those resin impregnated wood products like benchmade uses. The benchmade’s are basically some sort of wood impregnated plastic. Damn near impervious to water. And look really pretty too.
Bummer to hear the victorinox pairing knives are kinda junky. I only have experience with the chef knives. I probably gave 15 of them out one year for Christmas. 10 years later a lot of guys still have/use them.
Stuart
Do you mean like “Fat Carbon” or Ultem?
Industry trends can be amusing to observe, similar to the Stanley water bottle craze.
DRT42
I don’t know anything about Fat Carbon, but “back in the day” Ultem was pretty good stuff. There was no other thermoplastic that would work for the application I was designing.
Bob
Stabilized woods are usually soaked in resin inside a vacuum chamber. It removes all the air and moisture, filling all the voids and pores with resin.
Scott K
To be honest, I was really surprised and wouldn’t be shocked to find out they were knockoffs that snuck their way into Amazon. I would still try a fibrox chef’s knife when it’s time to replace my current workhorse.
Wayne R.
Not sure sneaking into Amazon is a real challenge…
MM
Some kitchen knives are specifically designed to withstand dishwashing, specifically the ones you often see in use in restaurants. The Fibrox handled Victorinox are a great example but there are many brands of those kinds of knife. Bakers and Chefs, Dexter-Russel, Mercer, etc. In fact those are designed to withstand commercial dishwashers which are a lot harsher on knives than domestic ones. And of course all the knife brands founded more on gimmicky advertising than actual performance like to talk about how their knives are dishwasher safe, but that’s really a side effect of using cheaper materials and construction. Generic stainless and an injection molded handle is pretty darn cheap and it just so happens to be dishwasher safe.
That said, I would avoid putting knives in dishwashers. Even if the materials can handle the heat and the soap there’s still a risk of the knives banging around against other things and taking knives in and out of the dishwasher can be a safety concern.
Stuart
NO DISHWASHER!!!
I got my wife a Wusthof Ikon santoku, and it has handled the dishwasher okay, but it’s generally not recommended.
I wouldn’t recommend the dishwasher for any natural or wood-handled knives. There are versions with synthetic handles that I’d feel less hesitant about cleaning in the dishwasher.
I like Victorinox’s inexpensive serrated utility knives. I tried their slightly fancier plain edge knives and don’t like them as much. They remind me of a cheap Farberware I had in college for a few years.
I keep hearing about cheapening quality in a lot of brands. I wanted to get another in the Wusthoff Ikon line, but kept running into negative reviews.
Messermeister is pretty good, and I like their relatively inexpensive Avanta steak knives more than the more premium Oliva knife I bought at the same time.
Richard Miller
I’ve never seen the 8” Chef Knife for $15… But then, I never paid attention to kitchen cutlery prices before 1991.
MM
It’s funny, the Victorinox Forschner chef’s knives skyrocketed in price after people started recommending them as being good value for money. But the irony, to me at least, is that there’s nothing special about the Victorinox brand here, they are just one of many companies making that style. The style–cheap NSF certified line cook’s knife–is what makes it a good beginner knife, not who made it. The Victorinox’s price jumped but the others didn’t. You can still get a Dexter-Russel, Mercer, etc, for under $20.
Robert Adkins
While there is nothing special about Victorinox knive’s handles and steel, there is something special about the way they sharpen easily and cut. Thin blades are part of the reason they cut so well, you don’t need to baton a kitchen knife.
Jared
Beautiful knife Stuart!
How does the handle feel? I assume a “stabilized wood” is injected with epoxy or something along those lines. Does it still feel like wood?
Is it a solid piece of wood or laminated like pakkawood?
Stuart
This all happened today, and so I didn’t receive it yet.
My older one has a “dark curly maple” handle that’s naturally colored. It needs to be oiled periodically, and shrunk a little. I’m looking forward to the new one, which I assume is stabilized with a dyed resin.
I read up on desert ironwood today, and it’s supposedly very stable and doesn’t shrink, but I’m skeptical.
Bark River has versions with other dense woods, as well as synthetic materials such as micarta and G-10. They also have resin handles, but I don’t think I’ve seen any Petty-Z’s like that.
For a Bark River kitchen knife, I would stick with wood (natural or stabilized), or maybe micarta.
I was hesitant about resins and stabilizers for the first knife, but opened up to the idea.
Alexk
Love the look of Bark River knives and I’d consider knivesshipfree if I was looking for a knife, based on your experience. That is the type of business that I want to deal with.
Michael F
I like to hear stories like this. I’ll share a great experience I had with ACME Tools yesterday. I ordered a Makita XGT power head with string trimmer kit, and ACME had that particular kit listed as including the Optimum Rapid Charger DC40RA. When I got the kit, it actually came with the non-Optimum Rapid Charger DC40RC. Now, I’m 99% sure this is Makita’s way of doing “shrinkflation”, and expected ACME to tell me to maybe contact Makita to see what was going on. Much to my surprise, ACME is shipping me out the DC40RA Optimum charger to make it right, even though it really wasn’t their fault.
MM
It sounds like KnivesShipFree gave you great customer service. As far as nice kitchen knives go I’ve had excellent service from two companies worth mentioning.
First: The Knife Merchant. They have special-ordered left handed versions of Glestain knives for me on multiple occasions and their communication has always been top notch. I also had questions for them regarding the handle sizes on some knives and they replied to me straight away with photographs and measurements.
Second: JapaneseChefsKnife.com I contacted them looking for a Sugimoto no. 11 Chinese style knife; I couldn’t find one anywhere for sale, but I knew it existed because I saw it in the Sugimoto catalog. They replied right away that they did not stock that model but they could get one if I wanted to order it. They offered me a fantastic price, I agreed, and they actually sent an employee straight over to Sugimoto to pick up the special order and had it on the way to me the same day.
928'er
I’ll second that. Koki provides excellent service. Fast shipping and since your order is coming from Japan, there’s no sales tax – which saves me about 10% here in CA.
My introduction to Japanese kitchen knives years ago was a 210 mm Misono gyuto in Swedish carbon steel. My kitchen arsenal now includes 16 Japanese kitchen knives ranging from a Shun Kramer 80 mm paring knife all the way up to a 270 mm Hattori slicer.
I’ve also ordered a few items from KnivesShipFree and I’ll also second Stuart’s recommendation. Again, excellent service.
Nathan
I’m glad you got and posted about a positive experience but I have to ask.
I do have to mention an alternative. I bought all my kitchen knives from warther and son out of Dover Ohio. Love them all very well made. They have a hammered blade which is interesting and the handles are wood or I think you can now get plastic. Mine are sharpened about twice a year by my hand and the oldest is around 21 years at this point
Ron
I have a couple knives I’ve bought from Knivesshipfree.
Great company!,
Doresoom
I purchased my latest Benchmade knife from KnivesShipFree. Had a great experience with them too!
Sean
That’s a great customer service experience, and a really good looking knife. Related to customer service that exceeds expectations, I want to share Darn Tough socks. They make wool socks in Vermont. I had bought a few pairs from an army surplus company, but they sold out. I loved the socks and wanted a few more. I emailed customer service, the asked if I could send pictures, and then they found the exact right sock. It is so refreshing when you freak with a human being that is empowered to actually help and wants to help you. Thank you for sharing about KnivesShipFree.
Wayne R.
Darn Tough makes real XXL socks too.
kri
if want one best tools made for pro kitchens and home https://www.dick.de/messer/en/cutting-edges/detail/brot–universalmesser/superior-sandwichmesser-18-cm
no worrys of thuja burl cracking or masur birch “curly birch” handels
japanese WA handels is way to go if want to japanese and easy repair handels
Dish washer detergent most of them use lye so the can re shape the edge on most knifes see it under a microscope on mirco level if put manytimes….
like microplanes and many files use acid to sharpen them in controlled
enviroment
VG 10 ikea walnut santoku probaly best deal on knife u can get
PS. yes there are spelling errors