2025 Factory Seconds Sale

[WilliamMunny]

I don't do the "grab a bunch and pick the best" bit. Once it hits the basket it goes home with me unless my bank account says "Thou shalt not". It has always blown my mind that people will be so picky when they're getting that much discount.

You are what I aspire to - much more selective, and knowing exactly what I’m looking for. I admire that.

That said, I am relatively new to this whole thing, so getting my hands on a lot of knives has been part of the fun, as well as sorting though to find something I really gel with.

To be fair, I've been going to these for quite a while, and the scale of the event was a lot smaller when I started. I think this was my eighteenth, not counting OpFocus sales.

I am guessing the amount of seconds grows with the expansion of the company each years. With the new expansion finished, the increased output should me a whole lot more seconds.

[WilliamMunny]

It is hard to appreciate is the scale of the event - I heard one estimate at 60k knives.

Shazam! That's a lot of defects. Of course I don't know what would be the expected yield loss out of a knife factory, or the total number of knives produced. Even so, that's a lot of cash laying on the table. I often wondered why Spyderco doesn't do an online seconds sale, but dumping that number of less-expensive knives into the market could very well disrupt sales for legitimate top-tier retailers. Whatever, it's far too complicated for someone at my pay grade. Thanks everyone for posting the pics. It looks like there were some nice knives to be had.

I think/hope they will do an online second sale. I am assuming to have them once in a while it is good to help clear out excess seconds that just don’t sell in the in person event.

IMO it doesn’t hurt sales. I mean I want to try a military but not enough to justify the new price tag. If I could pick up a second for $100 I would probably give it a try. If I liked it, it might even lead to me buying a new one.

[TkoK83Spy]

I remember when they did the online sale during Covid and it turned into a crazy complainfest! I wonder if they would even go through the headache of that again? I remember some folks were really raging over not being able to get the knives they had in their carts. I didn't dare say my order went through smoothly

[Red Leader]

I don't do the "grab a bunch and pick the best" bit. Once it hits the basket it goes home with me unless my bank account says "Thou shalt not". It has always blown my mind that people will be so picky when they're getting that much discount.

You are what I aspire to - much more selective, and knowing exactly what I’m looking for. I admire that.

That said, I am relatively new to this whole thing, so getting my hands on a lot of knives has been part of the fun, as well as sorting though to find something I really gel with.

To be fair, I've been going to these for quite a while, and the scale of the event was a lot smaller when I started. I think this was my eighteenth, not counting OpFocus sales.

And it’s the veterans like you the really help to provide clarity to the ones like me (2nd year) to understand what is written between the lines so that it can be the most enjoyable experience for everyone involved. Both my son and I really appreciate it, especially as this event is becoming an annual father/son experience. Thank you for your insight.

[Red Leader]

I don't do the "grab a bunch and pick the best" bit. Once it hits the basket it goes home with me unless my bank account says "Thou shalt not". It has always blown my mind that people will be so picky when they're getting that much discount.

You are what I aspire to - much more selective, and knowing exactly what I’m looking for. I admire that.

That said, I am relatively new to this whole thing, so getting my hands on a lot of knives has been part of the fun, as well as sorting though to find something I really gel with.

To be fair, I've been going to these for quite a while, and the scale of the event was a lot smaller when I started. I think this was my eighteenth, not counting OpFocus sales.

I am guessing the amount of seconds grows with the expansion of the company each years. With the new expansion finished, the increased output should me a whole lot more seconds.

I will try to post some pictures with my writeup that show the scale. It was massive. And massive fun as well.

[WilliamMunny]

I remember when they did the online sale during Covid and it turned into a crazy complainfest! I wonder if they would even go through the headache of that again? I remember some folks were really raging over not being able to get the knives they had in their carts. I didn't dare say my order went through smoothly

I am guilty for getting frustrated during one of their online sales 2022ish. Had my cart set and tried to order but their site blocked my IP as some type of fraud/vpn issue. They were awesome and fixed the issue but too late to get anything.

Their more recent online sales have run extremely smooth with their dedicated server. The Spyderco team did an amazing job making the experience much more reliable/fair for everyone. If you had a computer and were fast you could get something nice.

I think it helps Spyderco too. Just say they have 10,000 knives they can’t sell in person, an online sale could probably generate $100 average per knife and sell out in hours. That’s a ton of money.

[Mushroom]

Nick! Where you at, what was your haul this year?!

Stayed in Colorado to get things packed and shipped but traveling home today. I’ll post an in depth update a later tonight!

[Red Leader]

No slouching over here. Seconds already being put to warehouse work!

[TkoK83Spy]

Shaman is a fantastic warehouse knife! That's when I fell in love with them and eventually had 4 back a few years ago when I was a much heavier user. Amazing grip and comfort in hand, thick blade to not have to worry about breaking the tip. Feels like a folding fixed blade...but a fixed blade is also fun in the warehouse

[Spyderbot_matrix]

That python 10v… so jealous enjoy it

[Mushroom]

@Red Leader Dave, it was great to meet you and Jedi. Can’t thank you enough for that Lil Native. It was one I was hoping to find and there weren’t many out there. Looks like you guys got a great haul and I’m happy Jedi was able to find the Sage 6 and Techno 3. I was trying to find a Spynano for him too but struck out. Hope to see you guys next sale.

@Jimandchris2 Jim, it was a pleasure to meet you. I wasn’t lucky enough to find a Spynano by the end of the sale but your efforts to help locate one were greatly appreciated!

@aquanaut Great to meet you, Jeremy. Hope you ended up with a good haul. See you next year!

@Bstueve Ben, thank you for trying to help locate that DLC SE Lil Native for me. I was asking around and one of the employees said it is possible that there has not been a recent enough production run for any of them to be available anyway. We were on a wild goose chase.


_________

I’ll get to the goods from Saturday but I wanted to post another quick recap of Friday, the day before the sale, first.

The line really started growing Friday afternoon and there was a lot going on.

Some pre-seconds sale buying, selling, and trading -


@Red Leader and his son showing off their custom shirts. Very clever idea!



The afternoon hacky sack circle


@Candyman hosted a Tetris Tumbler tournament and generously rewarded the winners with a brand new NAND and Byrd knife!



The final move


The winners


Shortly after that, Spyderco came outside and gifted the first five attendees in line with a really cool prize pack! We received a Spyderco x Vanquest small chest pack, an unreleased full size Bodacious patch, a Spyderco logo sticker, a voucher for free food item from one of the food trucks, a metal Spyderco pendant denoting our place in line, and a Shaman LW hand engraved by Eric!




All of that came after Eric personally brought a small group of us from the line through the factory and gifted us with a steel cutout billet from the Damasteel Moran sprint run!!!





As always the night ended by the fire, this time with some show and tell.



Saturday, seconds sale day, recap coming soon!

[Manixguy@1994]

Great pics Nick ! Love the Moran blade cutouts with Eric . Dan

[AlexRus]

@Red Leader Dave, it was great to meet you and Jedi. Can’t thank you enough for that Lil Native. It was one I was hoping to find and there weren’t many out there. Looks like you guys got a great haul and I’m happy Jedi was able to find the Sage 6 and Techno 3. I was trying to find a Spynano for him too but struck out. Hope to see you guys next sale.

@Jimandchris2 Jim, it was a pleasure to meet you. I wasn’t lucky enough to find a Spynano by the end of the sale but your efforts to help locate one were greatly appreciated!

@aquanaut Great to meet you, Jeremy. Hope you ended up with a good haul. See you next year!

@Bstueve Ben, thank you for trying to help locate that DLC SE Lil Native for me. I was asking around and one of the employees said it is possible that there has not been a recent enough production run for any of them to be available anyway. We were on a wild goose chase.


_________

I’ll get to the goods from Saturday but I wanted to post another quick recap of Friday, the day before the sale, first.

The line really started growing Friday afternoon and there was a lot going on.

Some pre-seconds sale buying, selling, and trading -


@Red Leader and his son showing off their custom shirts. Very clever idea!



The afternoon hacky sack circle


@Candyman hosted a Tetris Tumbler tournament and generously rewarded the winners with a brand new NAND and Byrd knife!



The final move


The winners


Shortly after that, Spyderco came outside and gifted the first five attendees in line with a really cool prize pack! We received a Spyderco x Vanquest small chest pack, an unreleased full size Bodacious patch, a Spyderco logo sticker, a voucher for free food item from one of the food trucks, a metal Spyderco pendant denoting our place in line, and a Shaman LW hand engraved by Eric!




All of that came after Eric personally brought a small group of us from the line through the factory and gifted us with a steel cutout billet from the Damasteel Moran sprint run!!!





As always the night ended by the fire, this time with some show and tell.



Saturday, seconds sale day, recap coming soon!

Awesome review and great pictures Nick!

[DSH007]

I hope to make it to a 2nds sale someday; until then, I live vicariously through these threads, some of my favorites each year.. Thank you all for sharing your pictures and experiences!

[sal]

Great reporting on the event. Thanx much.

sal

[tzirconia]

I hope to make it to a 2nds sale someday; until then, I live vicariously through these threads, some of my favorites each year.. Thank you all for sharing your pictures and experiences!

Agreed, thanks to everyone for sharing their pictures and accounts for this thread!

[Red Leader]

***Please standby as I add tons of photos to this post*** - thanks!

Seconds Sale After Action Report! It's long!


This was our second year at the sale, and the most memorable one to date.  The first one was almost just by happenstance last year, but it really secured our passion for the Spyderco brand.  We made a plan to seriously prepare for this one, and have been looking forward to it all year. 

My goal for this second year was to make great memories w/ my son, get to know some of the 'deeper channel' folks that have been around longer than us, and maybe check a few items off the list.  We arrived Friday morning around 7am, and it put us around 18-20th or so in line. and the nerding out quickly commenced.  Some of the SFO team members started trickling in around 7:30am or so, and the shop opened at 9am, which of course was a nice break from the weather - it had been slightly drizzly and cold, but of course beside the warmth, it really just became a great excuse to talk more knives w/ more people.






Over the course of the day, we did games, hacky sack, competitions, basketball, and shared knives and stories.  The afternoon kept on and more folks started showing up, and the line was about 70+ by 5pm.








At dusk, the fire was lit and Spyderco brought in pizza, as well as @candyman (thank you to both!).  My son and I had some udon, and had to make the 'bed' in the 'bed' of the 4runner.  I learned it was about 3 inches too short for me haha, but who am I kidding?  I could barely sleep anyway.  





The big morning got going and we cooked some eggs and sausage, as anticipation started filling the air. About 1/2hr before 8am, the chairs started getting put away and the line started taking serious shape. 8am sharp and the doors opened!  We were led down the center corridor to the double doors of the conference area inside Spyderco.  The air was pretty electric!







Continued in Part II…

[Red Leader]

After about 15 min in line inside, the conference room doors opened, baskets were handed out, and the hunt was on! 






The next set of pictures probably happened about an hour later as we absorbed the tremendous scene all around us.  The format this year was about 4 rows, with 2 rows of tables per 'row', w/ Spyderco employees manning the inner part of the rows.  Along the stage area they had mainly fixed blades, and then another section along the side wall of reduced-but-new knives with the table directly in front of that full of trays of new-but-open-box knives. 













(PS - can you spot the Kapara in the above pic?)






I was given a little hint by one of the crew that they had seen some Python Shamans in the second set of tables, so that was the first place I went.  I started pouring through the trays...each tray holds 50 knives, and each row held anywhere from 25-35 trays, so you can imagine the 'knife overload'.  I immediately starting trying to train my eyes for that snake-style micarta, but the first knives that stood out to me was a carbon fiber Centofante, an S90V Kapara, and then I found a 'stormtrooper' Smock (Rex 45/white micarta).  And then, there it was - Python Shaman!!!  I was so elated.  And then I found another, and another!  I probably ended up finding about 4-5 in that first run of the table. 







By that time the room was filling up and every spot around every table had already been filled with folks searching.  I lost track of my son haha, but it was okay, he had made a bee-line straight for the fixed blade tables near the stage, and had snagged a couple Jumpmaster 2s in H1 - I didn't even know they still had these!  They had a LOT of cool stuff…







We looked and looked and kept finding goodies as we went, and after about an hour and a half, we decided to make our way to a sorting table to start combing through and deciding what to keep and what to put back.  This had 2 effects - one is that you are surrounded by others doing the same thing, so sometimes you will see something really interesting in their discard pile, and visa-versa, and it allows you to also barter your finds, which didn't really dawn on me until I saw some guys doing it.  Some were pretty intense about it, and keeping a lot of knives for trade fodder, but this also led to some really cool moments as well.  







After the first sort, back to the floor we went. 

Some basic observations from this year:  The hot knife of the day was the 'stormtrooper Smock', as rumor had been circulating about there being loads of Smocks this year.  I don't know how accurate 'loads' would be, but it was one of the first knives I did see that stood out to me, that I put in my basket.  It was also the only one I ever saw in the trays being circulated.  After that, I only ever saw one in other people's baskets - and they were in a lot of baskets!  It seemed like everyone was looking for one, by far the most 'asked about' knife that day.  The Smock seems to be an incredibly popular knife to 'knife guys', and both years we've been out to this event, had many people asking about or looking out for a Smock.  It had casually been on our list, but when we found it, it was solidified and we ended up taking that one home. 

A couple knives (previously mentioned in one of my other posts) that I saw heaps of were the Military 2s in 15V and the pink Yojimbos.  Maybe I only saw so many because my brain knew they were on my list so I was keeping a closer watch on them, but I'll let you judge that for yourselves by the pictures.  I saw so many of each, it started making me sad, like just what happened to account for so many rejects?  Yes, some examples were tight and sticky, yet others seemed to be like butter, centered, and smooth.  I'm not a QC inspector, so there must be more than meets the eye with this stuff.  










Another knife that I was excited to see and take home (but that sadly didn't make the budget cut) was the Ayoob.  I had read about this knife, and the 2022 run (Sprint?) from JD Spydo's thread, God rest his soul.  It gave me a real appreciation for the knife and the history.  And reading about why so many had been returned or demoted to a 'second' was really interesting.  After inspecting what had to have been at least 100 of them, and holding them, I have to say I'm very impressed with both the design and execution.  I see what they were talking about with the grinding of the teeth near the tip, but it didn't bother me so much.  I really think this is an enthusiast's knife - something maybe only a knife afficionado would truly appreciate, but if you know, you know.  I also really feel that due to its limited appeal and odd looks, this knife is being hardcore slept on and overlooked.  There were loads and loads of them - in almost every tray was an Ayoob, and in some trays, several.  If you go to this event next year, I encourage you to give one a look, you might be surprised. 




The Military 2 in 15V was in a similar position...there were just so, so many!  Some were tight and didn't drop free, and about half to two-thirds had centering issues, but there were some gorgeous examples in there, and I very sincerely hope there remained some after the doors were shut because I will absolutely be picking one up next year if they have any more.  This one was on my list, but the budget ran tight and this one was dropped, sadly.  I talked about this one and the pink Yojimbo - which is such a cool knife, but after Bass handed me a Canis (I'm so, so grateful!) I had less reason to pick up the Yojimbo, which didn't quite feel as good and was a little more expensive. 
















Whew! Okay, to be continued in Part III…

[Mushroom]

Holy moly!!! Going to be tough to follow these posts, Dave, but I'm still going to get to my Saturday recap eventually too!

Phenomenal write up and coverage from the sale, @Red Leader! If your posts can't convince someone to attend the sale, I don't know what can. Seriously, impressive!

[Red Leader]

Holy moly!!! Going to be tough to follow these posts, Dave, but I'm still going to get to my Saturday recap eventually too!

Phenomenal write up and coverage from the sale, @Red Leader! If your posts can't convince someone to attend the sale, I don't know what can. Seriously, impressive!

I’m looking forward to it Nick! Should be fun to see from a different perspective. There was still so much that I didn’t see. I’m going to start saving up for next year…right now!


I still have so many more pictures I want to post, but I think I broke the photo hosting website today - I’m forbidden to upload more haha!