Ok, so since I am new to the whole busskin thing I was just wondering how you get your knives? I know there's the order page here and at busse combat and rat knives, but, for example, how do you order the #1 model for the hog muk? The only thing I see is the boss jack. (Unless I missed the release completely)I have also heard of the "exchange" but that's not for new knives is it? Please enlighten me.

I made the same questions about a year ago to Scrap Yard sales. You can only order the knives that are available at a time. For example now you can order Scrapivore, Scrapizashi and War Dog from SY shop.

That brings me to the roots of my wantings. The SY MUK! -Surprice- I want a Muk! I need a Muk! etc...

You have missed the hog muk release. The exchange is new and used.....more new than used I would say. Hope that helps

One more thing: Welcome!

Welcome to the board and those are very good questions to ask. I think most of us were in the same boat at one time.

Welcome to the yard. Getting the blades you want is tough as only what is newly released are available in the three shops, everthing else is on the secondary markets such as the blade forum.

Welcome! It's all been said: buy what you can in the store and hope what you like comes up on one of the exchanges. bladeforums has a bussekin-only trading area where you see a lot of good blades come up from time to time.

You can also purchase at knife shows that the three companies participate in, or, if you can find a nice guy or gal, you can sometimes convince someone to act as a proxy for you at the shows.

Last way is to watch the bussekin forums or the busse discussion forum on BF for the occassional "ganza"--online mad shopping sprees where Jerry Busse puts up for sale a bunch of knives at a specific time. When he says "Go!" everyone who wants in sends in an email with their name, contact info and what they want to buy. It's first come first serve, so there's no guarantee you can get what you want.

I forgot. Occasionally, a super nice dog, rat, or Hog (although I'm not sure the the latter exists <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> ) will PM you with a great price on the blade you are looking for. The store sites are not exchanges and no one solicits or sells knives here, but at times, it is obvious that someone is jonesing for a particular blade. If a lucky dog has one or more that they want to share, they MIGHT PM you. But generally, that's not gonna happen much <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Hope that helps!

Nice summary Dogtired. It's a challenge for anyone new to figure all this out.

On the exchange many collectors/traders of Bussekin often have "new" unused blades offered on the exchange. Things sell very fast when the price is right (usually at a premium over the initial release price).

Welcome and good luck!

Thanks a lot. All this info is very helpful. Now I wait..........

The best bet is to order direct from the particular Bussekin division when they are available. If it is something that you even have the notion that you may want one, you should do it if you can afford it. If you don't like it you can resell on the bf exchange. Usually at a small profit or close to break even. If you have to wait and try to find one aftermarket you will usually pay a premium. Most offerings are limited availability so you have to constantly keep up on what's coming. Seems like a pretty savvy marketing strategy.

wrxguyusa, the unfortunate thing is that "premium" folks usually charge. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> Sometimes as much as 2x+ the original price for certain blades. Oh well. Free market and all that.

There are some good deals that show up now and then--people selling at or below cost; people selling at a slight mark up; people selling gently used blades at good prices (blades you might not ever know had been used); etc.

Keep in mind that in many cases, folks who sell there are often just recouping costs. There's the prices you see on the site (this site for instance, shows what the blades originally went for) which doesn't include the shipping you pay to get it from the company or the price the forumite needs to pay for shipping to you. If there's a sheath involved, that's usually an extra cost the original buyer incurred. Kydex sheaths can run anywhere from $20-60+ to have made depending on the maker and options (firesteel loop, tek lok, etc) and leather can run considerably more. So in many cases, what might appear to be an overly high price on the forums is actually fairly reasonable one everything is taken into account.

There are dealers as well that buy the knives in bulk on the assumption that they can flip them for a significant profit. Folks gotta make a living I suppose.

And you can always privately offer the seller what you think a fair price is (or what you can afford at the moment). Worst they can do is say no. Folks are generally fairly civil and respectful.

No value judgments, just noting what I've observed. May be a little off topic and I apologize if I've strayed a bit outside the boundaries of this forum <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Welcome!!!
Also, I've seen lists of what the original prices were of Busse Combat knives. I think I've seen a swamp rat list too. I have not seen a scrapyard knife list beyond the photo album of past offerings on the scrapyard website.

Original price can at least give you an idea of what it originally cost someone to buy.

swamp rat list (not complete)

Busse Combat price list (work in progress)