They are a family-run business based in Golden, Colorado, at the base of the Rocky Mountains where they employ around 50 people split about equally between the office and a small manufacturing plant. They also have small numbers of knives made in Taiwan (3 lines) and Italy (4 lines - fixed blade), but the bulk of overseas production is in Japan, where they have one large and one small manufacturer.
From their standard range of folding knives:
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"Collectibles" made in short (sprint) runs with different handle materials:
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They are constantly developing and innovating new lines, new locking mechanisms and so on, and frequently work with custom knife makers whose names are used to market the resulting knives. Shown below are a custom knife made by Howard Viele (left) and a Spyderco Phoenix designed by Howard Viele (right):
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In addition they have an economy range of knives made in China which are marketed as a sub-brand, the “byrd” range. They have a tear-drop shaped hole in the blade and retail at about half the price of the other knives:
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When the business was established in the 1970s there were not people with specific knife making skills in the area and they have both recruited people with specialised skills from further afield and retrained local people. MD Sal Glesser feels that for every five people he recruits, only one will have what it takes and stay long-term. He looks for three qualities in his staff; they must be honest, reliable and enthusiastic. He felt that passion was not something that could be created, but it tended to develop over time in individuals who were enthusiastic about their work. Spyderco office and factory:
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Sal's son, Eric took over running the factory unit three years ago and has turned around its profitability by introducing the Toyota way to the blade finishing and knife assembly areas of the factory, redesigning the workstations so one person follows through the whole of the process. This has greatly sped up their production and they felt it had given the company a huge competitive advantage. Assembly:
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A major problem in the States is the huge distances knife parts have to travel if processes have to be outsourced and the time this takes. Particularly at the development stage of a new knife there can be many small changes that need making and shipping pieces across the country and trying to communicate about them on the telephone is very difficult. To overcome this problem they have increasingly invested in specialist machinery; purchasing the laser cutter was a large investment that was quickly recouped through time saved:
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Their current area of development is designing knife parts that are easy and reliable to assemble. “No voodoo” is thier slogan and they would like to minimise the number of subtle tricks that are needed to construct a knife and make it work effectively. For example, when most knives are being assembled the pivot pin has to be tightened, then the blade tested, then the pin slackened until the mechanism works correctly. They have been developing a bush that will go onto the pivot pin so it cannot be over tightened and gives a reliable finish every time.
As part of this “no voodoo” campaign they have been cross-training the staff so they can operate in more than one area. The disadvantage of being a small manufacturer is that they easily become reliant on a few key staff members, so their current aim is to give all staff the opportunity to train in other areas of the production process away from their own specialty. He feels this also adds interest to their jobs and gives them a better feel for the whole of the manufacturing process.
