Your Trademark For Quality Goods Made In The USA

May 9th, 2008

Our beloved trademark, which I designed for my company, and for what is truly great about America, the people who toil and dwell here, is known throughout the USA and in forty eight other countries. It is a symbol of pride and quality. There are two things that confront us before an item is packaged for delivery. Our trademark, and a sign in the shop that reads "This Thing Will Belong To Someone".

In 1994 I started this company on foot in NYC. I left in the morning with $20.00, enough for round trip rail, subway fare, and a couple of dirty water hot dogs. I carried my wares, sharpened chefs knives and then honed them on leather to show what a superior edge could be attained. I didn't come home until the case was empty.

In 1996 our line was picked up by a company called PCD and soon thousands of our leather hones were in use by Pro & casual chefs nationwide. In 1997 handamerican was the first company to introduce bona fide honing leather on the internet. We've been responsible for many firsts and have been featured in some well know publications including Blade Magazine, Playboy, Classic Style, and Tactical Knives.

We've had the great pleasure of working with many fine individuals and some well known entities such as Tiffany & Company in NYC, the Library of Congress, and The Virginia Historical Society. Companies such as Woodcraft and Pro Tool manufacturing rely on us to supply them with hand selected leather and related products for their customers, and we've helped many folks along the way get started with strop and hone making.

For those of you who are not familiar with the economic climate for business in New Jersey I can sum it up by saying it is quite painful. Over the last year we've lost some key people. While in the past replacing them would be the likely step, we've decided that our objective is to re locate. Once we made that decision we felt it was not prudent to spend time and money hiring & training people from the area.

The occasional poor service and communication as of late is due to attempting to satisfy a growing number of customers with less people. Please bear in mind that 95% of our orders go out within 48 hours, remarkably good for custom made products.

Our objective is to do much better. One answer is to limit our product line. Another is to reduce individual customer contact and rely on distributors for getting key products out to the public. For months we have sought distributors who share our feelings with regard to quality. We hope to have our network complete by mid June.

Within the next week or so we will announce the name of our primary distributor for our Old Dog Strops. Some of you know that I come from a long line of leather workers, and that I have a great deal of knowledge and experience in leather tanning and processing, having actually done both since I was very young. My Old Dog strops are not only effective tools for keeping a straight razor sharp, but artistic expressions as well. They belong in the appropriate hands.

Currently some of our products are available through D & R Sharpening Solutions. Honing leather can be found online at the Woodcraft site, and custom made full grooved steel rods for making oboe reeds can be found at ROM Double Reeds.