Comments on the CNN article

[Grant Lamontagne]

This was posted in the Leatherman Forum earlier, but since this is a discussion of a media article rather than the tool itself, I figured this was what this forum was for.  One thing for certain, Tim Leatherman has a good head on his shoulders, that's for sure!

TIM'S TOOLS FOR SUCCESS

Let catalogs and stores be your design consultants - they know what sells.

When setting product deadlines, allot extra time for ideas to evolve.

Don't allow potential customers to ignore you - bombard them with calls and letters.

This is culled from that CNN article, which can be seen here if you haven't read it already:

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fsb/fsb_archive/2007/07/01/100123045/index.htm?postversion=2007072506

Personally I don't know how much I agree with the concept of "outdoing the Swiss Army Knife" since SAK sales are still well beyond almost everything but McDonald's hamburgers, and they've got a good hundred years' head start on Leatherman, but the article is pretty darned good overall.  And, given the obstacles that Leatherman overcame with persistence and good old fashioned gumption, well that's worth a thumbs up or two!   

Overall, there really wasn't a lot of news in this article to the average Multitool.org member, but there are a few points that really stuck out in my mind.  Of course the "Tools for Success" at the top of this post, but there were others as well.

First off, I always found it amusing that companies like Gerber shot them down- kind of like the guy who sold Elvis' contract for $5 (or however the story goes) I think that was one of the things that really hits home.  Nowadays Gerber is at best, a number two, situated well behind Leatherman.  Imagine if they'd had the foresight to see what was being offered to them and purchased the patent rights for a mere $1 million!  Tim Leatherman would have been happy because he got what he wanted in the beginning, and Gerber would be cranking out PST's by the hundreds of thousands in their shops in Beijing and selling them for a fraction of what LM's go for now.  I can't help but think about how much farther along the development of the plier based folding tool would be right now if it weren't for the initial building phase, the early trial and error, and if they sold for half the price that the US models do.  As Kelly Bundy put it, "the mind wobbles."

Gadgets don't sell.

Maybe in 1983, but nowadays the gadgets have taken over!  People are getting more and more gadget oriented these days.  Folks who aren't gadget freaks are into gadgets nowadays because as a society, we have become somewhat dependent on them.  Following the age old writer's trick of looking up a word, defining it and talking about how it's relevant to what you are writing, I looked up "gadget" in Merriam Webster's Online Dictionary and got this definition:

an often small mechanical or electronic device with a practical use but often thought of as a novelty

Well, a multitool is indeed a practical thing, and given how so many people manage to get through life without it, I suppose it could be a novelty rather than a necessity at least as far as daily life goes.  For traveling (road trips etc), camping, hiking, and even simpler things like yardwork I personally think they are a necessity, but then I also think that for the most part they are useful enough that I wouldn't consider them a novelty at the best of times.  How many times in the course of a day does someone ask you if you have a knife, or you save them from trying to tighten a screw with their keys?  I guess it's a necessity for each group of people, even if it's not a necessity for each individual.  Someone in the group will be able to come to everyone's rescue.

This part I had a little trouble with:

I was carrying a Boy Scout-type knife and used it for everything, from slicing bread to making adjustments to the car. But I kept wishing I had a pair of pliers! During the trip - it lasted almost nine months - I had a piece of paper in my pocket where I listed ideas for new products, things I might work on back in the U.S.

Nine months on the road with a car that kept breaking down.  I think I would have picked up a few dedicated tools in the next town we made it to, rather than continued complaining about the limited abilities of the Boy Scout Type Knife.  Admittedly, that's probably what he did, and even though it was a "budget trip" they probably could have picked up a few screwdrivers, socket wrench and sockets, pliers, wire cutters and hammer for only a few dollars.  Significantly cheaper than a tow anyways.  Fiats might be small, but they aren't that small that you couldn't toss in a few hand tools, especially if you knew you were going to need them!

Then there's this part:

If you envision a spectrum of knives and tools, Swiss Army knives sit on one side, and hand tools such as files and pliers sit on the other. Ours fit in the middle

It's kind of funny because with Leatherman now using actual "knife steels" with one handed opening designs, liner locks, carbon fiber, titanium etc, I would think they are closer to the knife industry than SAKs are!  Especially when you consider the various generations of Leatherman Tool Development since the very beginning in the 70's when he first envisioned the concept, versus the very few, very minor changes of SAK design between then and now. 

Back to my initial nit-picking about the article title, which I'm certain was penned by the ambitious writer and not Mr Leatherman himself, one should do their homework before sensationalizing:

By 1993 we were selling more than one million units a year.

Victorinox alone turns out 1 million units every ten days.  Silly writer loses a few marks for that one!

Anyone else have any thoughts on this article?  I thought it was a great read myself.

Def

[NeitherExtreme]

I thought it was a pretty good article, obviously not in-depth enogh for those for whom multis and knives are hobbies. But still it was probably good enough to peak a few peoples interest who haddn't given them a second thougt before.
In regards to the title of the article, I also think it was a little over-zealous. But if you look at it as improving on SAKs rather than outselling them, then I think you could have that opinion, although there might be one or two out there who would debate that. (Jesting of course  , who is better than who is always a question of personal opinion)

[Mike, Lord of the Spammers!]

good bit of leatherman properganda to the uninformed you,d think they were out selling/producing victorinox

[J-sews]

I always have to chuckle about the way Timothy likes to encourage the notion that he invented the first multitool. 

[Grant Lamontagne]

Well, when you consider that there had been no entries into the market for about 25 years when he released the PST, the multitool market was indeed pretty well nonexistant.

And even before that, if seems as if there were such limited offerings, I really don;t know if there could have been such a thing as a "multitool market" before him.

What I always wonder is if he actually came across an old multitool in his travels across Europe which is what gave him the idea?  That would explain why he never simply picked up a few hand tools to do the jobs he needed done.

Def