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Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

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DroppedTensionWrench

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Post Fri Jan 15, 2016 7:08 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

Great pictures. My last order my .025 gem and deforrest half diamond had the same problem as your half diamond.
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rerun12

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Post Sat Jan 16, 2016 1:55 am

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

Let us not forget the new competition Ken has to deal with in this day an age. Sparrows has made a strong entry and they keep pumping out cool niche stuff to keep their customers loyal. I'm sure Ken can see the race isn't as profitable when you consider time and other factors. It's just too bad he allows for that crap to be shipped, kinda unlike him, from what I know of him anyway. Maybe the market mistreated him and he doesn't g.a.f. anymore? Or did he marry a crazy b..lady? Really strange considering the quality he's given us for so long.

edit: I got a flawed postal years back and he sent me a new one within days along with extras. does that not happen anymore?
Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder, 'Why, why, why?' Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land; Man got to tell himself he understand.
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aeporia

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Post Sat Jan 16, 2016 8:46 am

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

Been following this thread with a wee bit of bemusement, noting both sides of the general take on this topic. As I think I’ve noted I only have a very small number of Peterson picks, and I’m glad they’ve held up for me so far — and that’s with near daily use (they’re the most common picks I use).

My only other contribution at this point — and I guess it comes in part as being a web developer — is my frustrations with the website (that said, most other websites within the locksmithing industry seem to be similarly piss-poor, so it would seem unfair to pile-on here given the general state of affairs).

I’d be interested in hearing what the haps is on QC — there was some talk of some members near the Peterson HQ in arranging to visit?
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LocksportSouth

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Post Sat Jan 16, 2016 10:50 am

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

I've tried to hold off on replying to this thread for a while, I did write a very long response the other day but decided to delete it as I don't want to start a flame war.
Suffice to say, my belief is that as a consumer, all that matters is the final product quality and the service provided. Anything happening behind the scenes and in Ken's personal life is a shame, but savvy consumers should not be prepared to purchase inferior products or accept inferior service just to support a company or creator that once created the things that you love. Blind faith is bad for the wallet and it's with our wallets that we can influence a company and drive their products and service to the level that we expect of them - in short "vote with your wallet" or "vote with your feet" as they used to say in the olden days of going into shops :D.

That said, I'm commenting now as I have two things to add.
Firstly - as DTW mentioned, I'd be happy to pay an extra premium for the continuation of high quality tools and service, if the cost of materials and/or competition has now risen to the level where Ken cannot due this competitively for the same prices any more. Hell, we're all already paying a premium price for Peterson picks.

Secondly, I too look forward to hearing back from Doogs regarding his communications with Ken. I absolutely agree that he should be given a chance to communicate with us, the community and explain why things are how they are. A little communication goes a long way and the majority of Kickstarter campaigns that fail, for example, is due to a lack of communication and answers to questions.

For the record, I don't have any strong involvement or sway with Peterson or otherwise - I don't know Ken personally and have no stock in the company other than owning a fair number of his picks, which I haven't had chance to review properly yet and thus don't hold a strong opinion of. I also harbour no ill will to him or anybody else here, so my thoughts and opinions are mostly neutral here. I just think people should get the products and service that they paid for, at a level that is to be expected for the price paid :).
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aeporia

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Post Sat Jan 16, 2016 10:19 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

Did have another thought over the last 1/2 day: we may not be the target market for this gear — the locksmiths I know locally will happily snap and kill 10 picks if it means busting open a lockout quicker (e.g. bending picks for use as a bypass hook post-drill into a mortise). I’ve asked them before on this and they say they just refill their pouch back at base, no questions asked from higher ups in case they sacrifice a bunch of picks on the job.
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LocksportSouth

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Post Sun Jan 17, 2016 8:02 am

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

That's very sad, IMO. No respect for the tools. If they're a large market for Peterson (and why wouldn't they be - lots of locksmiths, and if they're going through a bunch of these on every job....) there's reason to think he might make them more 'disposable'. But I don't want to speculate too much; still, that would be very sad if true. I wonder if there are even any other (commercial) artisan / high quality pick makers out there, outside of the very respectable stuff (IMO) that you can get from Sparrows and Southord Max.

Surely that has to hurt the bottom line of even the most successful locksmiths, though? They aren't cheap picks to be burning through several in one job...
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jtrade

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Post Sun Jan 17, 2016 10:38 am

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

I am just getting into the lock sport and have purchased picks from Sparrow, Peterson & Southord got them all last week.

Of the 3 brands out of the box the Southord's look the best finish wise. However I have yet to used them yet, waiting on some practice locks to show up & also researching final finishing of picks...

J
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aeporia

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Post Sun Jan 17, 2016 11:52 am

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

LocksportSouth wrote:That's very sad, IMO. No respect for the tools. If they're a large market for Peterson (and why wouldn't they be - lots of locksmiths, and if they're going through a bunch of these on every job....) there's reason to think he might make them more 'disposable'. But I don't want to speculate too much; still, that would be very sad if true. I wonder if there are even any other (commercial) artisan / high quality pick makers out there, outside of the very respectable stuff (IMO) that you can get from Sparrows and Southord Max.

Surely that has to hurt the bottom line of even the most successful locksmiths, though? They aren't cheap picks to be burning through several in one job...


The locksmiths here I consulted were using HPC gear. I suspect they have a bulk order gig going — these guys aren’t logging online to buy a set and a pouch — they’re grabbing 500 of each pick type per order minimum.

If the respect comment was re. bending pick after pick to bypass a lockout: hey, if at the end you get in, it’s generally worth it, from what I understand of the economics of the locksmithing industry. With respect to this one job in particular: he didn’t have anything else on him at the time to hook deep enough through the face-plate drill hole into the mortise, so picks it was (funnily enough, he killed one of my homemade bicycle-spoke tensioners to finally succeed at the bypass).
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Papa Gleb

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Post Tue Jan 19, 2016 12:37 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

This thread was made to inform of the decline in QC in my personal experience. I wanted the new picks or new customers to Peterson to know about the quality. If an informed purchase is made, the customers’ expectations are at the right place and chances are they will return however if an un-informed purchase is made with high expectations due to everyone’s high recommendations, that person will be very disappointed and most likely never come back to Peterson ever again. This logic was in mind when I made this thread so technically this is to help Peterson in the bigger picture.

I’m not a business owner but I think it would be wise to informed your clients of product issues and your plans to fix such issues, especially for smaller companies. I would rather have my clients be informed and take a chance of them respecting my honesty then stay silent like nothing is happening hoping no one will notice. I don’t think his business would be effected at all if he emailed stating "in an effort to continue to bring you the tools you love, we were forced to cut some corners but fear not we are still using the same exact steel we have always used". A simply email would have set my expectation and I would have been prepared instead of happily opening my order all excited about the brand new picks and finding the handle is molded uneven to the pick, the finish on the metal is uneven, the metal is uneven, the handle is sunk in at some spots, the tip of the pick has extra metal making a standard hook something like a tiny diamond.

In support of my point there couldn’t be a better example which is the discount sales Peterson has 3x a year. He clearly informs that these products may have minor defects and were made by mistake etc and guess what, no one complains or has any issues with. Those items get sold out within days if not hours. Its basically a full page of mistakes, either the picks were molder wrong color, or the thickness was wrong or something else went wrong. This is a pretty bad look for any company except it work for Peterson because it’s a small company and the community is small so there is that relationship and people do understand, when informed that is!

Honestly, troubles in life or in company dont mean shit. No one cares and I did not need to learn about their QC issues at my expense! On a human level it sucks to hear someone is having troubles but from a consumer level I dont care about his problem, especially when my money is involved. I have plenty of my own problems. Ken can increase the prices of the picks if he is having money problems in the business, heck SouthOrd max picks are $11 each (I believe) and people are buying.

Lauren, Ken would be more open and willing towards you, since you are friend or whatever, than to a stranger coming through his door saying his QC sucks. You decided to take the defense of Ken and Peterson because of all the “smack” what was said, yet you have said nothing in support or in defense. You are simply making excuses for Ken based on your relationship with him and/or Peterson. From what I gather, you are telling us to be understanding of Ken’s problems yet you fail to provide any information as to why we need to understand or even care. And don’t hint or suggest anything for me to do or where to go.
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Papa Gleb

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Post Tue Jan 19, 2016 12:52 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

Those pics of those 2 pick are horrific BUT Peterson will gladly replace them. Im not sure from where it was understood that the Customer service is slacking. I think I wrote several times that they fixed all the issues I had with no questions asked, no return needed and free shipping. The customer service aspect of the business is on point but the product are not.

As for Locksmiths, my understanding is that they order picks from the same cataloges as they order all their other parts and items like locks, door handles, hinges, etc etc and those cataloges dont have Peterson. They have HPC and SouthOrd, at least from the ones I have seen and order from. Not to mention 80% of locksmiths dont pick lock as its not favorable for the business so it only makes sense if they dont care about their picks. Plus HPC or SouthOrd picks cost them $1.50-$2 per pick (cheaper line and dealer discount) so again its only natural not to care. Im sure things would be very different if they used Peterson or SouthOrd max, a few picks quickly adds up toe $30-50 and the job is $75 so you are going to come back to your boss with $25 and a handful of broken picks and he wont mind? No way.

Im sure Peterson feels the battle for the market vs Sparrows but lets keep in mind 2 things. 1. Canada has different costs and rules for a business and 2. Peterson has Bill who is the #1 commercial of their products and its for FREE (at least I think). On the other hand, Sparrows is taking their business very seriously with new products but I dont want to give them sooo much credit because my first set of picks was Sparrows beginning 2 sets and they ALL arrive bent 3-5 degrees. When I contacted them, their response was "Yea we know, the spool with the steel was messed up". So they knew it was messed up and still stamped the picks out of it so this can also question their QC.
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HT4

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Post Tue Jan 19, 2016 2:31 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

I haven’t checked on this thread since it was first posted. Damn.

Frankly, I'm baffled by the controversy. People are providing accurate information and experience-based opinions that are relevant and helpful to members here – they are not “slandering” or “talking smack.” Further, from what I see in this thread, the information provided is already known to many Peterson customers. In fact, I recently had some issues with Peterson quality control myself (that were promptly remedied when I called). It may be that there are good reasons for these problems, but they really are not relevant to a customer who ordered some of the most expensive picks made, expecting to receive the best product. It’s inexcusable that PG and others are getting attacked for speaking the truth. I don’t know Ken or his issues. But if I did, I could think of lots of ways this could be handled that would be productive, and would not involve attacks on other members. Example:

I’m a friend of Ken’s, and am familiar with the situation. You probably do not know this, but he’s had some really difficult issues in his life recently, and running his business is getting increasingly difficult/expensive. Simply put, he’s having difficulties running his business at a profit, while maintaining the superior quality that the Peterson name has come to represent. So my question to the picking community is this: would you rather (i) keep current prices, knowing the effect that it has on quality, or (ii) raise prices, and use the money to ensure that Peterson continues to be the standard against which all other picks are judged? I know that customer feedback is important to Ken, and I will be happy to relay your thoughts and comments.

All of the said, I still buy Peterson products in spite of the issues because I really like the handles, and the metal is very good.
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Doogs

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Post Tue Jan 19, 2016 6:17 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

Crap I totally forgot to make that phone call. I'll try to remember to do it tomorrow. Memory like a sieve I tell ya.
The other, other, other, other Mike

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tpark

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Post Wed Jan 20, 2016 10:09 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

I sent a message to my vendor, and they forwarded to me Peterson's service email. I forwarded the message I sent to the vendor (detailing the defective items) and the next day (I had sent the message late in the day) Peterson shipped new picks to me. I haven't received them yet, but that shows a real willingness to make things right. That's the important thing - it's not always possible for things to be perfect, but if issues are dealt with in a professional manner, that makes all the difference.
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tpark

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Post Mon Feb 01, 2016 1:05 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

The replacement picks arrived, and they are good - even though there was a defect with some of the picks I received, they addressed the problem in a timely manner. That is good customer service ! I should also note that the last shipment of Peterson tools that I received was free from defects, so perhaps there was a production issue that has been addressed.
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jeffmoss26

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Post Mon Feb 01, 2016 7:55 pm

Re: Peterson's Significant Down Grade (?)

my last order, about 2 weeks ago was also pretty good. I got 4 picks for Luke's locks and one for myself. No complaints here!
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