Michigan Knifemaker Closes Store After Admitting to Utilizing Chinese language Metal and Labeling It USA-Made

Bark River Knives, a well known knifemaker primarily based in Escanaba, Michigan, has shuttered its enterprise within the wake of revelations relating to the metal utilized in a few of its blades. The fixed-blade knife producer has now admitted to utilizing Chinese language metal in a number of of its fashions, despite the fact that the knives had been labeled and marketed as CPM 154 metal and made within the USA.

Bark River’s proprietor Mike Stewart made the announcement by way of Fb on Monday and mentioned the corporate had concluded all enterprise as of Friday. Stewart additionally took full accountability, saying “it was 100%” his fault and that he had made the cost-cutting choice to maintain Bark River in enterprise. 

Stewart made the put up amid fierce backlash from knife patrons, sellers, YouTubers, and different critics. Stewart didn’t reply instantly to a request for remark from Outside Life, and it’s unclear what precisely led him determined to admit, although rumors had been spreading on-line in current days. It’s clear, nonetheless, that the LLC behind Bark River has been in authorized and monetary bother since earlier than the beginning of this 12 months.

On Jan. 14, Altbanq, a monetary lender primarily based in New York, filed a industrial and trade-contract lawsuit towards Stewart Knives LLC accusing the corporate of defaulting on mortgage funds and breaching their settlement. A separate however comparable lawsuit was filed towards the LLC on Friday by one other monetary lender, Litefund Options, and it accuses the corporate of further breaches of contract.

This was across the similar time that a number of the rumors round Bark River’s misleading practices began showing in knife-making and bushcraft boards. However some business insiders have beforehand famous quality-control points with Bark River Knives. And a whistleblower report printed again in 2006 by an alleged former worker of Bark River accuses the producer of operating an identical false-advertising scheme with Japanese blades fabricated from inferior metal.

Stewart additionally admitted in his Fb put up on Monday that his choice to make use of Chinese language metal was a part of ongoing mismanagement on his half. He wrote, amongst different issues, that “this closing was lengthy overdue” and he ought to have finished it greater than two years in the past. Stewart is now prone to face authorized repercussions for these misleading practices, together with further class-action lawsuits from patrons and knife sellers.  

“Please don’t Blame Lesley Stewart or Jim Stewart for any of this,” Stewart wrote in Monday’s put up. “Along with my mismanagement the Selection to make use of an Various Chinese language Metal was my selection — not anybody else’s blunder.”

He mentioned the imported various “had the identical toughness” and “virtually the identical edge retention” of CPM 154, which is a premium stainless knife metal manufactured within the U.S. by Crucible Industries. Stewart additionally claimed within the put up that because the knife blanks had been reground, reshaped, processed, etched, and inspected of their store in Michigan, “they meet the standards of Made in the usA.”

In accordance with the Federal Commerce Fee, a product can solely be labeled “Made within the USA” if “the ultimate meeting or processing of the product happens in the US … and all or just about all elements or elements of the product are made and sourced in the US.”   

By labeling the blades as American-made, Bark River was capable of cost a premium for the knives. In his put up, Stewart included a listing of the affected fashions:

• Camp Bolo
• Fox River Skinner
• Highwayman 4
• Mini-Manitou
• Gladstone Hunter
• Bitterroot Caper
• The final two Membership Knives

“Let me be clear that None of our Sellers knew about any of this and are 100% Innocent for this case,” Stewart wrote. “Let me additionally clearly state that every one different Bark River Knives have been made with the Metal that’s marked on the blade — This use of import metal was just for a really brief interval of Time to maintain our Workers working.”

As for a way lengthy this “very brief time frame” was, it seems that many of the above fashions — together with the Camp Bolo, Mini Manitou, Gladstone Hunter, and Bitterroot Caper — had been a part of the model’s 2025/2026 lineup, primarily based on previous launch posts on the Bark River Knives Fb profile, in addition to info from retailer websites.

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It’s unclear how (or if) patrons of Bark River’s Chinese language blades will obtain any recourse. In accordance with Outside Analyst, a YouTube channel specializing in knives and different outside gear, at the least two on-line knife sellers — Knives Ship Free and DLT — will care for their prospects by issuing refunds for the knives listed above. 

Editor’s Observe: Outside Life has not featured any Bark River knives in previous gear critiques or purchaser’s guides. Nonetheless, the Michigan-based firm was listed as an “honorable point out” of knives our crew had not but examined in an OL article highlighting one of the best knives made within the USA.