A couple of years ago, I was impressed by the number of different Stanley utility knives the local home center store carried. There were a couple of choices – something for everyone. I found exactly what I wanted, bought it, and went home.
Since then, selection has increased by quite a bit. There are now folding utility knives, ergonomically-angled retractable utility knives, retractable folding utility knives, assisted-opening utility knives, safety knives with spring-return blades, and auto-loading utility knives. And, you can still buy a basic utility knife that has to be unscrewed and taken apart for blade changes.
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Stanley Black & Decker relaunched the Craftsman brand in 2018, introducing new hand tools, power tools, and tool storage products. Now, new Craftsman cordless outdoor power tools are coming to Amazon.
I don’t remember what led me to conduct this search, but I came across a list of Craftsman utility knives. There are… a couple.
If my count is correct, that’s 8 distinct fixed-handle Craftsman utility knives, 5 folding utility knives, 1 quick-slide knife that’s as compact as the folding knives, and 3 snap-blade knives.
I should point out that I created this image from all the separate Craftsman utility knife product pages I could find. Meaning, there could be more than I missed! Also, they are not to scale.
Plus, there are also two pocket knife-style folding knives.
That makes a total of 17 utility knives and 2 more general purpose pocket knives. This doesn’t include 2- and 3-count utility knife bundle packs, of course, and there are a few of those. One of these knives appears to have different SKUs depending on how many blades it’s sold with (one or ten), so I only included it once.
The downside is that some of the designs might be hard to differentiate from each other, but you can probably tell most of the knives apart just by looking at them. The benefit is that there’s probably something for everyone.
I’ve lost track of how many different Dewalt utility knives there are, but that’s not a bad thing. Variety is good, as are design improvements.
Obviously, all (or at least most) of these new Craftsman utility knives are based on current Stanley Black & Decker utility knife designs. Still, that’s a lot of variety.
One of these days, it’ll be quite the challenge to see how many different Stanley Black & Decker utility knives exist across their Stanley, FatMax, Dewalt, Craftsman, Bostitch, Irwin, and Lenox hand tool brands. They also make utility knives beyond these brands, such as for Facom, which is more popular in Europe.
Are there any other utility knife designs or styles you think Craftsman should add to their lineup?