Knife Talk: Lanyards/Beads

I've always wanted to do a post where I question the point of lanyards and beads on knives. I see people on Instagram constantly go nuts over some bead that goes for like $50. Personally, I think that's ridiculous. I've never understood the trend. There's obviously demand for them, so props to the bead producers out there. They're just taking advantage of the market. This will probably be a short post, since I think beads are dumb and serve no actual purpose (they don't even look cool most of the time). I hope my rant entertains you more than anything. Do not take this seriously at all.

Personally, I don't think beads look cool. They remind me of arts and crafts as a kid. I don't understand the people that pay at least $50 for these beads made from titanium or whatever material is all the rage now. I can get all sorts of beads from any craft store super cheaply. If I sold these beads as fancy carbon fiber composite, people would eat that crap up. I still don't get the obseession with titanium, carbon fiber, etc. What's even crazier is that people have decently sized collections of beads. I could see these types of people at a summer camp sitting in a circle and doing a show-and-tell with all their fancy beads. Anyways, beads look too bulky on knives most of the time. Maybe I'm different because I don't carry my knives in the pocket. I'd never want to have some 2" to 3" lanyard with a bead sticking off of my knife. It's not even like these beads are helping people get their knives out of their pocket. The knives I seee with beads most often are titanium framelocks or other overbuilt folders. You can't tell me you need a bead to pull your 5 pound knife out of your pocket. I personally like my knives to be kept on a low profile and adding beads/lanyards defeat that purpose. Again, beads are unnecessary, and the apparent "cool" factor isn't worth it. Plus they seem like they could get in the way of opening and closing the blade. You'll never see me with lanyards or beads on my knives. If I was forced to, I think lanyards are more useful than beads, because the different weaves can look cool/colorful and give you some extra cordage at the very least.

I also see people say that lanyards are a good way to get some extra grip on a knife. That makes sense in a way, but why wasn't the knife designed with good enough grip in the first place? Lanyards should never be the solution for bad ergos. When handles are too short, people often make a lanyard to "extend" the handle. I think this a cop out. Either the company should have made the handle better, or you're using a knife that is really not that well-suited for you. If I had huge hands, I probably wouldn't own my Ladybug anymore. It makes no sense to have a tiny knife if you simply don't have a similar hand size for them. I use small knives, because they fit my hands the best. I know that is not the case for anyone. If you're using a small knife, sometimes you have to do a two-finger grip or something that's not the most comfortable to you if you want that smaller profile or don't want to scare people.

Lanyards as a decoration piece on a keychain are fine, but they're so pointless otherwise. I mean honestly both beads and lanyards lack a lot of value or utility. Some people think they look cool and aesthetically pleasing, yet I am not one of them. I do think tritium fobs, which are similar to beads in a way, look cool, and at least they glow in the dark. The beads that are strictly an ugly-shaped hunk of titanium are boring. I hope the bead trend dies in 2018. Beads are almost as useless as the spinning tops that were popular a while ago, but at least the tops could spin for crazy amounts of time. That's all the crap I've got to say about beads/lanyards. Obviously, people can do whatever they want with their knives. I just question why people thought beads specifically were a cool enough trend in the first place. Sorry for the lackluster post. There will be a better one next week. Thanks for looking!