Online Knife Sales Ban in the Works

For several years now, here at Greenman Bushcraft, we’ve been making plans for the somewhat inevitable change in the sale and supply of knives and cutting tools. Although until recently nothing official had been announced, we have naturally assumed that the day would come when the supply of knives through the postal system may be banned – and later this year we will find out what the fate of this new legislation will be and how it will affect the Bushcraft community as a whole.

Although nothing is set in stone (yet) the likelihood of the new proposals will include, but not limited to the following changes:

1. Ban the delivery of all bladed items to residential addresses.
2. Online shoppers will have to collect their purchase for knives and cutting tools in person.
3. Those collecting their purchase will have to bring along photo ID, such as a passport.
4. As a direct result of the changes to the law, expect prices to of cutting tools to rise.

Of course, it is already an offence to supply knives to anyone under the age of 18. But sadly, so many (even some of the well-known online suppliers) fail to check the identity of those purchasing knives before supplying them and this has now resulted in the above proposals to change the law. In fact, figures show that almost three-quarters of online knife retailers fail to verify the age and identity of those purchasing knives.

Since day one, Greenman Bushcraft has invested heavily in our age-verification process, spending hundreds of thousands of pounds to ensure that those who purchase bladed goods from us are of legal age to do so. But, sadly, many of our competitors and even some large corporate entities have failed to adhere to responsible online supply of such goods, which has now (as expected) ruined an important aspect of Bushcraft for all – and of course this will also affect many other markets such as field sports and even cooking.

Announcing her intent to tighten the law with the sale of blades tools online, Home Secretary Amber Rudd said:

‘We are going to be consulting on new legislation so that people can’t buy knives online without having their identity checked.

'At the moment you have to do it by the click of a button.

'What we are proposing is that if you want to buy a knife online it has to be collected from a place where you have to show your ID.

Amber Rudd said she wants to stop people buying knives without verifying their ID

‘We have evidence that young people have been able to buy knives without verifying their ID and I want to stop that.’

In the short term, should these changes take place sooner rather than later, we shall be opening up collection points for the collection of your purchases, but of course, this won’t be practical for everyone.

So, with these changes most likely to take affect very soon, should you wish to order knives from us (a responsible company who will verify the age of the purchaser) we encourage you to do so now as from the autumn this may change.

In the meantime, you will likely notice some changes to the line-up of cutting tools that are available online, so we apologise in advance if many cutting tools show as ‘out of stock’.

We have been working on many plans for the past 5 years to help keep our supply of cutting tools as smooth as ever, but we will be reducing the amount of choice available online.

Should you have any questions please feel free to email us (email rather than call so that we can direct your email to the correct team).