Have any of you KOA repeat customers emailed to ask about the increase,
more the already in stock older stuff thats gone up,?
i'd think they'd be the first to go in any future sale,
i havent dealt with KOA myself,but have read some great feedback from fellow forumites on here about them,
the prices you guys are mentioning are in and around what we pay in pounds for them over here,
three years ago i looked at a DT rapier at a fair,£425ish
custom quote over here was a good £50-100 cheaper, a far longer wait but,,,,,,
hope all you people stateside get some good deals when the sales appear.which, with the quality of the competition mentioned looks very likely.

I'm going to go ahead and throw my lot in with the "Del Tin is raising his prices" theory as I noticed that Viking-shield.com, which also had fairly good prices on their Del Tin viking swords, has also raised their prices to about the level of KOA.

What about the cost for casting hilts? They are lost wax castings (designed by a brescian artisan of fame) and I found that bronze castings has gone up quite a bit recently. It might be the same for steel castings. If you add shipping charges and other crisis related factors there could be an easy explanation. I recently made an inquiry to send a military cap to a US friend, just a few hundred grams of cap would cost him 48 euros in sending charges. If you consider that a sword is very long, so probably going out of normal length parameters by italian postal services, you might have a complete answer.

It's the cost of energy. It's going up and up and up...

I wonder how many kw go into that sheet of steel you mentioned, from ripping it from the earth, to refining it, to rolling it out and shipping it to your house.

M.

the USD has dropped 20% in value from what it was a few years ago so this might also be a factor

Ryan from KultOfAthena.com here. As there has been a lot of speculation about out recent price increase on the Del Tin swords, I thought I would clear it up once and for all. Oddly, with all these theories, not one person bothered to ask us what prompted the increase.
So here is what happened. We started stocking Del Tin swords with the intent to try and off set the poor Dollar to Euro exchange by offering lower prices for our customers. We were under no pricing agreement with Del Tin, so we set our prices as we saw fit. Soon after some European customers started complaining to Del Tin that it was cheaper for them to order from us in the US than directly from Del Tin in Italy. Though this happens many times when comparing dealer prices with manufacturer's retail, Del Tin felt that this made them look bad. As a result we were asked to raise our advertised prices to the equivalent of their retail price after the currency conversion. All other Del Tin dealers were asked to do the same. I respect Fulvio Del Tin and appreciate him allowing us to sell his products. We complied with his request. Currently our prices will work out to the same as ordering directly from Del Tin once you consider the exchange rate, however with reduced shipping costs for our US and Canadian customers. Also as we do stock many Del Tin products, those item can ship immediately as opposed to the normal 2-3 month lead time. I see a lot of people stating that they were "just about to order" or "would have ordered before, but not now". Should this actually be the case, feel free to email me from the website, and we'll see if we can work out a deal for you.
In the future I would encourage anyone who has a question about KOA to contact us directly rather than speculate. I will personally be happy to help you. The time involved in running this business leaves me very little time to frequent these boards, so please direct your concerns to our email address listed on our website.
Thanks
Ryan Whittlinger
KultOfAthena.com

Thanks Ryan, and best in business for you I might add.

Don't get me wrong, I never was blasting the KOA guys, it was just an unfavorable increase to the humble collector.

What seems to have been a wild swing in the cost of Del tins was the original prices. That was fairly evident. In looking at the new and broadly painted price structure, there really hasn't been that much of an increase over the years. The msrp for Del Tin had gone through this in the past as well. One may have seen a slight difference between Imperial and Valentine vs the pricing at Albion and Elwell. It was then and has been for years maybe a $10-$20 difference at the most. Both Imperial and Valentine offered the line up until '99 or so. Christian Fletcher as well. When those sales were discontinued, the demand did affect the wait times for direct orders. Retails usually get batchs more quickly than service to individual orders. Randall Knives would be another example of that. Dealers and forward looking business usually gets the priorities.

Consider a 5157 that I adopted from someone in 2003. The previous owner had ordered direct from Italy back when waits were more like eight months to a year instead of what has been a pretty quick turn around this half of the decade. That 5157 direct with shipping and tax came out to something like $400. So, at that rate of increase over six years really hasn't been that great when compared to other solid shops like the American 3 A. Even Windlass has gone up in the past few months. What had been a rock steady price for the Patton (just an example) the sword sold at $129 for several years. Last year I saw they had bumped that sword up to $149 retail and are now msrp $169. Look to the Hanwei katana as another example of price hikes over the years.


What? No one has grabbed that second hand claymore?

Cheers

GC

I ordered an Albion from KOA last year, in doing so spent about 3 hours one night on the phone with the owner, his profit margin is very small.

I often check the New Items area at KOA, and I've noticed that since this affair over the Del Tin price increase last June, not a single new model from that company has been added to the website. There are still many Del Tin's in stock, but no new model additions. Before June, a few new Del Tins would show up every week or so.

I imagine they won't be adding any more to their inventory until they sell what they have. Sadly, at those prices in this economy, alot of those remaining Del Tins are going to end up collecting dust.