As Montana Knife Company’s Founder and Owner, Josh Smith is the Master Bladesmith behind creating and designing working knives for working people that are built to last for generations. Josh grew up in Lincoln, Montana on the edge of the Bob Marshall Wilderness. At the age of 11 Josh’s baseball coach, Rick Dunkerley, began teaching him how to make knives. In the very beginning, Josh would go to Rick’s shop where he learned to remove stock blades under the guidance of Rick. About a year later, Josh began putting a shop together at his home. Josh’s Dad gave him room to work in his equipment shop, and at the age of 12 Josh joined the American Bladesmith Society. Over the next few years Josh began forging and honing his craft. Josh turned 14 at the Eugene Oregon knife show where he met other incredible knife makers, all too willing to share their talents and knowledge with Josh. At 15 years old, Josh passed the Journeyman Bladesmith test in Atlanta, Georgia at the Blade Show. Josh became the youngest bladesmith to ever pass this test. The Journeyman test is a two-part process. A test blade must be forged and heat treated with the capabilities to chop a 1” rope in half, 2- 2x4’s in half and then still shave hair. Once the cutting tests are done the blade must be able to bend 90 degrees in a vise without breaking. After passing the performance test the maker must present 5 knives to a panel of Mastersmith Judges. Each knife is examined closely to ensure the knife is made to the highest standard of craftsmanship. At the Journeyman level a maker is not expected to show perfection but is expected to show a sufficient level of craftsmanship expected from a professional bladesmith. Josh continued to work on his craft and at the age of 19 he earned his Master Smith rating from the American Bladesmith Society. Josh was the youngest bladesmith to ever pass the Master Smith test. https://www.montanaknifecompany.com/ Today's Sponsors: Black Rifle Coffee: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/ BetterHelp: https://www.betterhelp.com/clearedhot
Chapter 1: What is the background of Josh Smith?
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. We're going to go with a slightly different format for this Monday, and I'm curious to hear how it is received. I think it was pretty cool. Two weeks ago, I flew down and I visited Josh Smith and did a podcast with him. He is today's guest.
And if you consume the podcast through a medium that has video, YouTube or Spotify, you'll notice that I have two main sponsors on every thumbnail. One is Montana Knife Company. The other one is Black Rifle Coffee. And today is an awesome day because I get to combine the two. But I flew down there. And we did a little bit of a vlog to show you behind the scenes and then also a podcast.
And then his team did an amazing job and put those two together. So if you're on an audio only format today, you might hear some things or hear us talking about some things you may not be able to, you'll be able to follow, but it might have a little bit less context if you're in a video platform.
And today I would recommend perhaps consuming this via video because you'll get to see the vlog aspect and the podcast aspect. I think it's a really cool blend. And I'm curious to hear what the audience thinks. I definitely would not be able to do this with every guest because of the proximity that I have to Josh, but it's also not a bad idea. So I can play with it a little bit.
Chapter 2: How did Josh Smith start his career in knife making?
So again, I said, Josh Smith is the guest for today, episode 379, founder of Montana Knife Company. If you listen to the podcast, you've heard me do a bunch of ad reads about them. They're just down in Frenchtown, Montana, getting ready to move into Missoula when their building is done. It's a really cool brand and Born and bred here in Montana, roots in Montana, and definitely growing globally.
So that's the episode we're going to get into. Before we get into that, give me a second. Let me talk about the other co-presenting sponsor of the podcast. You guys know who I'm talking about. It's Black Rifle Coffee. Let's pay the bills real fast. This episode is brought to you by Black Rifle Coffee. Let's mosey on over to their website, shall we? What do we have here?
We have a buy one, get one free. Coffee bags and K-cups, very straightforward. We have the roasts they offer, some new releases. They've actually dropped a good amount of new merchandise from soft goods and drinking coffee type of offering. What do we have here? Spring product drop. Gear up for the season with our spring product drop.
A limited run of premium apparel and gear designed for the BRCC lifestyle. Each drop features exclusive designs, high quality materials, and rugged functionality built on those who live boldly. Let's click on this. What's it look like? Okay. Some coffee cups, some stickers. Is this a 50 Cal mounted on top of an old school RV? I support that. Coasters. Oh, I love this mug.
We saw this one in the coffee shop. All right. I like this. So they're doing some seasonal releases. And what I'm talking about with is their energy drink. I just tapped. I just clicked on that tab. This is one of the best sellers in our store week over week. I am not an energy drink guy. This is not my jam, but people are loving this.
Four flavors, Punch, Wild Frost, Ranger Berry, and Project Mango. 200 milligrams of caffeine, and it's not coffee. It's definitely an energy drink. If that's your thing, I highly recommend you check it out. Go to blackriflecoffee.com. Let's get in the show.
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Chapter 3: What challenges did Josh face as a young bladesmith?
Okay, got the red smoke. North and south, west of the smoke, west of the smoke.
Give it to me.
I need it.
Andy's coming to do a podcast down here, and he's flying down from Kalispell. He owns Black Rifle up there. It's pretty badass. So we're going to do that.
Chapter 4: What is the story behind Josh's achievement as a Master Smith?
We just had everybody up at our property for our Tuesday morning meeting. Had the whole team up there. Yeah, he came ripping by.
I think somebody just spilled their coffee. Now he's just showing off, just burning fuel. He's actually going to land this time. That thing holds ass. You can tell. That's a completely different machine than what he throws out there. Yeah. Holy hell. That makes me want to have one of those things. Jason did not. How nice. How nice would that be to commute to work in, though?
Not as cool as a three-wheeler.
Your three-wheeler still beat the helicopter?
I always walk up to helicopters with Hank, and that way if he gets clipped in the head first, I know I need to... It's like, don't touch the skinny shit or anything that's loud.
It's probably not going to be interactive.
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Chapter 5: How did Josh's upbringing influence his career?
Yeah. This thing is cool. There's not a lot of leg room in the back seat. Hank, I don't know if you'd fit in the back seat.
I was on a Zoom call, and it, like, scared me. I don't know if scaring you is a good metric for anything.
All fucking kitchen knives. I figured you guys could sharpen them.
Perfect. You want us to sharpen these? That actually would be interesting. I don't. We could give one to Tristan.
You still don't understand how this works?
I don't just choose to remember the things that are important to me. You have a podcast. Anything Aiden says isn't important to me. You have a podcast, though. You should understand how this works. I know.
How much time do you have, busy CEO of Montana Knife Company?
Like an hour and a half. Should we start with it? I have to go get my real ID. My birthday's coming up in a couple weeks. And apparently that is becoming into effect like in a month. You won't be able to get on a plane. You will if you have a passport. It's true. Who wants to haul a passport domestically?
Not me, but I don't think in Kalispell I could get a Real ID appointment between now and when it goes into effect.
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Chapter 6: What are the impacts of non-Montanans moving to Montana?
It's, um, we have a water shortage in parts of the world. So we're, you know, doing our part. Yeah. I don't know. The earth is 70% water. Nowhere that I go.
Yeah, the earth is 70% water.
I saw, it was a podcast with Tucker and he was interviewing, I don't know if it was some sheik from Jordan or Bahrain or somewhere over there. And they were talking about their water supply being out of the Gulf.
are they doing desalination?
And that's a hundred percent their water supply. They, they were talking about if with the Iran, uh, nuclear stuff, if they had a, like, forget about the Iran, like Iran having a nuclear bomb, just power plants or whatever. If they had a nuclear accident and they had that shit get into the Gulf, into the water.
And poison that water that every single one of those countries around there all use desalination and they would all be out of water in three days. Have you traveled much over there? Only to UAE.
Did you spend a lot of time or just kind of pass through? Like 10 days. It's an interesting spot in the world. I understand from maybe an entrepreneur or a business methodology why you would want to go there. I could not do it.
Could not do just like traveling.
I could not live in the Middle East. Oh no. I would fucking melt. Yeah. I don't do well.
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Chapter 7: How do housing prices affect the local community?
I nuked my entire gold supply on a knife for just a stateside customer. Yeah. Yeah. About a 12, $13,000 mistake or maybe more. Current prices. Today's prices would have been probably 25 grand. Yeah. But no, I went over there and, you know, was uncertain about security and whatever else. And we were there and I never felt so secure in a large city in my life.
I mean, walked around, went to restaurants and did whatever. And it was freaking amazing.
Have you ever been to Singapore?
No.
One of the cleanest countries, probably on planet earth.
Really?
Risk from a crime perspective is, Almost nothing. I traveled over there a bunch, not recently actually, but I did a stint. I was working with a guy I met through fundraising. Actually, he worked at Barclays and I was kind of on the circuit speaking with them, but I would hit Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia once, but was over there a half a dozen times. one of the coolest places I've ever been.
Zero risk whatsoever. Like spit your gum out on the sidewalk and you're going to end up talking with the cops type. Nobody's messing around.
It's kind of funny if you actually uphold your laws and are serious about it, how people will actually obey them. What do you mean? Well, like in our country where we tend to let people just walk in and steal something, unless it's less than a thousand bucks, it's not a big deal.
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Chapter 8: What initiatives is Josh involved in for community support?
And I'm thinking that's not a bad way to solve that problem.
Yeah.
Yeah. So they put it over whatever the amount was.
Yeah.
Non-criminal discount applied at checkout. Interesting. Which I think though probably drives your staff nuts because how many people are going to come up to you and say, what's the actual cost of this? What's the actual cost of this? And it was a souvenir store. Yeah. So maybe five bucks was the actual answer.
Yeah. When I was down there, uh, last year, I just walked down on the pier. I was waiting, went down to do Mike Rose podcast and I was just kind of killing some time.
How did you get linked up with him by the way?
Um, cause he seems awesome.
I've loved that show.
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