Does anyone know what's going on with Kataba and UK Hitohira distribution?

[OkayMode]

Despite the widely mocked mark ups, Kataba in London used to be the only distributor of Hitohira knives in the UK.

Post-Brexit, Kataba had a captive audience comprising those of us not willing to stomach the painful customs and import duties for overseas purchases from other distributors, whilst some overseas retailers paused shipping to the UK entirely.

Despite this, Kataba haven't had any 'exciting' drops from Hitoriha for well over a year, and no one I have spoken to seems to know why.

I was on the Hitohira website today and noticed that they appear to have been removed from the list of official retailers. I don't want to speculate, but it seems fairly clear that the partnership is over.

Does anyone know more about this, and whether any other UK stores will become an official Hitohira retailer in the future?

 

[kemp2906]

Please lord let someone else take over.

I'm sure they're great people but a dark and moody product shot doesn't justify prices 300% above the rest.

 

[OkayMode]

Please lord let someone else take over.

I'm sure they're great people but a dark and moody product shot doesn't justify prices 300% above the rest.

I will take simply having some nice Hitohira knives in stock at this point to be honest!

 

[kemp2906]

I will take simply having some nice Hitohira knives in stock at this point to be honest!

Yeah they do seem to be in short supply, ProTooling could be an option now with the scrapping of duty + vat between us and AUS?

 

[OkayMode]

Yeah they do seem to be in short supply, ProTooling could be an option now with the scrapping of duty + vat between us and AUS?

I think you’re bang on there.

Picked up a 240 kasumi Tetsujin with one of the nice taihei handles for £300 during their 17% sale, free shipping too

Before that I also used JNS and HomeButcher as good options that didn’t tend to land you with duties and taxes.

 

[kemp2906]

I think you’re bang on there.

Picked up a 240 kasumi Tetsujin with one of the nice taihei handles for £300 during their 17% sale, free shipping too

Before that I also used JNS and HomeButcher as good options that didn’t tend to land you with duties and taxes.

Oooooooft that's tasty.

Good to know about JNS & Homebutcher, its so hard to know whether you're gonna get lucky or not!

Fingers crossed for a UK Hitohira supplier soon.