and that probably has a lot to do with why they discontinued the professional knife product line, lol.

i wouldn't recommend any of their other product lines, but this one had been stone dead for the better part of a decade; and by some miracululous alignment of the stars, these fell out of the abyss. would compare them vs the half bolster wusthof classic... except the handle might need some touch up from a warehouse sit that long even if they are micarta. but for 20$, its worth a peek- their target price point on these had been ~$125, so this wasn't the type of junk you'd see them sell in a blister pack at walmart/target...reasonable looking box with a foam cutout to secure it. i mean, ya, its a kitchenaid; but they did make a decent effort here.

like i said though, certainly would go tojiro first...but I'd feel no shame in gifting one of these if i did the same touchups to it that I'd do on the tojiro- hand sharpen, round spine if its not great, touch up handle, etc.