In the last year I went thru 4 can openers and they were all junk made in China. Every time they lasted just long enough for my brain to forget when I bought it and after they stop working I go to Walmart like another sheep to slaughter and remember not to buy the one I just had but by the next piece of junk they sell. The final straw came Friday when I came home from work and opened the fridge and there was a can of tuna ¼ opened that looked like it was opened with a pair of vice grips a screwdriver and a sledge hammer and then the contents were fished out with an ice pick. I asked what happened and was told the can opener broke on the first can it tried to open. I took a look at it and it totally self-destructed broken plastic and bent and loose bits of metal.
My goal this weekend was to find a good American made can opener if it killed me even if I had to buy a 50 pound restaurant bench model. I went to a nearby town that had a cooking store and caters to homeowners but also their main business is restaurants and schools and such. Sure enough they had the big bench models, but they also had a big selection of hand operated openers. Many of these looked fairly good but still had a high plastic content and when I would flip the package over it said made in China or made in some similar place that was not USA. Then my eyes caught some packaging that was not at all slick it was actually kind of gaudy and looked like it was designed in 1950 and made from heavy cardboard not the blister formed plastic that keeps you from trying it until you get it home and hack it out of its shell. Red White and Blue package with U.S.A. marked on it in 5 different places and stamped into the tool another place. It had the guys name on it that made it with a phone number and a web page and email addy plus the location of his company in St. Louis Mo. It felt heavy and solid and good thick chrome over some heavy gauge steel. No plastic in the whole thing except the outer coating of the grips. If Channel Lock made a can opener this would be what it would look like I thought. For 14 bucks about double the Walmart junk price I went out the door with a smile on my face.
Got home and grabbed the mangled tuna can and she said dont try it on that its mangled to bad. To both our surprise it opened the can and on the way around it straightened the can back up with very little effort cranking it.
It might sound crazy writing a review for a can opener on a home improvement page but Im hoping this thing makes my life just that little bit easier and more fun and every time I open a can with this Im going to yell out its tacky 1950s name Ez-Duz-It and think there might be a little hope left for Made in America quality I remember.
