Axe Thrower Interview: Babs, Regional Rep and Sheath Maker

Babs, even before I started talking to him, struck me as the affable sort. A friendly demeanor, happy to carry a conversation on with anyone, and just generally into being a part of the tourney we were at. It was only one the second day that I realized 1. he was the rep from the southeast, and 2. he made really nice axe sheaths.

I kinda fell into this axe thrower interview after talking to him for a spell about his sheath-making process, only realizing after ten minutes that I shouldn't permit myself to just talk to someone. I need that sweet, sweet content.

Badger:

...And you were just saying you started making these sheaths, and this is the first time you've set up a stall at an ax tournament. Is that right?

Babs:

Yeah.

Because you broke your leg?

Well, yeah. I broke my leg. And so at the time, I had been doing handle work profiling and leather sheaths just for league members. And so when I broke my leg, I all of a sudden, I have a small cabinet at our venue, and so I just filled up the cabinet with stuff and nothing was really selling.

So then I just started to try to figure out, well, what else can I do? And so set up a Facebook page, set up an Instagram page, realized that I could buy a table here for a relatively affordable price, and just went for it.

It's been awesome.

And where do you throw out of?

Asheville, North Carolina. I'm the incoming appointed rep.

We have a tradition in the southeast Bill. Bill. Bill was bought one of these (a desk plaque) by his general manager, and so now he passes it along.

That's very fun!

So your sheaths are beautiful. Obviously, I mean, depending on the material, but they're all obviously very, what I would call heritage sheaths. Whereas you have them and they're always going to be,

Yeah, that's the idea. So some of the sheaths on the table, they're less expensive, and they represent me and my sheath making. These were like eight months old (he pointed out some less expensive sheaths).

But then all the ones with the logos (a bit fancier, thicker sheaths) is me in the last two months, and this stuff was before broken leg. The stuff that's in the $40 range was before broken leg, and that's why we call 'em our league sheath. I made 'em for league members.

And they represented what our league throws a lot of It's flying foxes, it's half hatch. It's just a few different things. We don't throw a lot of different stuff. So for this, I had to kind of scale up and make some more varieties.

Obviously you're making sheath for popular axes that you would find, but you can also, I heard, obviously, you and I even talked about it and making custom sheaths.

That's right. I get a measurement off the sheath. It's a tracing, and then it's a wrap of paper around the sheath to see how leather fits around axe, where the sheath would go just to see how something flat will wrap around it.

And then I go home. It's usually make four to six sheaths a week. I can make more, but that's usually my production stuff. But stuff like that, four to six a week. And so I put them in the calendar, and then when the sheath is getting close to being done, I reach out to the customer and let 'em know it's getting ready to be done, send a couple pictures before I mail it and mail it off. It should be pretty easy for this event. We're waiving shipping, so it's not going to matter to anybody who reads this later.

Right. That's true. But hey, it's good for the aura.

Yeah.

And what do you think you're doing differently than perhaps other sheath makers that, I mean, even if in the industry?

So a couple of things that are totally different about my sheath that I haven't seen in other ones is the fully removable strap. Replaceable. So you can remove it, replace it with a different color if you want, which I really like. But why I like that is more than anything, it's because everybody opens up their sheath in different ways.

And so I found that with a sheath. Some of my sheaths used to have rivets where the button was, and what would happen was I would see people in leagues just fighting against that rivet trying to open the rivet side. So I was like, I'm just going to put a snap on both sides

So that's pretty different. I use these solid brass rivets that are very durable. They're almost impossible to get out. In order for me to get one of these out, I have to completely drill out the whole thing.

I find them to be really strong. That was something, I started really early. This was the first set of sheaths that I made with those rivets, and then I set the rivets inboard. So I put the rivets right behind the blade about an eighth, three 16th of an inch behind the blade.

If anybody was to drop it or if they were to accidentally be thrown, it is going to catch into the rivets, and it's not going to blow out the front of the sheath unless they have a bad throw and they throw it like this, it'll come through the side.

I can't help it if you throw bad, but they usually can take a few hits.

Yeah. I actually recently threw an axe with a sheath on it.

Did you get it to stick?

Yeah.  It's cool. Makes you feel cool.

Anybody want to throw a h's axes sheath into a board? Give me a picture. I'll make you a new sheath if anything bad happens.

What's the typical price range?

So for sheath, on the cheapest side of things, are these $30 sheath? These are the older ones. For the most part, all my sheath are $55. I don't change prices for big axes or custom builds. They are all just around 55 bucks.

And it looks like, I mean, obviously I'll get pictures of this, but it looks like it's a pretty wide variety of natural and traditional colors. If people wanted specific colors, would you be able to manage that or..

It's a little difficult. Mean, basically, my color swatch is this, I work with Wickett & Craig. It's the oldest tannery operating in the United States. They allow me to buy direct from 'em, and I have a good relationship with 'em, and I think that their leather is the best.

Oh, yeah. You can tell it's really, really good.

So this is my color palette that I have to work with, and it's Browns, but I can get some reds and greens a blue. They're kind of hard to get. They're a little bit more expensive. I've kept it this way just to keep it simple. If somebody has a special request, I'm always willing to do it.

Is there anything you want to add or anyone you want to shout out?

I love working with axes in any way that I can, whether it's playing with leather, whether it's throwing axes, I just love it. So it's really fun for me.

Definitely a big shout out to Shane and Rachel Miller. They allowed me to sell sheaths in their venue. I wouldn't have been able to start doing this if they didn't allow me that opportunity. They have a little spot in a cabinet for me that I can put all my stuff in there, and they do it out of the kindness of their heart, and that's basically the way they operate.

Big thanks to Babs and H's Axes for the interview, and for being just swell company! Check out their stuff here and here!