1,770+
Customer orders served from 2022 through 2025.
Edge of the Wedge · Since 2021
I started Edge of the Wedge with my dad. The local business put me in direct contact with customers throughout my community. It has grown year over year and now receives orders from across the Seattle area. Running it taught me how to balance work with baseball and school, work closely with customers, and save patiently for long-term goals, including my first car and future investments.
Visit Edge of the Wedge
The business
I started Edge of the Wedge with my dad in 2021 as a way to earn money to buy my first car. From the beginning, customers could book online and use a secure locker to drop off and pick up their knives. All orders were ready within 24 hours, making the process simple and reliable.
As word spread, the business grew year over year, from customers on Mercer Island to orders from across the Seattle area. I learned how to manage the day-to-day responsibilities of a business, promote it to new customers, and build strong customer relationships by answering questions, understanding what people needed, and making things right when a problem came up.
Balancing the business with baseball, school, and homework taught me how to manage my time. Saving what I earned also showed me the value of delayed gratification: I eventually saved enough to buy my first car and began setting money aside to invest in my future.
Edge of the Wedge donates 5% of its proceeds to Breakthrough T1D. The mission is personal to our family because my sister Clara lives with Type 1 diabetes and serves as a Youth Ambassador for the organization.
Growth and operations
Growth came from making a local service dependable. Customers book online, pay by credit card through a custom Square checkout, check in by QR code, and use nine secure lockers for 24/7 drop-off and pickup. We monitor each order and text customers when it is ready.
| Year | Revenue | Year-over-year growth | Approx. knives and tools |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | $10,800 | Baseline full year | ~1,000 |
| 2023 | $15,570 | 44% | ~1,500 |
| 2024 | $18,355 | 18% | ~1,800 |
| 2025 | $25,309 | 38% | ~2,500 |
| 2026 projected | $31,000 | 23% | ~3,100 |
Customer orders served from 2022 through 2025.
Of 2026 orders were from repeat customers through July 6.
Projected cumulative knives and tools sharpened by the end of 2026.
Built into our 300-square-foot home workshop for secure, around-the-clock customer access.
Customer reputation
Edge of the Wedge grew mostly through word of mouth, Google and Google Maps, repeat customers, Yelp, Nextdoor, and the public website. Today, 41 Google reviews average 4.98 out of 5.
Reviews consistently point to the same things we work to get right: easy booking and locker access, quick turnaround, clear communication, strong sharpening results, and responsive customer service when a knife needs extra attention.
Inside the edge
For more than 90% of the kitchen knives we sharpen, the edge moves through six increasingly fine stages. A digital microscope lets us see the burr and scratch pattern change, while an Edge-On-Up tester measures how much force the blade needs to cut a standardized filament.
Lower force means a sharper edge.
80-grit ceramic belt
Removes damaged steel and rebuilds the cutting angle.
240-grit abrasive
Replaces the deepest scratches and brings the test reading to 255 g.
600-grit abrasive
Makes the burr smaller and more uniform, reaching 210 g.
Medium finishing wheel
Smooths the scratch pattern and lowers the reading to 190 g.
Fine finishing wheel
Leaves a nearly burr-free edge measuring 155 g.
Diamond-loaded leather
Polishes the edge and removes the last traces of the burr.


