Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

These matches are both impervious to water and any attempt to ignite them. I bought these as an emergency fire solution to keep permanently in my mountaineering pack. Before heading out, I tried to light them at home. The abrasive strip on the outside of the pack is little more than a piece of black construction paper. I could not get a match lit on it no matter what I did. This included carefully removing the wax from the tips of the sticks to get down to the combustible material. I WAS able to get them to light with a torch lighter...but that kind of defeats the purpose. I'm guessing that there are many different suppliers of these. Mine did not come from Amazon directly, but rather a 3rd party seller. I think you'll be playing roulette if you decide to order them. Also note that only one of the positive ratings on this item actually mentioned trying to use the matches. I'm going to stick with a magnesium starter for now on as my back-up.