one LBS near me uses 8" side "CK" brand side cutters. Even in daily use they last about a year, so I think they must be pretty good quality. ~6" Bahco ones are great for inner cable but you need to be strong to cut some outer cables with them.
IME the thing that most quickly knackers cutters is cutting SIS gear housing with them; the wires are made of spring temper steel that is only a bit less hard than piano wire. Once the cutting edges are dulled, the next thing that you find is that you can't make clean cuts in inner cable or spiral wound outer any more. However the cutters may continue to cut SIS housing OK, whilst driving you nuts on every other job. So one approach is to use one set of (sharp) cutters for inners and spiral wound outer, and keep a different set for SIS outer only.
However a long time ago I discovered that the quality and longevity of my cable setups was significantly improved if I dressed the cable housing ends after cutting. [If you take a look at the wire strands in SIS cable when they have been cut, you can see why they sometimes chew their way through plastic ferrules; the end of every reinforcement strand can look (and work) like a little chisel.]
Now, filing is tedious and quickly buggers up the file if you dress SIS gear housing (which needs it most) this way. Grinding is better. Thus I rarely bother to cut outer housing using cutters these days; if I am going to grind the ends square anyway I will cut the housing using an ultra-thin cutting disc and then dress the (plastic) burrs from the sleeving and the liner. The result of this is that I have not had to buy a new set of cable cutters for a very long time....
BTW the smallest and easiest tool to use when cutting housing, spokes etc is probably a set of compound action side cutters; these reduce the force required at the handle to about half that of other tools with similar length handles and jaws. Maun Industries
https://www.maunindustries.com/heavy-duty-cutter/ make some excellent tools of this sort, but the jaws will still wear (unsurprisingly) and they are eye-wateringly expensive; I bought some secondhand.
cheers
