The Pen Addict 427/Transcript
From Relay FM. This is the pen addict episode 427. Today show is brought to you by the fine folk over pen chalet, an express VPN. My name is Mike Hurley and I am joined by Mr Brad Dowdy. Hi Brad.
Hey Mike, that's a lot of.
Podcast numbers 427 of them.
Keeps going up every week, doesn't it? That's
Crazy how that happens.
I was thinking recently that it is still a surprise to me that we managed to pull one of these off every single week without without trouble. Yeah, I'm having more trouble in like I have more trouble this week.
With trying to come up with stuff to talk about on, my text shows, then we have had or what you put together. Pretty much all the document today which.
Yeah, like you were literally no help this week.
Absolutely zero none. Which maybe we'll get to later on why that is the thing why I'm zero to none help at the moment, but.
Um it it's great that this I it's just great for me that this show continues to put itself together most weeks.
Yeah, and actually I know we've we've kind of talked about how we put it together before. I generally I take the lead on all of it and if I'm good, I'm good. If I need help, I say, Hey Mike, I need help and then.
We just you just handle it and then like it's done an we're really good about that every week sometimes it's.
Gonna ship you do this before the show and I do the after the show, yeah?
Yeah, and sometimes it's done days ahead of time. Sometimes it's done minutes ahead of time, but it always gets done right. We always deliver speaking.
Of delivering Brent.
Look at you look at you.
I've been seeing the retro 51 celebration start to appear in the wild. People have been sending pictures like even in my fair country. I've seen someone with them.
Yeah yeah, so were shipped as of yesterday. I have dropped off at the post office through background number 650. That means I have about 200 more.
To go, which I should be able to get done before the weekend, so that's my plan. So wrap that up. I want to make a comment just real quick because I'm getting a lot of questions about the USPS right now. It's a little bit of a show right now to send a package to the US Mail they're having.
Some difficulties and so that affects these shipments which you know their my shipment provider for this for this campaign.
And.
What's happening is we're getting a lot of early scans or a lot of prep scans people are seeing in their tracking and then not getting a scan for days and days and days and then the package will just show up the next day kind of thing. So I'm getting emails. Every email I've gotten. That's explained this scenario. The package has eventually showed up in like a day or two.
But like it's been seven days, it hasn't moved. It hasn't scanned and then I'll get an email the next day. Say it's here, so it's been consistently poor, but the packages are showing up. I haven't had anything loste yet, you know, crosses fingers. You know, it happens, there's, you know. That's why I have extra pens and things like that. But don't panic if the tracking.
Isn't updating as you would normally expect it to, where unfortunately not in normal times with the USPS and it is affecting things like package tracking and delivery so things are delayed. Things are not tracking.
Appropriately and just be patient. So far, so good on actual deliveries and we'll just keep monitoring it. So thank you all for your your patience and will have this thing wrapped up here.
In another week or so, and then I'll spend the rest of my life tracking down like the 30 addresses I need from people that didn't respond to the survey. So if that's you, please email me or contact me via Kickstarter. I would like to get you your pin so I don't have to sit here and hold it through eternity.
Oh, Speaking of which, Speaking of holding pins to eternity, Mike, yeah, yeah, yeah, I grabbed your stuff. It's altogether like it's it's it's in one place in the shipping area so I don't. I just have to box yourself up. Wow, it's like that means it's close. It's just mesh yeah yeah, no, it's it's, it's gathered.
It's in the gathered state.
Right by my shipping desk and then I'll probably just like I get so focused on the other 200 packages I have to ship and I'm like sweet. Got him done. Then I'll go to the post office and like whoops, I forgot that one.
What happened? What happened Mike?
You get that my friend. You're gonna get there I believe in you.
I will get there.
Nice work though.
Thank you feeling good about it. Everyone's like in the pen, that's what makes me Happy, Yeah?
It looks great. The Postal looks amazing too.
Yeah, I will say and I don't do this very often. I think I'm going to do it a lot. This show in particular will will say why in a minute we did a really good job with this pen. The design and the poster and everything that went with it.
Um, we executed our vision very, very well with the help of retro 51 and their design team. I am very proud of how this turned out and like I I always am, but I usually don't. I'm usually not like, Hey look how good I am. Let's Pat me on the back. We did a really good job between the design.
And the Letterpress printing of Skylab Letterpress on the poster like the whole package, is just.
We crushed it I I'm very happy with that. With how this has came to be and how it was executed. Yes, so props to me.
Sure, no, really, though you did a good job everyone's happy about.
Initiating no no, it's it's props to all of us like it legit. It was we did a good job on this one. Very happy.
All right, So what else have we got coming up today? Podcasts on time, yes? So we are in September. So that means you can join relay FM in support of Saint Jude Children's Research Hospital. Because September is childhood Cancer Awareness month. Childhood cancer remains the leading cause of death by disease for children.
Under the age of 15, children undergoing treatment for cancer and other life threatening diseases often need transfusions. Physical and cognitive therapy. But patients at Saint Jude. They're not charge a dime, and this is because of the wonderful donations from people like you. Your gift can help Saint Jude provide the very best care and treatment.
For patients without charge, go to stjude.org/relay today and you can help save Saint Jude Kids once again that is stjude.org/relay to donate now. Saint Jude is an incredible medical institution. It's an incredible hospital that takes care of these patients, but it's also a Research Hospital.
So the work that is done at Saint Jude is shared across the world for other people to learn from and to benefit from. So it really is a place that deserves your time, your money and your attention. Once again, that stjude.org/relay.
We've been doing a bunch of streams, twitch.tv/relay FM. We've been doing streams throughout the month and you can watch some on the page there. One that might be of interest. Listen to this show. So tomorrow, so Thursday the 10th of September at 11:00 AM Eastern Time. I'm going to be doing a stream on twitch.tv/relayFM.
Where I'm going to be showing off my keyboard collection and doing like some show and tell and kind of talking about what I've learned about the keyboard hobby so.
But that is also that Twitch page you want to follow it so you will get notifications becausw on Friday.
The 18th next Friday, we're going to be doing the six hour podcast farm for Saint Jude from 2:00 to 8:00 PM Eastern Time. We got a ton of fantastic things lined up. Do not miss it.
Sounds awesome, it's gonna be in your stream tomorrow. I will be streaming before that so we will.
Rage you, yeah boy when you start and well I'll come over and watch. Thank you.
Yeah, that'll be fun. That'll be fun, um?
We did something pretty cool for the pen addict to raise money for Saint Jude. Yeah, specifically.
Our good friend Jonathan Brooks at Carolina pen company donated something pretty cool for us to raffle off and to help raise money for the kids.
For those who are not completely dialed into, you know everything that we do here, and you know, following us all over the Internet, Jonathan attempted to make.
An Urushi Lamy Safari for me as a kind of weird one off. Let's see if we can do this project which turned into making three pins. One for me, one for M1, for honor.
And then a fourth pen that he said, Hey.
Do something with this. Whatever you want to do, do it. Keep keep it like which I would never do. Keep it donated. Give it away. Whatever I said, OK, well, let me hold it and we'll think about what to do. And then as you know, time got closer to our big September Relay FM charity drive for Saint Jude. It was pretty obvious that.
We could raffle off this pin, the Urushi Lamy Safari will have pictures in the show notes.
Ann raise money for the kids and I couldn't be more excited with the feedback we've gotten so far. So this just went live last night. Will have a link to it in the show notes to go see the details of what you need to do to sign up for this raffle. But the short version is it's.
$10 per raffle ticket an you donate that money directly to Saint Jude through the tiltify platform.
Stjude.org/relay you donate that?
And you send me a receipt. You know, email me the receipt. All the details are in there in the post. How to you know which email address send it to you know.
All of that good stuff.
Mike, the response has been fantastic so far, right?
We're going to run this through. I think. I said September 21st, which is a Monday and then that Wednesday I'll have. We're not going to do it live on the on the.
On the podcast pulled the winners, but I will be able to announce the winners on Wednesday. I'll have them drawn an and picked by then because it'll it'll just take me a minute once it's over to organize everything, get everyone in the in the spreadsheet for all of their entries to the raffle and then pick out the winner so we do have the Rushi. Lamy Safari.
Made by Mr Brooks is is the Grand Prize and then I have four other small prizes of a panic. Karen dash 849 ballpoint with one of the Kokuyo sketch note notebooks or sketchbooks notebooks with the pen addict, the gold stamp foil logo on their stamped on there. So I got four sets of those that I'm giving away. A little pin attic writing kit.
4 four other raffle winners so.
What do you think like? What do you? What do you think about this pen? You talk about the pen. I talked about the program. You haven't seen this pen in person, but I shared some pictures with it. But um, what? What are your thoughts on this?
So I really I really do like this pen a lot. Again, I've said like I think for me personally.
And my blue one that I got was my favorite, but I think we all felt that about our individual pans, which shows again just not only how talented Jonathan is, but how like, studious, right? But this is an absolutely stunning pen. Like you will not find what I would tell you is if you are the person that wins this Urushi Safari.
You will have a pen that literally nobody else does on the planet, nor could they. Even if they wanted to. Right this is a true one off item, right? Like no one's gonna make one of these. Again, I don't even think Jonathan is going to do it again. He seemed very hesitant to want to go through this process again, so you're looking at a beautiful, very classy.
Brown and black exterior and it almost is like you know that effect that you get when you see oil in water. That's kind of what it looks like a bit, especially because I believe there's some rod and flakes in the pen as well to give it a bit of extra shine. This really is something incredibly special that can be yours if you're lucky enough.
To win the raffle, but the only way that you're going to be able to win that raffle is by going to stjude.org/relay, donating and then emailing your team. Your donation receipt to Saint Jude at pennattic.com. But again, if you're one of real details before you do this just to make sure you've got the mall unlock and I'll put the link in the show notes It be very clear.
If you don't know where the show notes are, they were relayed dot FM slash pen addict slash 427 is the place to go for that. It is worth and I will. I will just like stay on the show if you have done it before today. Thank you, but the donations for the raffle have to have been from today onwards.
So if you have donated fantastic, why don't you donate again?
Yep, absolutely, and we had to do that. Do it that way for.
It to be a point, yeah?
'cause as well look.
We're trying to raise money here, right? Like you know, the point key is to add more money into the campaign, right? Like that's that's the goal with this.
Yeah, we hope you are doing it to raise money for the kids and then maybe you know it might be a pin in it later or something. Maybe if your name gets picked.
Yeah, you're primary reason for donating the money should be to support Saint Jude. And yeah, because you want to do that, you should want to do that, and you can't do that and then a secondary benefit is you may be lucky enough to win the OR she's far, yeah.
So like one last comment on the pen, you're right about its appearance like it looks like stunning. This black and Brown urushi. Then it's like, wait a minute. What are all these hits of Rodan all over? It's like secret Rodan all over the all over the pen. It's kind of fascinating to look at because you can not notice it at 1st and then once you see it you see it everywhere. It's pretty cool. It's really really well done so.
Great job by Mr Brooks as always.
Thank you both for making this happen. Both you and Jonathan. I really appreciate it.
Oh how the easy part.
For now, you're gonna be the one pulling together all the.
Yeah it took him. I don't know it still took him like a year to make these pins and he and he was. I won't say he hated every moment but it was far from easy to execute this.
Alright, this episode is brought to you in part by our friends over at Pen Chalet. They're the company that have the products you are looking for from the brands you love and trust. Whether you're looking for and you roll a ball or you want a new pen Holder, maybe you want a carrying case or a fountain pen. Maybe you're looking for a converter. Maybe you want a mechanical pencil. It doesn't matter what you're looking for.
Pencil I have got it and they offer the best prices and the best customer service around. Super fast, super reliable and they're always doing great discounts as well. Twice a month you'll find a bunch of wonderful discounts over at pen chalet, but as you know, pen addict listeners benefit from being able to save 10% at anytime potentially and I'm going to tell you how.
In just a moment pencil I also have limited edition pens and they have all the accessories that you're gonna need as well. To really kick you out with your favorite stuff to fill your stationary hobby. They're free shipping on orders of over $50 in the United States. They also sell internationally and they have great shipping rates as well. I have purchased from potentially many times and have had things sent to me over here in the UK.
And I can attest two things. One, the shipping was very fast.
That was before the Postal Service issues and then two when we were having, uh, I had a pen sent from them. Recently an Anet. I was wondering where it was and I contacted their customer service and they responded Super Quick and they were super great and they gave me the information that I was looking for so I can attest above with those things being true. Pen chalet has low prices and high quality pens and a 100% satisfaction guarantee.
If you go to penchalet.com PNCKLE t.com, click on the podcast link at the top of the website and enter the password pen addict. This is where you will get the 10% code that you need to save 10% off at anytime at pen chalet on anything.
And also to find details on this week's special offers Brad. What is grabbing your attention?
So the big special offer right at the top, all of the Esterbrook Nook sink, Nook pen cases, the new ones that are in the Navy.
An red colorway and the new snap kind of folio design are all now available for purchase and 10% off. On top of that, one of the more popular bennu fountain pens. I don't know if you've seen some of the reviews I've done, or Sarah has done for Bennu Fountain pens.
Recently Mike and how kind of impressed I have been with them even though I was very, you know.
Curious if I was going to like them when they first launched they've they've turned into a company that everyone really really enjoys. Their kind of wild and weird and wacky designs. These are not your normal fountain pens, so they had the big Newtown Tattoo fountain pen, which is one of the more popular styles on sale and then Mike as I scrolled, I never made it to the bottom.
While you were talking, by the way, so there's a lot of things. There is a sneaky Pelican M2. I just 200 special edition.
Uh, from below that price couple of years ago. Whoa, come on so that was that was a sneaky sneaky little find in there that if.
You have ever thought Oh Man I I don't own the Pelican I would love to get one. You should get this one because that price is absolutely fantastic, fantastic.
Price it's really good. Great looking pen and.
Yeah, really great stuff is always big bright.
Lights on a platinum 3776 down there too.
Yeah, like a.
Superb price Oh my God, that's enterprise look, you know where you're going to go and get these prices right? Got a penchalet.com an click that link at the top of the website. Enter the password pen addict and these special deals are available to UI thanks to potentially for their continued support of this show.
And Relay FM.
My favorite kind of topic on this show is when I get to put my good friend, Mr Brad Dowdy through the the ring. I put you in the hot seat. Ask you a bunch of questions 'cause there's been some huge news over at knock that I want to talk to you about that stuff that I've known about for a little bit. We've been talking about it.
Do you want to give the the kind of the?
The the top line. Yeah the.
The the big fly over yeah I. I'll give the fly over so basically like if anyone's been following me or the podcast or knock, you know that we haven't had much new inventory come through over the past year. Plus and we I've talked about it several times. I've talked about it on this show about how when we went into retail, we.
Pretty much over bought inventory and dug ourselves a very very big hole that.
Brad Dowdy
Kind of limited our flexibility in being able to order.
Mike Hurley
Like you kind of made a big bet which was good, but that yes, it then ended up locking up the wheels too much so that you couldn't really do anything else.
Brad Dowdy
It was good. I would do it again, but it turned out not to be correct, right? Like I don't know that I would ever say it was bad.
Brad Dowdy
Hey Mike, that's a lot of.
Brad Dowdy
Podcast numbers 427 of them.
Brad Dowdy
It was just it didn't workout as intended, so we've been playing catchup. Basically ever since an you know where the past like 12 to 1618 months, you know it's kind of been that way. Just kind of, you know, slow, slow, roll in, not a lot of new products.
Brad Dowdy
Crazy how that happens.
Brad Dowdy
You know, not a lot of hype around the Brandon just because we were just kind of had our hand side.
Brad Dowdy
So we're getting to the point where we're just.
Brad Dowdy
You know, selling, selling what we currently have and you know, paying down, paying down our bills, and doing all that kind of stuff and you know not getting paid for. You know anything we do at knock, which we haven't been for ages and ages anyway. It kind of got to a point where like.
Brad Dowdy
It wasn't going.
Brad Dowdy
It was going well, but we were getting to a point where I thought it was going to slow down a little bit, but I also felt at the same time that we're close enough to where I could see like very quickly down the line like turning this around to be able to make more products. But the problem is.
Brad Dowdy
When I guess we had the the company set up in a way that you know I was unable to put my own money into it, which is the end game that I was trying to get to is to put some of my own money into it, write a check, but the way our business is set up, I'm really not allowed to do that in, you know, the type of organization that we had set up.
Brad Dowdy
So I work with Jeff and Jeff and I have been talking about this and I was like.
Brad Dowdy
Here's what I would like to do. Let me know your thoughts an the end goal would be that I would take ownership of the company as a whole where we were a 5050 partnership before.
Brad Dowdy
An that would allow me to put in some of my own money. We've never taken any investors any outside investors. No, you know, no loans or anything like that. We all just kind of done it ourselves. And and here's and like I explained to him, here's why I want to do it. And kind of laid it out. You know, dollars and cents wise to where we could get the company like.
Brad Dowdy
Actually moving forward again like we really haven't been moving forward for a while. We've been fine and we exist, right? But we haven't been moving forward, so.
Mike Hurley
Yeah, in the sense that there haven't been knew styles of cases either in like material or overall like physical design for a bit, yeah.
Brad Dowdy
Or even new colors of popular cases? Yeah, right so.
Brad Dowdy
Jeff was super agreeable to that. You know we had a real good conversation about it and so as of like August 1st, I own the company and Jeff is essentially a contractor now. So like when we do new designs or if we need any like design work, artwork, graphic design, you know labels pretty much everything that he's.
Brad Dowdy
That he's done for us in the past, like he'll do it and be able to get paid for it, right? So none of us. We haven't gotten paid a dollar, and it's probably been like 18 months. Which is fine, but like I'm to the point now where I can see like? OK, if I can do a little bit and put a little bit of my own money in here, I can ramp this back up.
Brad Dowdy
And get us going on the right track again an. So that's the plan an. We've done that so that allows me to go in an launch this new Kickstarter.
Brad Dowdy
Which will help even further, but today that's just not today, she said. Yeah, it's coming. It's coming. But only like a week from now.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, like uh, launch a Kickstarter for black wax, canvas, brass towns and Sinclairs which people have been asking for for years. Since we kind of tease them, I don't know about three or four years ago we just made like 50 of 'em just by hand. So this is going to allow.
Brad Dowdy
Us to kind of.
Brad Dowdy
Make a case that is something new for everyone that everyone's been asking for.
Brad Dowdy
And use the funds to not only make that case, but to get other cases made for our standard inventory like we have, I have purchase orders sitting out there.
Brad Dowdy
For two different lookout case colors, um, the fodder stack, which people have been asking for for years, we have a pencil case design that we that has done very well for us. That's going to be a new a new design, new color. So it's basically kind of like a double whammy of inventory in this Kickstarter is what this Kickstarter is going to allow so.
Brad Dowdy
It's kind of like not Co version three now. It's like this is like the 3.0 version. We've done a lot of things over a lot of years, and you think we'd know what we're doing by now and we do. As far as case designing products go, but business is hard and you know we keep trying to make the right decisions at the right time and do right by our customers.
Brad Dowdy
But most importantly, we just want to keep making good products and we always will like we just I really, really believe in the product and in the brand. So I'm just going to lean into it. And Fortunately now I'm able to.
Brad Dowdy
Um, invest some of my money into it to push it along a little bit faster and we'll go from there. Like I'm very, very bullish on the future and I'm ready to kind of put my money where my mouth is.
Mike Hurley
So like you know, I, I think these things can be difficult for people if they understand the brand is the two of you right? And you know, it's important to note that, like Jeff is going to continue to pretty much do all of the things that he did before yet with the main changes being like 1.
Mike Hurley
The man gets money for it because the fact that you too have had some outstanding bills that needed to be paid meant that there was no money coming out of the company.
Mike Hurley
Uh, but that you kind of will be, uh, the person kind of leading as completely now, Yeah, but yeah. So like Jeff will be involved but just, you know, like imagine if he's just like the head designer, right right, that's that's kind of the way that it's gonna move going forward.
Mike Hurley
Because, you know, I think knock is is at the moment more of a thing for you, right? Like that's, which is why you want to do it. But Yes, it would have required. I believe I can equal investment from the two of you financially, right, like and right? It's you know, it's it's obviously up to Jeff if he wanted to do that or not, but.
Mike Hurley
It seems like the better option for the two of you right now is to route that you've decided to take.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, and we're both very content with that. Very happy with that and you know, Jeff's you know. Got his full time job and he's got his wife and he's got young kids and he's like cool you you go do that and then when we need to make stuff I'll be involved. I'm like.
Brad Dowdy
Cool, so you're happy with that and he's like, yeah, so it's pretty much exactly the same, except on the the paperwork side of things and that just gives me the flexibility to handle all the back end stuff like quickly, efficiently make a decision an an go for it. And then when it comes time to like making products.
Brad Dowdy
Me and Jeff collaborate so pretty much kind of like we've been doing it before. This just allows that that true flexibility that I want to get knock back to, you know, like the high ground where I believe we belong. Like I, it's just when but when you're not when you're in our business and you're not releasing.
Brad Dowdy
At least you know a couple of products a year. You're falling behind and like that's.
Mike Hurley
OK yeah, like forgotten.
Brad Dowdy
Right, right? And like it's OK, like we're never going to be, you know, world beaters, and every store in the world type of thing. But we want to be making things that make our customers happy. You know more often because our customers are generally like of the Superfan Variety, which is. That's a hard thing to build.
Mike Hurley
From scratch, you know you have a kind of a customer base that that would really love to give you money, but your side of the deal is you need to create products written to buy it. Then it's just going to keep you don't. You don't have a a disposable product, right? Like right people? People buy it and they keep it and then they use it but they will buy knew models if you will give it to them.
Mike Hurley
But if you're not coming up with the new models and the reason you know, like again like this, is very like inside baseball. But that's what we're doing today. The the reason that there hasn't been new products because you couldn't make them because you have bills at your manufacturer that had to get paid because of the retail cases and stuff like that. So it's like it's not for the lack of trying.
Mike Hurley
But there's been this logjam an my my I. I expect that the money that you've now put into the business plus the combination of the Kickstarter campaign will clear that logjam, right?
Brad Dowdy
That would be a very accurate statement for me not having given you any specifics, yeah.
Brad Dowdy
Which is great. That's where we need to be an. This will allow me to run the business differently in the future as opposed to I can be. I want to be able to pay for products on order, not paper products on credit through the manufacturer.
Mike Hurley
Right, right? So you have paying when paying with the money, right? So you're not paying and then hoping you'll sell 'em all.
Brad Dowdy
Yep and then.
Brad Dowdy
When God, this is really inside baseball then when.
Brad Dowdy
I don't have to worry about.
Brad Dowdy
Any type of pay out, right? There's no payroll, no ones getting paid anyway. I'm just running the business in the best way possible because in the future maybe there's something that comes out of it or something. But like not anytime soon an I can do that. I'm with. I'm able to withstand that, you know.
Brad Dowdy
As an individual owner, better than if we had, you know, a partnership or multiple people own it, or investors, right? I just have that freedom to say I don't have to get paid from this, for, you know, years, as long as we can just keep making awesome stuff and not lose money, right? Just keep turning that money into more products an then.
Brad Dowdy
We'll be back in good shape in no time, and that's my firm belief of what's about to happen.
Mike Hurley
And you know, I guess that you're a point now where, which is not always been the case, but that has been the case more recently. I guess that knock has not needed to be a part of your income because you're more diversified.
Mike Hurley
Right so, but what that gives you is a Freedom. Now is the idea of like if knock doesn't.
Mike Hurley
If knock isn't needed to be a profit center, then it can become a product generation company where, like you keep reinvesting the money that the company makes into more things. The company can make, and then you expand it. So then when then you can get to the point where you're like now I can enjoy the fruits of my labor, but like you you're building to that point again.
Mike Hurley
So it's a good time, but to say it's been it's been difficult because you've been jammed and it's like a chicken and egg situation and the only way to get out of it was money. Had to come from somewhere and it just worked out that for the both of you this is the best way to do things, yeah.
Brad Dowdy
Yep, so I'm excited about what's to come an, you know, Jeff, and I've already been talking about new cases we can launch. You know, once we get past this like initial like this Kickstarter like what's gonna? What's 2021 to look gonna look like? And we've already been discussing those things so it feels good to be back in like a some type of knock workflow again.
Brad Dowdy
So next, long time coming.
Mike Hurley
Is the Kickstarter campaign right? That's the next thing.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, I'm shooting for a launch next Tuesday. You never know how those go with Kickstarter, right? You know, as far as approvals and things like that, like we're in the pretty. I always say we're in the good Q to where I just push the button and they say Yep, you're free to go, but you never know until you actually push the button.
Brad Dowdy
So you know, we'll see I I each time that's my plan is next Tuesday. We'll get this, uh, loaded up, we'll have some awesome new cases available, and we'll have a little bit of a story about why I'm choosing Kickstarter for this, as opposed to doing a direct presale presale so we can talk about in the future.
Mike Hurley
Well, congratulations to you both on another, um movement in the company that you created.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, I'm just lucky to have a partner like Jeff who who gets it like he's really one of the best in the business at being able to make things and being able to take ideas out of my head and put him into a physical product.
Brad Dowdy
An like that is like having someone like that in my life and just being a totally cool person. On top of that is I'm I'm very, very lucky.
Mike Hurley
Yeah, definitely.
Mike Hurley
OK, this episode is also brought to you by Ixpress VPN. There are tons of VPN's out there and you probably heard of some of them. You may have even use one of them before, but as a reason I use express VPN and the reason we have them as a sponsor too, 'cause they're really good. And here's why. Express VPN doesn't log your data. Other VPNs make money from selling data to ad companies.
Mike Hurley
Express VPN developed technology called trusted server that makes it impossible for their servers to log any of your info because it's all stored in ram. Second is speed. Many VPN slow your connection down or make your device sluggish.
Mike Hurley
Whenever I've used Ixpress VPN, My Internet speeds are blazing fast, so much so that I can stream HD quality videos with zero lag from servers that are thousands of miles away. Like if I'm in the UK and I change my connection to America, I can still stream in HD quality. The last thing that really sets express VPN apart from other VPNs is how easy it is to use.
Mike Hurley
You don't have to input or program anything, you just fire up the app, click one button and you connect it. Super easy in your grandparents could use it right? Maybe you have an amazing grandparent, understands that he is technology, but most people don't and I'm sure they could even understand express VPN wired, the verge, seen it, and many other tech publications have rated expressed VPN.
Mike Hurley
The number one I've used ixpress VPN for years now whenever I'm on a Wi-Fi network then I'm unsure of what that is. One that I control. I use express VPN just just for a Peace of Mind, but even on my own Wi-Fi I've used it to be able to access content from other places in the world, which is a great great benefit. Protect yourself right now with the VPN that I use in trust.
Mike Hurley
Go to expressvpn.com/pen addict and get an extra 3 months free on a one year package that's expressvpn.com/pen addict. Check it out today. One last time, expressed vpn.com/pen addict to learn more. Thanks to Ekspress GPM for their support of this show and relay FM.
Brad Dowdy
Alright, let's get into some new product talk.
Brad Dowdy
This week Mike, I actually wanted to talk about hobonichi season last week, but we just ran out of time. We had plenty to talk about so I shifted it over to this week. Can you believe it's already that time of year? I call it hobonichi season because they have such a big log. Big impressive launch, even though it's like once you hit September, it's.
Brad Dowdy
Planner season for the following year, but I just I just go with hobonichi season because it's such a big deal, right?
Brad Dowdy
And um, so this year.
Brad Dowdy
I'm going no hobonichi which nobody she you could say no bonici. It's an open each year. Last year I went for weeks just to because I knew I wasn't used. I've used the touch oh, I've used the 'cause and these are amazing products. There's a reason why this is so popular is because these products are really really good. But you know you have to decide. Do they work for you and how you work?
Brad Dowdy
And you know, I've realized that the Hobonichi.
Brad Dowdy
The best hobonichi, the most popular hobonichi setups don't work for me and then something like the weeks, which is actually a layout Idol.
Mike Hurley
I have an Elmo one this time right?
Brad Dowdy
So this is what we're gonna talk about. We're not going to dig too much into the hobonichi, but you're doing exactly one thing that I wanted to do is I wanted you to look at the covers because those seem to be one of the most popular things.
Mike Hurley
I love the covers.
Brad Dowdy
But I wanted to talk about just how.
Brad Dowdy
Much hobonichi is putting into their website every year. So because these are complex these are. This is a shockingly complex product that should be very simple, right? Like you think I need a planner. Let me buy the planner and then you go to hobonichi site and you're overwhelmed, yeah?
Mike Hurley
It's like OK. We have six planners.
Mike Hurley
Wait, wait, you know there were six planners that you had.
Brad Dowdy
There's different sizes of some.
Mike Hurley
Of them there's multiple ones in the same size pick one writes. Very confused. It's a big. It's a big thing, but as you say, I think I agree that they do a lot of work in trying to break it down. They have graphs, charts and FA cues, right? Like they really do. I think as best a job that they can.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, and it's also because Hobonichi season usually involves, like you found out, buying covers. So like you don't just get your planner, you get an accessory with it. What accessories fit this planner so you have your six planners you know, does this accessory fit? That planner? Does that accessory fit this planner? And on and on and on? So there's.
Mike Hurley
Accessories too. It's not just office.
Brad Dowdy
So we're actually going to link in the show notes to the buying guide page, which is 1 gigantic chart style page that will take you into like the places you need to go. It includes images on layouts because not all notebook layouts are the same, and it tells you like what you get, what cases fit that? What's the descriptor?
Brad Dowdy
You know, for this and things like that and you know it has a little kewene of like what should I do if this is my first one? What if I want a light one or a big one? You know, how does you know what's the best for this type of work? So it's kind of involved, but This is why they become so popular, right? They have all of these options.
Brad Dowdy
There Super High Quality an you know they're great to use their Tomoe River Paper. Which do we know? What paper we're getting? Again I have to say this every time now, at least for probably all of next year. What paper are we getting in that Imogie River? Is it gonna matter? Hopefully not.
Brad Dowdy
You know, just all kinds of things like that. So, um, I wanted to point out on the I think the what do they call this one? The day free model which they launched? I don't know a year or two ago, they haven't had this forever. I would just scrolling down. It's like, well, maybe I'll try something this year and what the day free one is is basically your.
Brad Dowdy
Small calendar pages in the front and then an open notebook in the back so it's got like your um, two page per day calendar, right? Like you'll see a full month on a on a spread and then like the back 170 pages or just grid page notebooks like that's a kind of a cool option. It's more of a planner type calendar and I don't know I.
Brad Dowdy
Keep thinking maybe I should do that, but I'm not. I'm not going to do it, I'm I'm very much in.
Brad Dowdy
No banegi, I'm going no no banegi, but they did a what do they do here so they have this so I just I didn't go through all the pages but this one caught me and This is why I love. Hoping you want a lot of other people love Hope Enerji so on their day free notebook they have. They go through all of the features right. Here's the features.
Brad Dowdy
Kind of limited our flexibility in being able to order.
Mike Hurley
Like you kind of made a big bat, which was good, but that yes, it then ended up locking up the wheels too much so that you couldn't really do anything else.
Brad Dowdy
And then they have a section at the bottom. It says new in 2021. We've made the following changes in the 2021 edition. You ready Mike? OK, the flip book comic change tuiaki condos dancing Fox.
Brad Dowdy
It was good I would.
Brad Dowdy
The secret line moved slightly to the left.
Brad Dowdy
The pages are now numbered.
Brad Dowdy
Basic posture techniques.
Brad Dowdy
Enjoy your tech show with letter art where is like thread. I need to see like there's like 15 of these things in here and.
Brad Dowdy
It's just glorious that this is the care that they put into it, and you know, I like I said, I, I could have spent hours going through all of these other pages. I'm putting it in the doc right now. OK, but just to see that those are the things that they care about.
Brad Dowdy
Tells me that they just really care about their product as a whole, right? We're changing the Fox comic and your flip and your flip pages.
Mike Hurley
You don't worry everyone.
Brad Dowdy
Like like that's important to them and that's why people love them so much because fonts used in the titles have changed their cute.
Brad Dowdy
They're fun and their infinitely useful, like they do. They execute what they set out to execute, and while being fun, whimsical and just flat out cool, it's very personal. You can get some very unique things. Like you said, there's Fuzzy Elmo covers. There's Fuzzy Cookie Monster covers, and a lot of this stuff, Mike.
Brad Dowdy
It sells out like hobonichi launch days a big deal. It's like you know some tech launch day like Apple launch day for you like can you get the one you want on day one like some people don't and they get ticked off. And it's like man I didn't get the cover that I wanted like it's a big deal. So for those who are not familiar with Hobonichi, at least go poke around and look and see what.
Brad Dowdy
What people are talking about, because it's it's really fun. They do a great job and then we'll go quiet. You know, like you know, January or February, we won't talk about, you know the hobonichi planners anymore. Then boom, hobonichi season comes right back around again at the end of August and beginning September. It's never ending cycle, but the covers look great this year. I I gotta admit.
Mike Hurley
That I like that they keep adding in other, um, like properties like Sesame Street. Whatever it minds me at full screen. But what I like about that is like it's. It's like the moleskin model but with a good product like genuinely like, really good product.
Brad Dowdy
That's completely fair. That's completely fair. Yeah, like they've expanded on all of the mother covers, which I also going to go.
Mike Hurley
I like that they they're not doing it to the cover of the book, right. They need every night you only get it at one time, like you buy a cover that you put the book in, which means that you can use it next year too if you love it. And I, I, really, I really appreciate that because they would.
Mike Hurley
You know they would maybe make more money the other way around. I don't know if it would, but it I believe I would also believe though that that customers are more loyal to them because of choices like that that made.
Brad Dowdy
Absolutely like I have a, uh, a reader or listener and I can remember their name, but I I know what their hobonichi looks like because they sent me pictures.
Brad Dowdy
And I've had to ask about the cover and they're like, Oh yeah, it's this one from 2013 and like that's just the one that they use every year, right? It's just what you do, so they've done a great job. So I I will never get tired of talking about Hobonichi even if I'm not necessarily using one today. I just love what they are and what they do.
Brad Dowdy
They're great, yeah?
Brad Dowdy
Alright, pilot doesn't always get the same love for me as much as I love pilot, you know what my stance is and how I think they're just.
Brad Dowdy
Not quite tweaking the formula enough on a regular basis.
Brad Dowdy
For my liking like now, pilot doesn't care what I think. They don't care that I want like the rainbow of colors and the pilot custom 912 because I think it's a smart idea because it's the direct competition too.
Brad Dowdy
Sailor and platinum's most popular lines, but hey, what do I know? I just want I just want what I want an I'm not gonna get it and that's fine but every now and then pilot will surprise with just some random color one off in a random product lineup like last year it was the 91. I don't know if it's the 91 or the 74 I think was the 91.
Brad Dowdy
They did an orange barrel and a blue barrel just randomly. Hey, here's orange barrel and blue Blair this year. It's a purple barrel in the pilot Falcon, which is an awesome pen and it traditionally hasn't had.
Brad Dowdy
All a great berrill right? It's just a resin barrel. They do have a upgraded one. That's an aluminum barrel that's actually quite nice, but I love the Falcon nib so much.
Brad Dowdy
That I actually got Jonathan Brooks to make me a barrel for it because, you know, it's just a basic black plastic barrel an they have a red one now. I think they introduced a few years ago and now they have a really cool purple one an this makes me happy like super happy like I want to see this an at the same time.
Brad Dowdy
I just want to yeah, I just want to yell at pilot say can we do more of this please like can we do five of these?
Brad Dowdy
Right, it's one random color in one random product lineup per year seems to like get the color berrill treatment and then we were talking about this on stream an. You know I've always been banging on the 912 series as the one that could do the most with colour, but they will probably never do it because this is just kind of their classic businessy.
Brad Dowdy
Line up, but we got to talking and thinking about what about the pilot elite, which is their pocket pen? That's Super Fun, Super Great. It's the perfect platform and then a friend shared a link in the chat room and said Yeah, pilot has made a bunch of colors of the pilot elite in the past.
Brad Dowdy
And look at this link, Mike.
Mike Hurley
I look like this today. This is a low level of customization.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, this is like there's pilot Elites in here that look like practically like air brushed aluminum. They're like.
Brad Dowdy
Um, you know bright Blues and pinks and Purples and oranges.
Brad Dowdy
And they've done all of this in the past. Like none of these.
Brad Dowdy
Our recent other than like the only recent ones are black, black, white and burgundy I think are the recent colors, but I look at this image and I'm like, yes pilot. Can we release three of these a year for the next decade? Can we just have one product lineup that's fun and playful and whimsical? If that's not, that's you know mid price or higher end.
Brad Dowdy
Right, you know they do good. Great job with the Kakuno which I love and the Prera and all the end of Metropolitan. I love all those pins. They're great and the vanishing point. The vanishing point gets a ton of love. Can we get this across some of the, uh, another product line up an or why aren't we getting this? And I don't know maybe you know their numbers say hey these don't sell if we do that but.
Brad Dowdy
I don't know. I love seeing the new purple Falcon. If you don't have a Falcon, I highly recommend that it's not a flex nib. Don't go in there thinking you're going to have some like massive calligraphic handwriting style. The minute you use it, it's gonna take it. Takes some getting used to. It's more of a soft flex than the real flexible Falcon.
Brad Dowdy
A lot of people do, um I got mine.
Brad Dowdy
I got mine modified right after I bought it to use as a writing pen. Yeah, so I only use mine for writing and it's glorious. I absolutely love it. It's one of my favorite nibs to write with, but it is by no means a flexible. You should not go into it thinking of it, which is why Someone Like You would not like it because it's just not going to work with your handwriting style.
Brad Dowdy
Right, it's it's a specific nib and I definitely admit that, but I I'm glad to see this purple barrel on on this and.
Brad Dowdy
I keep waiting for.
Brad Dowdy
A big surprise.
Brad Dowdy
From pilot and I just keep getting my hopes up that you know, maybe we'll get the 912 one day. That would be. That would be my number one choice, but the pilot elite I thought would be a great idea if we could get some some whimsy into the pilot lineup.
Mike Hurley
It's weird really, to see such a bold color as this purple. It's like quite a bright, vivid purple.
Mike Hurley
And that's like it.
Mike Hurley
Other than that, they have the blue and the black, and sometimes you can get a red one.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's weird, it's just like let's do one and I'm like.
Brad Dowdy
That's it, and it's not even.
Brad Dowdy
That they just do want like make the decision OK if you're going to do purple, let's do it in all of those midrange gold nib price points. Let's do it in the. You know, the 74 the 91.
Brad Dowdy
You know the 9:12 in all of these kind of let's do purple in all one purple in all of these, but I don't know fish.
Brad Dowdy
Weird, it's weird I don't understand it because then I look at like our next topic. Mike is the karandash claim. We're style new addition. They came out last year with this wild funky karandash 849, you know, already loved 849 I'm making my own 849 which will be on sale soon.
Brad Dowdy
And you know, karandash is an older established classical pen company, right? They could sit there and make the Ecuador all day long and they'd be just fine. But they see this market.
Brad Dowdy
Now the price point is different like this is you know a $40 pin, not, you know, $150 pin like the Falcon.
Brad Dowdy
And but this is, you look at this pen and you don't think if you didn't know what the 8:49 was. You know just by looks like you know a lot of us do. 'cause it's a classic design you would never karandash would never be on your short list of the manufacturer of this style of pen, right? And that's what I want.
Brad Dowdy
That's what I want to see from pilot. One day is OK, you don't have to go as far as claim here. Style which what karandash does for this is basically colorize every single part individually on the 8:49 ballpoint from the berrill color to the clip color to the not color to the imprints.
Brad Dowdy
You know they can use several different colors to to make up a pen, and I bought one last year. One of the six. They released six colors last year. 6 brand new colors this year and every it was hard to not buy every single one of 'em last year. And it's the same this year. They just do a really good job so wild with customizing an making these colors that you wouldn't think.
Brad Dowdy
Would normally go together like there's a bright blue berrill bright red clip.
Brad Dowdy
Um and then purple anodized, knock on.
Mike Hurley
It is a baby blue body with gold clip and a bright pink nib. Bright pink knock I should say.
Brad Dowdy
I mean, claim your style Mike, I love your claimant. Pull Smith once. Yes, the Paul Smith. Once they've done for awhile. I think this is the best one that they've done.
Brad Dowdy
Like with the stripe, the stripes around the barrel, they've done solid colors and some other things in the past. Distractions around the full.
Mike Hurley
Stripe one 'cause the Postal Smith stripe is great. It's This is like a pen that I've always thought I would like to own it, but I've never bought it for myself, 'cause I probably wouldn't use it that much, but I really just like I would I I have it to just look at it.
Brad Dowdy
Well you you might have an orange one coming your way in a certain package. I need to send you so OK, just hang tight, hang on.
Mike Hurley
Who knows who knows? Yeah, right?
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, who knows? You never know Mike, but yeah, these are great like this. Last year I bought the like the baby blue and that you see this year there was a green one with the gold clip and a pink knock like that's The One I bought last year. This year I'll probably buy the pink one with the blue.
Brad Dowdy
Clip and they um, in the black knock. This just would.
Mike Hurley
Be kind of cool though. I mean, I don't know if this is possible. If you could kind of like make some match. If you bought a couple, can you get pieces often? Can you get the clip?
Brad Dowdy
Off, yes, we can get the clip and the knock off 'cause it just unscrews because that's where the refill goes. So you could swap those so you.
Mike Hurley
Could swap it. I mean, I see even more you're claiming your styles and it by dragging.
Mike Hurley
Right, measuring about like the yellow one. I like the yellow body, but I don't like the clip on the yellow one.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, but I just, you know it's hard for me.
Brad Dowdy
To not compare karandash and what they do and what their status is as a brand and then look at pilot. And then like I know it's not fair of me to say to pilot.
Mike Hurley
Registered this same thing very.
Mike Hurley
Different brands but but but but.
Mike Hurley
It would, I would say that like they may not be as equally comperable, but there are a lot of Japanese classic pen brands that Arkham Parable with pilot that are doing way closer to what Karen Dash is doing here. Totally pilot is leaving a lot on the table.
Brad Dowdy
Yeah, I guess that's all. I just love pilots so much, but they don't give us anything to talk about like all these other companies do.
Brad Dowdy
I think that's my my main takeaway, which you know they don't have to like they're doing their doing perfectly fine without making Brad his pink fountain pen like they're gonna live. Mike, I'm pretty sure, but you know, I still can. I can still hope for it, right? A boy can dream, we can dream.
Mike Hurley
So next week's episode. Um, I'm I'm going to be taking the week off because next week next week is already a pretty busy week for me with the podcast and on the 18th. But then Apple popped in and was like, oh hey, would you like an Apple event next week as well?
Mike Hurley
So due to various many many many projects and time constraints, Brad is going to take over the hosting duties next week and bring a guest in for the show.
Brad Dowdy
My favorite texts are Mike Panic texts because I Know, and you know.
Brad Dowdy
Then I'm going to handle it, but I have an opportunity to like turn the screws a little bit and I don't. I generally don't take that opportunity because I can tell the stress in your in your text. You know I can read, I read them in Mike stressed voice so I don't mess with you. But boy, I really have an opportunity and I I'm.
Brad Dowdy
I'm leaving a little bit on the table there, you know, Speaking of which.
Brad Dowdy
So, uh, yeah, you know, I I, I'm glad to do it. I don't know who I don't know who next week's guest is gonna be, which is always a thrill for me. And but I got ideas. I got ideas and as always we will have a great episode. And once I do know who I will be having on, I will let the.
Brad Dowdy
Let the listeners know via Twitter most likely, so we can take some questions for whoever I grab 'cause I always want to. I want to always have some listener interaction when when I have a guest on so I I look forward to when you're not here, Mike.
Mike Hurley
If you want to find her links and notes about this weeks episode, including more information about the raffle for the Urushi Safari, if you donate to Saint Jude, go to relay dot FM slash pen addict slash 427. You can find Brad on Twitch on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10:00 AM eastern.
Mike Hurley
Twitch.tv/pen addict should go there and find more about that and you can watch wonderful stuff that Brad is broadcasting to the world twice a week. Gotta panic.com and knock.cospokedesign.com as well. Go to all of those websites, look at them, see what's there. Maybe buy some stuff. Brad is at dowdy ISM on Twitter and pen addict on Instagram.
Mike Hurley
We're going to have to do a spinoff show at some point.
Mike Hurley
Where it's just me talking about all the things you're doing.
Mike Hurley
Very, very busy right now to you cause of Lions and a lot of fires.
Brad Dowdy
It's good to be busy. It's good to be busy and, uh, I I am that.
Mike Hurley
I'm at, I'm like I am YKE thanks potentially and expressed VPN for their support of this episode and will.
Mike Hurley
Brad will be back next time I'll be back in two weeks. Until then, say goodbye, Brad, Goodbye Brad.