The Pen Addict 571/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	571
Title:	Stationery Is Life
Release Date:	July 5th, 2023
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 571
Audio File:	Audio Episode 571
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 571
Length:	6161 min <br />1.017 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 571. Today's show is brought to you by Enigma Stationery. My name is Myke Hurley. I'm joined by Brad Dowdy. Hi, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: Back together again. One week off, one week on. It feels so good. It does, it does. Good to be back. Thank you for allowing me the week off last week, but no thanks to you. Thanks to our good friend Miranda Sanchez, aka Havoc Rose, who filled in admirably last week. What a wonderful conversation I had with Miranda on literally everything. Like, this is, again, this is one of those times and people yell at me because I say it all the time. It's like, I could have just kept going, right? Like, she's the best.

Myke Hurley: So, if you're going to keep having such good guest episodes, I don't even think it's worth me being here anymore. Lies. I actually have a request that I would like to make.

Brad Dowdy: Okay.

Myke Hurley: And I don't know how anyone will feel about this, but I'm going to make it anyway. If I die, I would like to leave the podcast to Miranda. Oh, wow. To pick up the reins from me. That's serious pressure. That would be my request. I'm making it now. This is my remaining will and testament for the pen addict. If I die, then Miranda can have the show. Miranda can choose to do whatever they want with it, ultimately, but I think that they would be a great person to pick up the reins from me if I was to die.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, number one, I agree. Okay. Number two, I told you, like, before I told you who the guest was, that I told you you did not have to worry about any technical aspects of this show because they are a professional. And apparently that has come to bear because you're ready to just hand off the podcast. It's not the technical part.

Guest host Miranda's expertise and impact on the show

Myke Hurley: It's not the technical part. Miranda is just so good and so entertaining and, like, just delightful to listen to and really knows her stuff. I'm just going to say, like, is more knowledgeable than me. So, it would just be a great person to take over. But until then, you're stuck with me, I'm afraid.

Brad Dowdy: Well, yeah. I mean, that is actually one of our benefits. Your lack of knowledge actually plays to our advantage. It's like cyberbullying, what you just said to me there, to be honest.

Myke Hurley: We can just move faster.

Brad Dowdy: One bit of feedback. You know, I know a lot of people, you know, might listen to Miranda's podcast, Words and Roses, or follow Miranda online and all the places where they're at. But I did get some feedback that I never heard of, you know, Miranda or the podcast before. I went and downloaded all the episodes of the podcast, and I'm following all the journaling prompts, and this is the best. So, thank you for having Miranda on and sharing her work with the world. So, it was great.

Myke Hurley: Definitely. But I'm back now. That's what you got for.

Brad Dowdy: You are back. You are back. And you're going to get right into a topic where I lost my mind. Okay. Pretty quickly on.

Brad Dowdy: And this is how my brain works a lot of times, that I see, in this instance, a blog post. Sometimes it's a new product release or some note from someone or, you know, something on Instagram randomly. And this time it was a post from Anna at the Well Appointed desk about the Muji fountain pen and an updated Muji fountain pen. And this one's called the polycarbonate, the Muji polycarbonate fountain pen. And I'm like, man, I love this pen. It's just like the Platinum Preppy. You know, I have this whole diatribe on the Platinum Preppy and the Platinum Perponet. And I put all these links together to discuss this product. And, like, this is the best. Why haven't I talked about this before? And I did that, I don't know, yesterday or two days ago. I was writing all these notes, this very comprehensive set of notes and links in the show document. I was like, I'm just going to lay all this out. It's going to be fantastic. And then I completed that task, you know, completed the preparation. And then it was just weighing on me. It's like, how have I not talked about this before? Right? Because there is no more perfect item for me to discuss than a $5 Platinum Preppy was what this ostensibly is. And especially one that has been white labeled by Muji and made in a design that I love. How did I miss this? So, I'm seeing Anna's post just from last week going, how did I miss this? Turns out I didn't, Myke. But it was racking my brain trying to figure this out. So, first off, let me talk about this pen real quick. So, it is a white barrel Platinum Preppy with no markings on it whatsoever. And it's at Muji, which is known for their white label products. So, this is their second fountain pen that I'm aware of. The first one is the popular aluminum barrel knurled grip that I very much dislike. I'm well on record as saying that's maybe the only Muji product that I dislike is that metal barrel fountain pen. I just think it's very average. Like, it's fine. Like, there's nothing wrong with it. But it's being held up to a standard that I don't think it's deserved. This pen is a literal mimic of the Platinum Preppy, just with everything stripped off. Where, like, we know Muji white labels, pretty much all their pens. And they will use the refills for, say, like a Pilot G2 and create their own Muji barrel exterior around the outside. Very generic, plain. A lot of them translucent, kind of frosted barrels, whatever. But use the stock good barrel. So, this one, you literally look at it. You go, oh, that looks like a Platinum Preppy. You uncap it. It's got the P on the nib, right, from the Platinum Preppy. And it just, it's basically a stripped-down version of my favorite Platinum Preppy, which is called the Purpinep, which I've talked a lot about on this show. I've reviewed it glowingly on the blog. I'll have the link to the review in there. And it all kind of links back to this early fountain pen that I discovered, I think it was back in 2009. I did a review of a pen called the Sailor Ink Bar. So, there's this whole through line of inexpensive white plastic barrel fountain pens with blue-black ink. Yeah. That kind of all roll through since 2009 on the blog. And this is a category that I love, right? The Ink Bar was such a popular pen because it was just kind of this inexpensive disposable pen. But it was also cool-looking for people who like, you know, cool-looking pens and had, you know, blue-black ink. And then it just went away. And I kind of, the Purpinep was the kind of the, not predecessor, what is the, what would be the follow-up to that pen? And it kind of took the place of it later, you know, a decade later. And became one of my literal favorite pens. Of all time. And it's just this $7 plastic pen. Well, now you can get this basic white one at Muji. The problem is, they don't seem to be super accessible at Muji. Like, I was still finding the links before I discovered that I'd actually talked about this before, which I'll get to. My whole discovery process here. I just went to Muji. And I guess I went to the U.S. site. Doesn't exist. Like, it's just not there. So, I was having to search around all over. I only found it on the Canadian Muji site and the Philippines Muji site to actually purchase this pen, which is about $5. So, and it turns out that I didn't miss when this pen launched back in February of 2022. As I was searching, I found it on our friend Jacob at Food A Fan on Instagram. He had an Instagram post from February 2022 that I did not heart, Myke. I did not heart that post, nor did I save that post. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. So, I was like, in my head now. This actually really bothered me because how did I not see this? Like, I feel like I would have raved about this pen if I saw it. And that would have been the first place I saw it. And I certainly would have hearted that post, Myke. And it was not hearted. It is now hearted by at Pen Addict. Good. If you go and look now. I'm happy you rectified this travesty. From the February 2022 post of Jacob at Food A Fan.

Myke Hurley: Also, you say hearted? Like, you say that in your mind? Like, if you're doing that to a post, you're hearting it? Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. See, I say liked. I still say liked in my brain. Sure.

Brad Dowdy: I'll heart it or I'll thumbs up it. I just never like it unless the button, like, literally says like.

Myke Hurley: Like, okay.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. Okay. So, on YouTube, YouTube's thumbs up and Instagram's is hearts. I hearted that post, yes. I did not heart it, Myke. So, I was even more confused. Like, how did I miss this? So, then I went on a search. I searched all the Pen Addict archives. I searched the Relay archives. Oddly enough, like, so, here's my investigative mind at work. So, since Jacob posted that February 22, I was like, oh, if I would have seen that, I certainly would have discussed it around that timeframe. So, I went back into our archives and to, into the, into the Wayback Machine of our podcast archives and was looking for the links. Did I discuss this? Did I discuss this? Turns out we had Jacob on. It's not we. I had Jacob on in March of 2022. Not once did this pen come up in that conversation. And literally, like, a month after him. So, even in my research to talk to Jacob, I missed this. And then it was still bothering me. I was like, how did I not talk about this around that timeframe? And then I found it, Myke. Episode 501. In the Ask TPA section. From frequent Ask TPA or Fibber. Hey, have you seen the new Muji fountain pen? Boom. So, I am not crazy. Well, I'm, based on this conversation, technically, I am.

Myke Hurley: I'm going to say, Brad, you two sound a little unhinged at this point.

Rediscovery of the Muji Polycarbonate Fountain Pen

Brad Dowdy: A little unhinged. But I feel satisfied that I did find the original mention of this pen in episode 501 at the 46-minute mark. That's how much it was bothering me that I hadn't found this pen. That I had talked about this pen before. It bothered me so much. Because I love it so much, Myke. And I was distraught at missing this. The most perfect pen ever. I mean, okay, that's a little hyperbolic. Like, I'll grant everyone that. But still, you know how I feel about a product like this. And for me to feel that I had somehow missed it over like a year and a half ago was completely bothersome to me. So, there you go. We'll have a bunch of links in the show notes to go check out this pen. The only thing I want to hear now is if people can find this pen. Right? That's what I'm curious about. You may just have to go in person to your local Muji store and see if you can come up with this. You can't buy it online? Well, like I said, I only found it on the Canada site and the Philippines site. Right? I have links to those. But not in the U.S. site. I didn't even see them on the Japan site. But I could have missed it. So, and yeah. Like, this is the pen.

Myke Hurley: Go to Muji in the U.K. and see if I can find it.

Brad Dowdy: All right. It's called the Muji Polycarbonate Fountain Pen is how they list the products generally. Terrible name. Right? Like, it's just not good. It's, it's, people aren't going to just stumble across it. But if you see these in the wild, like if you walk into a Muji store, see a bunch of just generic white looking pens. This is the Platinum Preppy in the awesome white barrel. And it's just going to be the best pen. Like I wrote in our show notes, you cannot buy too many of these pens. Right? Because you'll either use them yourself, you'll give them to people as, hey, do you want to try a fountain pen? Like we always talk about the Platinum Preppy. And a lot of people know about Muji that may not know about like a lot of stationery things. But they know that, hey, Muji pens are good or Muji notebooks are good.

Myke Hurley: The U.K. site doesn't have any fountain pens. Oh, it does have one. Weirdly, it doesn't. The metal one? When I search the word fountain pen, it doesn't come up. But if I search the right, I find the aluminum one, which is weird. But, yeah, it doesn't look like they have the polycarbonate one.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. So I'm just curious now if people that go to Muji stores, can they find this pen? Because it's been out for a year and a half now, apparently, and I never hear about it, which is kind of how I got to this point of disillusionment on what I had actually seen previously. So my apologies to the pen world for repeating myself. But I was really flummoxed on this whole situation here. But I'm glad I've sorted it out, Myke. Aren't you happy for me?

Myke Hurley: I'm so happy for you that you found peace.

Discussion of the TWSBI Eco Heat pen

Brad Dowdy: I did find peace. I also found peace in this next pen, Myke. Okay. And it is the TWSBI Eco Heat. We are bringing the heat this week. Myke, what do you think about the TWSBI Eco Heat?

Myke Hurley: I haven't. Oh, okay. See, from the link that you put in the show notes, it just went to the pen chalet page. And I didn't know that heat was the name of the color. It's the orange one. Okay. So I saw the orange one. I was like, oh, that looks fun. So, yes, this is good. This is good.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I'm the same way. This is good, right? This is the first, like, TWSBI. I think I've bought every TWSBI version that has come out, their new color versions. Like, let me be very clear. They're not inspired. They just keep picking really good colors, right? But I'm not going to say, oh, like, this is some groundbreaking thing. But they do a really good job at color selection. They're just a little bit off the basics into kind of these cool color ranges, which I do like and do appreciate it. So they had the limited edition orange one that was Japan only or it might have been China only. I can't remember the exact location. And it was more like orange peel orange, like pure traditional orange. This has a little tint of yellow in it.

Myke Hurley: I was going to say, like, I can't tell if it's, like, there's, like, a gradient going on here or if it's just the way the orange reacts to different lighting.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I don't think there's a gradient. I think it just has that lightness in the color that is giving it that sunshiny orange as opposed to, like, a pure, like, orange peel type of orange that you might expect. So I think it's good. I've actually, I'm going to use this one for me in my own rotation for a while. This is the first one I've probably bought for myself in a long time. But it's a good color. I will ink it up with some fun inks. Maybe Fire on Fire. I don't know. That seems like the obvious choice.

Myke Hurley: That seems like the one.

Brad Dowdy: But I could always go with a yellow ink. Like, I do like some, if I can get it, like, my good yellow inks that I like, I can put that in there. Like, Orochizuku Daikokuten, which is one of those anniversary inks, which I really like. So I don't know. But I bought this for myself, which is not something I've done from TWSBI in a long time. So I really like this color. It's obviously going to do really, really well. You shouldn't have any problem getting them, though. Like, this is a pen they make a lot of, right? So, like, you don't have to run out and go crazy trying to get one of these. Like, they're very well in stock at our good friend's pen, shall I? So I should have plenty more coming your way.

Myke Hurley: Very cool.

Market dynamics and competition in the fountain pen industry

Brad Dowdy: What I don't know, Myke, and I'm curious about, is how many more Pelicans are coming our way. Okay. I mean Pelican fountain pens. So news broke the past week that Pelican, the brand, has been sold. And our good friend Joshua Danieley at Pelican's Perch, of course, has all the details. And I'm basically linking this to implore you to go read all the ins and outs of this transaction. But the short version is Pelican was sold to a French brand called Hamlin, the Hamlin Group. And I'll more on that in a second. And there are a lot of interesting tidbits in Joshua's reporting on this. I want to read this one snippet I clipped on the reasonings why. And then we'll get into more on maybe what it means for us. Okay. So this is the reason why they sold it. And yesterday's filing with Bursa Malaysia, which is where the current ownership group was, I guess, a Malaysian group. Pelican cited changes with their distribution channels, production technology, and the global economy as the rationale for selling the brand, which they've held on to since 2005. So this was the previous owner group. Wholesalers, Pelican's main customers in the past, have increasingly been replaced by more direct distribution channels, a change that has resulted in high complexity and increased margin pressures. At the end of the day, Pelican felt that they lacked the resources necessary to continue to invest into the changes within those channels, resulting in the company being less competitive in the global marketplace. So now you take this and juxtapose that with the fact that 93% of Pelican's business is school and office supplies.

Brad Dowdy: Their luxury brands, the fountain pen section, luxury writing, 7% of their market. So this is great context to have when we think about the things we talk about. And this goes for a lot of brands, right?

Brad Dowdy: The love, the oversized love and reverence we have for, say, like a Pelican fountain pen or a Pelican fountain pen ink is a really small factor. Well, it's not tiny, though. Like it's 7%. And to add more context to this, they do like annual sales of like, what was it? 140 something million. So the fountain pen, the luxury brands lineup is responsible for 10 to $15 million in sales a year. For us, that's a big number, right? But for Pelican, it's a very small line item. So the fine writing instruments division accounts for 7% of Pelican's 2022 sales. So that's interesting, right? Like I find this interesting that what we as Penatic listeners think of as Pelican is actually a very small fraction of the Pelican business. And I think we lose sight of some of that sometimes when we talk about some of these larger companies, you know, including like Sailor and Pilot and that have a lot of other things going on, you know, in their business operations. Right. So I think I'm surprised that they are struggling in the marketplace.

Myke Hurley: I feel like, by and large, Pelican are a bit more ignored now than they used to be. I think that competition has increased around them quite significantly. And I don't think that they have rose to the challenge like some of the competitors have. That's my reading situation.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. But then I look at your statement and then I think, I don't even know their competitors, right? Because 93% of the business is not the part of the business that I am focused on, right? So who are their school supply and office supply competitors? Well, that's who ended up buying them, right? So the Hamlin group, I looked at the list of products that Joshua listed or the list of brands under the Hamlin umbrella. I recognize two of them. So Oxford and Cambridge. Interesting combination there. Those are two like office supply staples. That just hit me when I was saying that out loud. That literally just hit me. So a lot of their whole lineup is essentially school and office supplies, right? So this brand, what are they going to do with a high-end luxury fountain pen lineup? Are they going to keep it? Are they going to keep that going? Are they going to spin that off and sell the luxury portion or the fine writing instruments division? Like is that a thing? Like these are all things Joshua talks about. So this is a great read. And I'm going to say something that I rarely say. You should actually read the comments section, which the internet common idea is you should never read the comments. The comments on this are actually very good. There's some good conversations and some good breakdowns in the comments on what people are thinking about this. And there is some general – and people that are reading Joshua's site are fountain pen fans, right? This is the 7% of the market that is commenting on this post. And they're generally positive that we could have a good outcome as fountain pen fans. You know, whether that's a sale of the division or a refocusing of what that part of the company means to the overall brand. So it's interesting. And Joshua obviously has some really, really smart takes on all of this. So I implore you all to read that and read the comments. So there's a lot of good stuff.

Myke Hurley: So do you think my take is wrong?

Brad Dowdy: Like that Pelican hasn't really been competitive? If we talk about it from the fine writing instrument, if we talk about it from that 7% market, I do agree. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah. And my statement of that doesn't mean I dislike Pelican or what they do. And that's not what I'm saying either. Yeah. To me, they're the most static brand.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Big brand out there, right?

Myke Hurley: I feel like there was a time where it was like, oh, man, it's like the best thing you can get. Like I remember when I got my M205, it was like a big deal. But that was like 10 years ago, like eight or nine years ago. And I feel like their pens today aren't massively different. And every now and then they do something special like the Ocean Swallow or whatever. But it's not like if I look at Platinum, right? I feel like Platinum and Maroon are in a similar state. And we're going to talk about them again today. But then they decided seemingly all of a sudden to just churn out loads of really interesting 3776s. And I feel like that is a thing that Pelican has not awoken to do. Of like, we're going to take one of our models that people like and we're going to make a bunch of really interesting looking ones. And I feel like Pelican seem to do it quite sporadically. And they haven't necessarily broken outside of what they are known for doing. So like they have their fans, but I don't think that they've done as good a job of like expanding their design range to include more people.

Brad Dowdy: Right. And if we're going to have a completely fair conversation, I would have to rope in my hitters over at Pilot. And you could take everything you just said, take out the word Pelican and put Pilot in there. Yeah. I think that's the closest thing we have. Although I think Pilot is a larger company. They have more different subsidiaries and more different things that we don't even know about that's in their business model. But as the fine writing market, you see very little change at Pilot, which is something I've yelled about for years. And I think Pelican is the same way, right? Like where is the innovation? Where is the, you know, the style changes, the idea changes, the modernization of the product lineup changes, you know, all these things. I think you could very much go down like Pelican and Pilot's product lineups and have a very one-to-one type of relationship with what we see from both. So I just wanted to point that out that I think they are actually, those two companies are actually very similar in what they are. But Pilot probably has a leg up in Japan, I would say, in the general marketplace. So I don't know what those numbers and what that comparison looks like. I would love to see that. But I do feel in that fine writing division, I feel like they can both get caught up in that same rut of our stuff is so good. And we're just going to keep pumping out the same stuff and people are going to keep buying it, right? So, yeah, I think it's very similar. So this will be interesting to see over the next year or two with Pelican what changes we see in the market, in the fountain pen lineup, fine writing lineup, the 7% lineup. Because that's what we focus on, right? Like, you know, the rest of the stuff is like, man, I haven't even heard of all these brands.

Brad Dowdy: Yep, we are super special. We are fine writing.

Myke Hurley: Genuinely, though, like, I feel like I can't wrap my head around what the other 93% is.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: What is the, who's, what is it?

Brad Dowdy: Who's buying it? It's 44% school supplies, 36% office supplies.

Myke Hurley: Who is buying Pelican office supplies? I don't know. Is it? I mean, it must be in like.

Brad Dowdy: So then there's fractions of other things which are not listed, you know, specifically.

Myke Hurley: It must be in like Germany or something, right? That like a bunch of German companies are buying like all Pelican office supplies.

Brad Dowdy: Right. So that's 80% of sales, another 7% in fine writing. So that leaves 13%, which is not directly accounted for in this post, but, you know, just random things.

Myke Hurley: So as wild to me, I mean, it's telling me two things, which is either.

Myke Hurley: They don't. I'm trying to work it out because like the fine writing stuff must account for like a large amount of revenue, right? It's 10 to 15 million based on the percentages. Right. Because the prices are more expensive. So they must be absolutely crushing it.

Myke Hurley: Well, I mean, that's probably why Hamlin bought them then, right? Because Hamlin do office supplies. They just want an office supply company. Pelican must be destroying it in Europe.

Brad Dowdy: So that's the one interesting takeaway that I had from like the business aspects of this and reading Joshua's dissection of this is that this brand is profitable, but the shareholders are not getting their dividends. Right. So Pelican is actually making money every year, but not enough money to pay out more to the stockholders, which is just like a completely weird concept to me. Right.

Myke Hurley: But that's where I feel that why like I've focused on the high end stuff. There is more room in there and that would account for a higher profit. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So it's interesting. Like I am not obviously like really dialed into like these aspects, but I find the concepts and the moving and shaking very interesting. And I'm glad that we got to see some numbers here. Right. To kind of help, you know, frame some of the conversation. It's interesting when we and you can use these kind of conversations to think about the other brands that we talk about, too. Right. Like thinking about how much we talk about a Pelican fountain pen or ink and that it's just such a fractional piece of the bigger Pelican puzzle is just kind of mind blowing. And I think it's very interesting.

Myke Hurley: This episode of the pen addict is brought to you by our friends at Enigma Stationary. Enigma Stationary offer unique items made from in-house designs alongside top brands, which include now Troublemaker Inks, which is a fantastic name. Ferris Wheel Press with the best packaging in the game and Thousand Skies. You can join Enigma Stationary as well at the Pacific Northwest Pen Show from July 8th to the 9th in Portland, Oregon. Enigma Stationary are launching several new items at the show, including some fresh imports from overseas and their newest exclusive pen, Special Edition No. 7 PDX. PDX was made by Terry at Hogtown Pens using his Adelaide pen model. The material was a new blank from Enigma with green, yellow, white and blue colors inspired by the City of Portland flag. This edition includes just 10 pens priced at $200, including your choice of Yobo No. 6 nib. Now, Enigma have put up the pen on the site so you can go look at it in advance, and that is quite a handsome blank that they have produced here. The colors look fantastic.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it is going to do absolutely gangbusters at the Pacific Northwest Pen Show. Y'all should all go see Enigma Stationary there. Y'all should all go make the time to go to the Pacific Northwest Pen Show if you're in the area this weekend. It is a Saturday-Sunday show, which will be very cool. And I promise you, you want to hold some of your budget for the Enigma Stationary table. Because when you get there, if you're going to look for this pen, having seen Dan and family at the San Francisco Pen Show last year, the amount of goods they bring that are just so cool. You like go down their table and you're just like, oh yeah, I need that and I need that. It's one of those tables that you come away with like a handful of stuff. And especially seeing this pen that has the colors of the Portland city flag on there. Myke, I think it's going to do gangbusters at the Pacific Northwest Pen Show. It's very cool.

Myke Hurley: As Brad mentioned, Enigma Stationary will have many other exclusive pens and products available at the show. But if you can't make it to Portland, don't worry. New items will arrive on their website by July 12th. I expect if stuff isn't bought, it will be there. If it's all bought, I'm sure they'll have some other fun goodies as well. Go check it out for yourself today at enigmastationery.com slash penaddict. And you can use the promo code penaddict to check out. And you'll receive a free gift and discounted shipping on orders of over $40 or more. That is enigmastationery.com slash penaddict. And the code penaddict information will be in the show notes. Our thanks to Enigma Stationary for their support of this show and RelayFM.

Brad Dowdy: Shout out of the week, Myke.

Myke Hurley: Shout out of the week.

Brad Dowdy: Extra Fine Writing, which is a newish, what do you call writing on Substack? They're not necessarily newsletter. It's a Substack. Just call it a Substack. Yeah. Okay. All right. So it's a Substack that I've been following, I don't know, maybe the last six or eight months. I describe Extra Fine Writing as a stationery fever dream, Myke. It is one of the weirdest, wildest, most fun stationery blogs. I'm really stuck on what I got. But it's, you know, it's singular. It's a Substack. It's a Substack. All right. It's a Substack. But it's a blog letter stack.

Myke Hurley: It's a Substack. Just call it what it is. It's what it is.

Brad Dowdy: All right. It's a Substack. There you go. So all you got to do, Myke, is go over to the Substack. Click on the About page. And my commentary on what Extra Fine Writing is comes to life immediately on the About page. It says, Extra Fine Writing is this picture, but as a newsletter. What is that picture, Myke? It's a picture of the chaos pen. It is the chaos pen. And not just a picture of the chaos pen. It's one of the marketing images with Sylvester Stallone in it. And it's just freaking glorious. And the subheading is this is the best picture of the best pen that has or ever will exist. It perfectly captures the joy and exuberance of fine writing and also skulls. So this is everything you need to know about Extra Fine Writing. All of the writing is this. Like you take this introduction to the Substack and transform that into a weekly product review. And this is what you get. It just so happens this week they reviewed a spoke design pen and just absolutely went off in the best way possible. Right. Like we need to rename this pen. Like that was their their idea on our spoke roadie to perforated lava pen that we just launched a couple weeks ago. And it's like we need a better name for this pen. Here are my ideas. And it's great. Like I love that. I love that. So I thought it was really fun. So go check out Extra Fine Writing. And yeah, it's it's kind of fantastic. So go check it out.

Critique of the Platinum 3776 Fuji Unkei Uroko Kumo pen

Brad Dowdy: Two weeks ago, Myke, we talked about the Platinum 3776 new series. The Fuji Unkei Uroko Kumo. And I still haven't learned how to pronounce that yet. And we were talking about it because I had gotten an image that I wanted to share. Then I realized that it was a private image. So I chose not to share it, but I still talked about it. But now the full release and the pre-orders are out. Like all the images are out of the pen. So I wanted to follow up on that. Link it to the show notes. You and I had seen it already. You mentioned how you really liked it. But I wanted to put that as a follow up link to the.

Myke Hurley: I liked the image you showed me more than the images I've seen now.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. I very much dislike this pen. Yeah. I'm going to go on the record. I don't like it. From the beginning, I did not like it. No.

Myke Hurley: I'm like, okay. I liked the image you showed me. It's fine. Yeah. This I don't like. Like, I don't understand why that's changed. But now I'm seeing it. It just looks like a bunch of holes in a pen. Yeah. Which I don't like. You know, the tryptophobia thing. Like I have that. And so I'm just looking at this and I'm not enjoying what I'm seeing. I think the image that you showed me was low enough resolution or something that it made it look better. I don't know. But now I'm not a fan of this. I'm not a fan of this.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. I mean, I'm not, I don't feel like justified in my thinking, but I really felt like an outlier. The people who are seeing this were loving it. And that's great. Like, you should absolutely love this pen if you love this pen. But it's like, this is very like, it's a very disjointed design.

Myke Hurley: Because all of these images have come from platinum and it looks like one photo shoot. And they put a bunch of watermarks on it, which makes it look like the word platinum is printed on the pen cap, which is just so stupid. I don't know. That's what everyone has now. I don't know what they think is going to happen. Like what is going to be like some, Oh, it's a fake image. Like it's, this doesn't make any sense to me. Why platinum have watermarked the images they've given defenders. It's like, I'm going to hold out like for a third, you know, like I want to see somebody take a photo of this pen. In studio images. Because this does not look like what you sent to me. And I don't really understand what's happening.

Brad Dowdy: This is a very much more aggressive looking pen than what I sent. And to me, like I said, it's a very disjointed design to me. I would want, I understand based on the theme picture that we were able to share last week, what they're going, trying to do. I just don't think it needed this type of differentiations in cap design and barrel design. There's, I want some kind of through line instead of like a, this one's very divisive. It's like, it's a very dividing line type of pen. So I think it's going to do well, right? This is a good pen. People want to get in on the new series of the Mount Fuji series. So like, this will be the first of five, one a year for the next five years. So this will obviously do well. A lot of people will buy it. We do now know the price of it, which is $396, which is probably exactly what I would have guessed for this pen. Like that's the current kind of going rate. I'm glad it at least starts with a three and not like a four or something, which they were getting to with some of the last, the previous product lineup after the Kumpu, they started just kind of really ramping up the pricing on these pens. Some of them getting up into the 400s. This seems better. This is also a 3000 unit edition of pens. So 300 pieces. So 396 seems about right for this pen. So no, no qualms with the pricing on it.

Myke Hurley: So if they make 3000, why didn't they make an extra 776 of them?

Brad Dowdy: I don't know if they used to do that. I don't know what the holdup is. It's like, it seems like that's the thing to do, but I mean, that's a, that's a, that's a big number.

Myke Hurley: I mean, it's again, a lot more. I mean, you're adding like 30% more on top, but I just got to say it, you know, I'm with

Brad Dowdy: you. Like, it feels weird. Hey, it's the 3776 limited to 3000. It's like you had an opportunity, but that's a big chunk.

Myke Hurley: That's a big price. But like, it feels, yeah. Anyway. Yeah. It's expensive.

Brad Dowdy: A lot of times, a lot of times they'll just go with like a thousand. Right. And it's like, okay. Yeah. Like they're not even close to 3776, but it feels like a little bit close, but it's also very, very pricey.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So anyway, that's the followup on that. And with that, I want to get into a little mini topic. I was thinking about coming off of vacation, Myke, if you'll allow me. And I think it's probably, I don't know that I'm in the summer stationery doldrums. Like I don't feel like I am, but I've coming off a vacation where I didn't use much stationery and I came home from that trip and sat at my desk and I was like, I don't know what to use. Like, what should I pick up? Like I have the world at my fingertips, right? Like I can literally do anything. And I couldn't, like I was, it was like, I was locked up. I was like, oh, what is this? What is happening? And I quickly got out of it, right? Like you start, just pick up a pen, start writing, pick up a notebook, start writing. But you start thinking about all these things that we have. And we also, as shown by this specific podcast, we're also driven a lot by the news cycle, the release cycle, you know, what's going on in the broader stationery community, what's new and coming up. And we've obviously talked about those things a lot here. But it feels like this time of year is always like the quiet period in stationery, like pre August, even though it's like back to school season, that really has kind of fallen flat over the past decade or so, because there's not a lot of change by the broader companies, the bigger companies like your pilots, Uniballs, Pentels. They're not doing much new stuff that are bringing out like the reels, like school supply season. So like school supply season is not really a thing anymore for me. So when I was looking at this, I was like, why am I feeling a little bit, you know, having the stationery doldrums right now? And I thought about like, what seasons do we have during the year for stationery? Like, what are the ones I always talk about? It's February is always a big one for me, because that seems to be the product release time for the first half of the year, right? People, the companies have gotten past the holidays and are into a new year and they start talking about all the new products that are coming in like March, April, May timeframe, right? So, you know, that seems like a season to me, like February new release season. Then we have August planner season, right? We're about to run up on that now. And oh my gosh, there's already stuff popping out now for planners, which is just really bothersome for me in this far ahead for 2024. But that's, that is something we will definitely cover in another month or two. And then we kind of have the holiday season, right? There's general good amount of new releases, like around the October timeframe leading into like the November, December holiday time. So those are the seasons I see like in the stationery world. And I'm sure there's more like little subseasons and other things that I'm missing. So I was thinking about during this kind of gap that we have right now, what can we do to get out of the stationery doldrums? And I came up with a few small things that you can probably all think about this yourself. And you could probably come up with these same answers that I did, but I wanted to put them down in paper and kind of put some of these things into practice, which I have done recently. And since I've come back from vacation to just kind of reboot and refresh my love for stationery, like it never goes away, right? But we all have these days, right? Where we have a day or two or maybe a week or even longer where it's like, you know what? I just can't, I can't pick up a pen right now. I'm not inspired, right? I'm not inspired to write or to use things. So that's, that's tip number one is use something new. And I mean this in something you currently own. Like I'm not telling you to go out and buy stuff, right? What do you have that you haven't used recently? Like take a good look at, you know, do you have like myself, do you have 12 fountain pen inks inked up and that's what you're using all the time? Well, maybe I should grab a multi pen, right? Why not grab like a Jetstream multi pen or a Kalido multi pen? Pick one of those up. You know, it's one of my favorite, some of my favorite products ever are these classic multi pen designs. Use that for a week, right? Grab a wooden pencil. You know, I love my wooden pencils. I haven't been using them for months. Why don't I dedicate, you know, some time with wooden pencils and don't pick up the same, you know, Blackwing 602 that I'll always grab, you know, go find a different one. Like I've got stacks of this stuff and you can all do that individually too. You know, if you only use fountain pens, well, maybe you have one that's sitting around that you haven't used for six months. How about go ink that one up? Give that one a shot. So a couple of recommendations that I have for multi pens and wooden pencils. Like if you do, like I'm not, again, I'm not saying go buy something new, but if you haven't used a Pilot High Tech Sea Kalido and you're a fountain pen user and you want to try a neat gel pen, you can buy a three cartridge Pilot High Tech Sea Kalido and refills for like under 10 bucks. And you get a really good writing experience, a really fun type of pen to use differently than you use your fountain pens. And that's the key here is kind of setting aside what you normally use to discover something new. And for a pencil, how about the Mitsubishi Office 9850? I think it might be the best pencil ever made. And I've kind of gone on record with that. And it's like, it's like a dollar or a dollar 10, right? Like these things are like cheap. And it's such an interesting experience. Like if you only ever use pencils back when you were in school and you haven't used a pencil for 20 years and you pick up a Mitsubishi Office 9850, you go, oh, this is different. This is not what I'm used to growing up. So like, what do you think about like just trying something new, even if you have, you know, something, you know, personal, Myke, like what, what would you try new that you haven't been doing?

Myke Hurley: In stationery or in life?

Brad Dowdy: Both. I mean, I think it, I think it kind of all works together, right? Stationary is life, Myke.

Myke Hurley: It sure is. We should be. That's a, that's a t-shirt way to happen. I mean, I do agree with you that like, especially with hobbies, especially when there are hobbies that are like product driven in a way that there are a couple of things that can happen, which is one, like you get into the cycles, but two, you don't necessarily want to keep spending money all the time. And I think that there is a benefit to going back to stuff that you have and finding new things to do with those things. Like, I think one of the places that I found this easier, like generally is keyboards, where I have amassed this collection of like different things now from keyboards to keyboard switches and like keycaps and stuff that I have a more like a feeling of like, um, more endless customization options available to me that I can like go in and swap stuff around. Like imagine if it genuinely was easy to like swap all of your nibs between all of your fountain pens, right? Right. Like not just ink, but like imagine if all of every nib that you had, you could change, right? And that's kind of how I feel about like keycaps and stuff, right? Where there is a stand, there's much more standardization when it comes to, to keyboard stuff than it is fountain pens. And also keyboards are more like moddable and stuff like that. So you can go in and like tweak them and like play around with it. So with fountain pens, like, yeah, you've got like inks and stuff like that, but I feel like there's maybe different ways to express and like something that I was thinking of, of like, if I was going to do something new, is this something I would like to do, but I just don't know if I will do it realistically time, et cetera, et cetera. But like after listening to last week's episode, I love the idea of like Miranda's, what I'm thinking of is like purpose-led journals. So like when she was talking about having like particular journals for particular video games, like I think that that kind of thing is really cool, right? It's just like an idea of like, you know, giving yourself an excuse to do a certain thing. And like, I do feel like I've done a little bit of that with my theme system journal that like I use different pens, like I force myself to use different pens, you know? So like that's something. I also think of like Annabelle's F1 journal. Yeah. Right. Of like another thing where it's like, oh, here's this like very particular thing that I'm doing with my products that you kind of do in a bunch of stuff, which like you don't necessarily need to do it. I need to do it in the way that you're doing it, but you end up in a situation where it's like, oh, I've made something with more care because I'm forcing myself to take the time on it or something like that. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And the feeling when you do something about that is so cool and unique. Like I think like that's why we have the listeners that we do is because they find the like pure joy in discovering something that really like makes them feel good about, you know, using a pen and a piece of paper and right. It can be just any pen and piece of paper, but having those solutions or that little spark of creativity, I think it's super important. Like that's like really like at the core of what we do, this is, is figuring out what those little things are. So yeah, I think that's awesome. So like the second topic I had, it's, it's kind of like, you can probably relate to this too with some of the theme system journals, but you, you need to take a notebook and paper audit right now. Now is the half of the years gone. If you started a new planner or a journal at the start of 2023, where are you with that? Right? Did you, did you peter out in February? Like, is it you already done for the year in February? Hey, I'll raise my hand. Like that has happened to me before. And so what I did this year is I have three kind of notebooks in action and I assessed all of them. How, what is good about these three notebooks? And that's my plotter that I use for mostly like planning and work type stuff. I have my five year journal, my Hobonichi five year journal, which I started at the beginning of 2023. And then I have just my general everything notebook, which is just a life, a five notebook where just kind of notes and everything go. How have those products or ideas or ways I'm using those things? How have they worked so far? What has gone well? What has gone poorly? What can I change? What can I do better? So I wrote all that up for PenAC members this weekend in a Chronicles post that I do and just kind of broke down, Hey, here's my plotter. Here's what's going well. Here's what I'm not taking advantage of. How can I fix it? And then I did that for the Hobonichi and I did that for my everything journal. And I gave each one like a little grade, like, Hey, how has this gone this year? Well, my everything journal, it's been a C, right? How can I fix that? Like I, it's a C because I haven't been using it as much as I do. Like it's where my idea brain dumps kind of go. And I wrote how, like, I'm having millions of ideas, but they're going on scrap sheets of paper or in random places or in, you know, just on like places I'm not even like considering like the results of. I'm just like capturing somehow. Well, they need to go here. Like this is what this book is for. So like I literally wrote two, two and a half pages for just for this topic of the podcast today. Like I'm not going to talk about everything that I wrote down, but like I'm barely even looking at what I wrote, but I just wrote, like I opened up the notebook said, I'm going to write about this topic because it hit me the other day and I'm just going to open up this notebook and put the things there. My other choice, which happens a lot is I just don't write. I'll have the idea and then I won't do anything with it outside of leaving it in my head. And that's frustrating because I have these opportunities to sit here for whatever it took me, 20, 30 minutes to write these two and a half pages. And I just went, I just like went off. It doesn't matter, right? I used three different pens. I made all kinds of weird, like, you know, arrows and notations and things like that. Like none of it matters, but except that I did it, right? Like I got the thing out of my head, put it onto the paper, right? Like I'm literally holding this notebook while I'm talking to you. I have referenced it like very, very little, right? I don't, we don't do a podcast where I'd like read a script. So if y'all couldn't tell that by now. So literally take a notebook audit. Like, do you have one notebook you're using and you're using to capture everything or you have a bullet journal and, you know, you've done good for like three or four months, but you kind of fell out of the practice of doing it. Like why? Like think about why, like what broke to, to get that out, get you out of the habit of doing that. And how can you go about and fix that? Right? Like, like, do you ever run into something like that with your, your theme system journal, Myke, where you'll ever just kind of go on a run of like, I haven't used this for a week or in like, you get a little bit stuck in what you're writing every day.

Myke Hurley: No, sorry. I don't know.

Brad Dowdy: No, I figured I knew that answer going into it.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. The only time I don't do it is when I'm traveling and that's like a purposeful thing that I do. So like a variation to my life. Like it's, that is like a purposeful thing. So like, I don't feel like it's the same, but I mean. And this is the benefit of creating a system of your own and making a product for it. Right. Like, well, this, this works exactly the way that my brain works. But I mean, not to get to, you know, but that's kind of the point of the journal itself is it is intended to be flexible enough that you find the thing that you want to track every day, the things you want to write about every day, and then it should become easier to do that. That's my belief. So.

Brad Dowdy: Right. That's kind of what we said. That's, that's perfect. And that's actually why I wanted you to bring that up because you have actually found something that works and that allows you to stick to it. Right. So what I'm asking people, including myself is what about my systems works and where are those kind of like failure points and how can I overcome those and thinking about those types of things. So, and I'll just write down like, like literally write down this works. This does not work. And think about, well, if it doesn't work, do I just need to like fire that piece off into the sun and say, yeah, that doesn't work. Cool. Like I'm like one page a day planners do not work for me. It took me like two years of trying with like a Hobonichi Techo to say, hey, that doesn't work. And I was trying to force it to work. And sometimes you just got to say, that's not for me and move on to something else, try to figure it out. Last, um, last thing you can do is something we all need to do. Something that's always high on my priority list that I never ever do or do it rarely. And that's D stash, right? You need to like, not only audit your notebooks and how you're using them, which I mentioned before, just audit your stuff, right? Do you have pens that you don't use that you can sell gift rehome any of that stuff, right? You all know, like you're, you're all feeling seen right now. It's like, oh yeah. But to D stash, it's not always that straightforward. Like to me, there is a little bit of a process to a D stash. And I've done that when I've sold my pens before, like step one, you need to clean your desk or your workspace, right? You can't be sitting around with a mess. Like I'm staring at right now and actually think you're going to get anything D stashed whatsoever, right? Like first step is to organize what you have clean those spaces up. How do you know what you have, you know, unless you have it somewhat organized, right? And then, then start taking once you have like, okay, I've got all my pens organized. My fountain pens are in one place. Now take a real look. And if you haven't used the pen in like a year or two, like, when are you going to use it next? And if you're not, like, is there any reason to keep it right? Then like, we can all make excuses for why we have it, why we want to keep it. Oh, it brings back this memory, but it's also like, you know, an expensive pen that I haven't used in two years. Like really, what good is that to you? Maybe you can find a new favorite pen type of situation. So, you know, figure out what you want to sell, what you want to gift, what you want to rehome, inks are a problem, right? Like we all, well, I won't say we all, but me specifically, I get to an ink buying spree. Let's not, I won't, I won't lump everybody into my situation. That was my mistake.

Brad Dowdy: But y'all, you know who I'm talking about out there. You know who you are. Yeah. Like inks are difficult because once you have them, you kind of own them because to rehome ink is a challenge because it's one relatively inexpensive, right? You're not going to like get much cost back. And if you have to ship that, well, that's very expensive and kind of risky to do. So inks are very, very weird things. So if you can find a way to like, you know, if, if you live local to a pen show that you can drive to and that, that hat, that pen show might have a, uh, give one, take one type of table, you know, or something where they're giving things to beginners. Maybe you offload, you know, 20 of your ink bottles to give away at a pen show, something like that. That's a little, little bit more difficult. Um, and then the notebooks going back to the previous topic, de-stashing notebooks.

Reflections on using and preserving Tomoe River paper

Brad Dowdy: For example, if you've been hoarding Tomoe River original 52 GSM, are you using it? I want you to seriously consider those questions. Like, did you buy a thousand pages worth of Tomoe River just to sit on? Did you? And just, I did not. I did not. So that one, I'm not- I wasn't sure if you were looking in the mirror right now. No, there's not a mirror on this one, but that's what I thought of is like, people would buy five and 10 notebooks of this. And that's, that's something I've done, not for that particular product, knowing that I already have five and 10 notebooks I haven't used, right? So those are actually easier to rehome. You know, start using your Tomoe River paper stash, right? Like, just start using that stuff and commit to saying, hey, this is my favorite paper. I'm going to use it till it's gone. I want you to do that, right? I don't want you to take any of this stuff as it's too precious to use, right? And then when it's gone, you should be thankful that you had it in the first place, right? Like, it's just gone now, right? It's okay. You're going to be fine, right? You don't have to keep every last notebook stashed away of your beloved Tomoe River paper, right? So start using that and give away your other stuff, right? Let other people, you know, give them a notebook, something to try out, like, and start using like your fancy stuff. So that's kind of, those are kind of my quick tips. The overarching idea to get out of the old doldrums here is just to get creative, right? Think about what you have and how you use it, right? And, you know, if you have too much, figure out how to sell it and reinvest into something else that you want or gift it to someone who's getting into the hobby and wants to try the nice stuff, right? So use them differently, like Myke was saying about Miranda has specific gaming journals. Maybe you have a pen and a notebook and an ink that you're going to commit to using something new on. So there's all these little things just about using your stuff, you know? Like, for example, if you have all these A5 size notebooks and you're just not getting through them and you get 20 pages into one and you're put that away because there's another fancy A5 notebook over there, maybe you should use a pocket notebook for a time period and fill that up instead of halfway or a quarter way filling an A5 notebook, one of the 20 that are on your shelf right now. Maybe fill up a pocket notebook instead. Do something different. Get a little bit of creative. And then when you fill up that pocket notebook, maybe you'll be ready to just like jump back into one of those A5s and fill that thing up, right? We got to use this stuff. Use this stuff. So yeah, just think about getting creative. Maybe even like with the ink stuff, just if you know ink's hard to rehome or reship, maybe you reorganize your storage so you actually see what you have, right? So maybe you don't buy your fourth magenta ink bottle, right? Because you already have three, but you didn't realize it because your storage is a travesty. So things like that, get a little bit of creative creativity and thinking about all your stationery. Maybe that'll help you get out of the stationery doldrums. And this is something that I find during the summertime where we kind of, you know, don't have as much breaking news or interest in the hobby. Everyone's on vacation. Everyone's taking a break. Everyone's enjoying the summer, at least in the Northern hemisphere. I don't want to besmirch the winter down in the Southern hemisphere right now. So maybe you have the winter doldrums as well. So something to think about, something I wanted to talk about today, because it's something that hits home for me from time to time.

Myke Hurley: All right. If you want to get in touch with us, maybe you can share your feelings on this topic or you have any questions for us to answer on a future show, go to penaddictfeedback.com and you can fill in the form there. If you want to get in touch with us directly, you can find Brad on Mastodon. He's penaddict on mastodon.social. I'm imike on mike.social, I-M-Y-K-E. You can find Brad streaming twice a week. It's twice a week, right?

Brad Dowdy: Well, three on Wednesday. That's true. Tuesday, Thursday, 10 a.m. Eastern. 10 a.m.

Myke Hurley: Wednesday once we're done.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. 11.30-ish Eastern. And that one's always kind of up in the air.

Myke Hurley: Twitch.tv slash penaddict. You can go to penaddict.com, spulkdesign.com. And Brad is penaddict on Instagram as well. I'm imike, I-M-Y-K-E, and you can check out my work over at cortexbrand.com. Thank you so much to Enigma Stationery for the support of this episode. But most of all, thank you for listening. And we'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.