Editing The Pen Addict 278/transcript (section)

== Baron Fig Pens ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep. So, my bad on that, Myke. I'm sorry I cost you money and didn't give you this pen. But we'll give it a happy home.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay. We can do that. We can take care of that.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Because I feel bad I didn't give it away. Like I said, I was. Especially to you. I don't know. Maybe I should give it to the listeners or something like that. I don't know. We'll see. We'll see. So, I wanted to bring up an article that my friend Jonathan Deans wrote, I guess, over the weekend. I just read it today. So, I don't know what day he published it. A couple days ago, I guess. And it was on one of our favorite topics for quite a long time on the show. And that's the Black Amber Lamy 2050th Anniversary Edition. I just put this in the doc this morning. So, I don't know if you got a chance to read it. And like Jonathan's post, they're usually, you know, long. You got to sit down and read it for, you know, 10 minutes or so and figure out what he's saying. But he's essentially kind of getting into what happened. Like trying to put his spin on what he thought happened with that edition and why Lamy kind of failed at that launch when they had kind of the world in their hands. They could have really, really knocked something out of the park here and it completely flopped. And so, he was just kind of breaking down between, you know, limited editions and, you know, his very economical style of writing. His sensibilities being in the economics business, you know, trying to figure all this out. And the short version is, his conclusion is that Lamy has a marketing problem. And I kind of agree with that. Like I don't, I never think of it, think of a large company as different entities within the company, right? I think of Lamy made a decision, not Lamy manufacturing, Lamy marketing, Lamy design, you know, those type of things. Like I never think of it that way. But that's why I enjoy reading his posts because he does think of it that way.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, there's like an interesting one in the technology world where you have Samsung, right? Like so Samsung make phones that compete with Apple. But Samsung also have a display division who supply displays for Apple's iPhone, right? So like it's a, that's always an interesting one that comes up in my other world.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Right, exactly, exactly. So I still am flummoxed by this whole thing. And I think Dr. Dean's kind of is too. But what really confuses me is that they do have some successes in marketing. And I look at it in the Asian market, which is where they're turning their focus a lot as a company, redoing their distributors across the world, pulling, I guess, some availability, like with the nib issues, the EF nibs from the Western market and moving to the Asian market. And I look back and I was thinking as I read the article, well, what successes has Lamy had? And do you remember the Lamy line friend series that I went cuckoo over with the bear and the duck and the bunny?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I saw those, I saw something I forgot to tell you. They had them, a table had them at the London Pen Show. They were like £120. I was like, don't even. Yeah, that's the aftermarket price. It was either £80 or £120. I can't remember the exact amount. I was like, it's not worth it. Either of those prices, that's ridiculous. It's a Safari, right?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. I mean, the original cost was premium, you know, but I think it was in the $60 or $70 US dollar range, if I'm remembering correctly. But that was a huge win for Lamy and it's still going, right? They killed that. And I wonder if it's just lack of knowledge of a lot of these other areas across the world and regionalizing some things. Like a lot of the Japanese pens, you know, do a lot of, you know, Asian things, Asian only, you know, productions. And then they'll do, like Sailor did, a North American release. Like Lamy, you know, I'm not saying they need to do that, but they've done some very cool things in Asia. Why don't they do more of that? Like, what are they, where's the gap there in the rest of their product lineup?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Priorities, man.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, it is. Well, they're going where the business is the hottest, right? Mm-hmm. So, you know, one of the, the other thing he, he talks about is their product lineup as a whole from the lower dollar to the higher dollar. And I want to read this one paragraph. There's a lot of paragraphs and a lot of sentences I could take out of this. This is one I took out. So this is from the post directly. It says, you could even argue that this surge is tailor-made for Lamy. Much of it's fuel. He's talking about the fountain pen as a thing in the world that we live in right now. Well, as, you know, that little surge in fountain pen buying. Much of it is fueled by younger people, from high school through to young professionals who value quality products, appreciate functional and minimalist designs, and are willing to make frequent purchases in the $50 to $200 price range. That almost sounds like a description of Lamy's target market, so they should be selling hand over fist to this group. But apart from the $2,000, they aren't. Their product lineup simply doesn't cut it, and many of those users find themselves more attracted by Pelicans, Pilots, and Twisbees. Instead of aspiring towards high-end Lamy's like the Dialog 3 and Emporium, they yearn for a Conan bulk filler, Pelican M800, and Pilum Custom 823. So I think he's absolutely right. Like, Lamy's high-end is non-existent, and as a company, I almost think they should just eliminate it. Unless they're going to do something really interesting and do something different than what they've been doing. Like, the Emporium was not a good pen. There was a couple other high-end pens that they do, and by Lamy high-end, we're talking in the $200 to $300 range. They just, the Scala, I think, was one of them. And the Dialog 3 is consistently, you know, talked bad about.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I do not remember the Emporium. I do not remember this pen.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So they don't really do well playing in this market. They should almost refocus and do more of the Lamy-Line Friends collaborations, right? I mean, I just think that's such a young and fun thing to do. And if they're not going to really put the efforts into the expensive end of the lineup, like the Black-Amber failure, well, can they do something on the lower end that makes it more intriguing? Like the Lamy Aeon. I don't know if that's going to be the winner that a lot of people think it is. I'm kind of on the other side of the fence. I don't think it's going to be much of a winner, but I do think the price is good. Like Jonathan thinks the price is probably too high for the Aeon. I don't think the price is bad. I just think the design is not compelling. It's, you know, you can get a black pen or you can get a silver pen, and it's kind of just a Lamy like everything else. You know, could they have done something more fun with that? And that seems to be where Lamy is kind of falling flat in my book. They don't seem like they're having very much fun doing what they're doing. And they can't get behind themselves as a company and push that because it's not exciting. You know, we are an online community. You know, we look at these things all day long. We change our minds quickly when the new shiny toy comes out, and the new Lamy never has that new shiny toy. They're not playing in the market that we're shopping in. And it doesn't mean they have to, but it's also an interesting business decision if they don't at least do something. And I've been, it's been probably, what, a year, year and a half since we've really questioned the direction Lamy's going. And this was a good look at it by Jonathan, and I suggest you all read it and, you know, come up with your own opinions. But I generally agree what he is saying across the board. But it's just like you want to get up in there and, you know, kind of shake them and, like, you know, check yourselves, look at what's going on. But at the same time, they know more than we do, right? That's always the way I look at these big companies. Like, I want to tell these companies what to do. Yes. But they have the data, right?

'''Myke Hurley:''' This is an incredibly useful thing to remember. I mean, we all get stuck in it. And, you know, my life is commenting on companies. Like, that's what I do for a living, right? Like, I talk about companies. But it's so easy to forget that, like, they know their business, or at least they should know their business better than I do. And you would expect that they have the data to back up the decisions that they make. You'd expect. Right. Right. But I've also worked inside of a huge company and know that it doesn't always work that way. Sure. Right.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Sure. I think a lot of us have had that experience, too. It's like, you know, so it's hard to say definitively what's going on. The appearances say, boy, this is really weird what they're doing. And are they going to make it? But I guess it all remains to be seen. You know, we'd like them to do more cool, fun things and, you know, continue to succeed and ride this wave of popularity and resurgence of fountain pens and writing as a whole has. But, you know, the past year of actions doesn't exactly have any, it doesn't give you much faith that they're going to fix any of that. So we'll see. We'll see. Because there are companies out there that do do it right. And they'll eventually just leave Lamy in the dust. And I'd hate to see that. I don't think that's going to happen. But I'm not exactly compelled by what they're offering me here in the past year or two.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. Should we take our first break for today?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, I hope Pen Chalet doesn't have a Lamy deal.