Editing The Pen Addict 673/transcript (section)

== Discussion shifts to Pelikan ownership changes and community events. ==

* And this year, the hubs are in October, late October, October 24th. So the announcement just came now. So people have just been curious. It's like, Hey, is this going to happen? You know, Pelican changed ownership a couple of years ago. And it's like, Oh, is this going to continue to happen?
* And it looks like it is. So there's going to be some updates coming into that. I know that's a big deal for a lot of communities for stationery lovers to kind of get together that may not have pin shows or like, you know, maybe they had a pin show in February and now they can get together in October and everyone can kind of meet and greet and share pins and have food and drinks and just hang out. And it's a, it's a great thing that Pelican has done over the years. So we'll, we'll see how this goes. And if it continues on, I hope it does. They're usually pretty generous with like some door prizes and some giveaways. These, you know, it's ranged in the past when, um, things were, you know, a lot more stable and they were more flush with cash. They would send out literal bottles of ink to almost everyone who was attending hubs. And now, you know, it's, it's down a little bit in, in how much they can send out, but the size of the hubs has also grown, um, like in volume. So it's still pretty neat that they have this buy-in from around the world to use this date, get together and, um, you know, celebrate fountain pens, uh, specifically Pelican. But it's not, uh, it's not limited to that by any stretch of the imagination. So check that out. That's some, uh, some cool news to come out because I know people have been wondering who, uh, attend every year. Very nice. Next up, this link just came across my Instagram feed. Um, Kaweco has an in-store product at their Nuremberg store where they worked with an engraver. Um, gosh, what's his name? I already forgot it. Uh, Alvaro de la Cruz engraver.ad and where Alvaro has been engraving various items for years, took 10 of the bronze sports. So Kaweco's pocket metal pen, right? They do a lot of different materials in there. I have a stainless one. I'd say the brass is the most popular one. And, um, so, uh, Alvaro de la Cruz, um, did some engraving on these pens. They're doing 10 of them. When I first saw this today, uh, I didn't read it clearly. And my initial, uh, what I thought I was reading is that Kaweco were teaming up with tennis player Carlos Alcaraz to do some kind of celebratory pen. That's what I originally thought this said. Um, but it didn't, it's not even nearly that. Uh, but that's where I was today. I would be into that actually. Like I'd be, I'd be cool with that too. They probably make more than 10, I'm assuming. That's what, that's when I questioned it. Uh, yes. I was like, that seems odd. Why would you do it that way? Uh, yeah. So this, I can kind of like somewhat put this in with like the price increase question. We're talking about Montegrappa. Like this is the kind of thing I do like to see that, like, I'm sure this is very expensive, right? Because it's handmade. But like, this is the kind of thing that I do find interesting, even though it's probably going to be like super costly. Like they're not even listing the price here. Who knows how much this is? Uh, I imagine it's high hundreds of dollars. Um, but you know, we'll see. But regardless, like this is what interests me these days is seeing pen platforms have their standard products and then do something a little bit extra with it. And I don't necessarily mean like a limited edition. I look at someone like Stanford pen studio who is doing a lot of hand painted work on fountain pens, which is something I enjoy. It's like a fountain pen plus type of experience, right? To where you can have, you know, like I can have all the sailors in the world I want, but maybe I want a painted sailor with maquiez on it, you know, something like that. And like, is, you know, those are the type of things I'm looking at. It's like, if I'm going to spend up, I want like a really unique experience. Um, you know, if I'm going to spend that much money, when you see like the basic pen prices going up into like two and $300 from what we could get before for like $150, you know, I still might spend $300 on a pen, but not as frequently. And if I do, I want it to be even more special. So then I'm looking at something like this Kaweco stuff. And I've actually become like a little bit more patient these days on like what pens I buy, right? They really have to strike a certain chord, um, you know, and, and price does, does play into that, um, you know, a pretty sizable amount, you know? So, um, anyway, I wanted to put, put this out there because I think this is really neat to see a brand working with an artist, even if it's in like a super small scale, most of us will never see this pen outside of Instagram in our entire lives, but I'm glad it's done and I'm glad it exists. Right. So like, that's why I just kind of wanted to shine a light on it. And it looks on top of it. It looks amazing. Right. It looks really, really spectacular. It looks like some real cross, crossmanship has gone on here. Yep. Yep. And if you actually, like, I've never heard of, uh, engraver AD before, but now if you go follow him on Instagram, it's like, oh, he's been engraving these Kawecos since last year. It's like, it's like, you know, it's literally right out there. Um, all this cool work he's doing. And so now I follow them and see what they come up with next. It'd be pretty cool. So it is him that's doing them. Cause I wondered if like, maybe he just came up with a design or something, but no, he's actually doing that. No, I think these are hand. I think these are handmade. Yeah. And then. And engraved. Kaweco is selling them. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Just like a, for the, a local, local shop.
* I mean, I'm, I'm assuming that's their home shop. Uh, you know, I don't think I have many like Kaweco shops. Or it's like the flagship store or something. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
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* Yes. It's really nice. That's what I was going to say. And I was looking at like, they, like, I love postcards, right? So, they have these, like, I'm looking at this Curator Dragon Mochi Shop postcard. Like, these look spectacular. Like, you know, I will buy like a handful of these postcards for sure. Just because I like that type of stuff. So, yeah. It's great. It's great.