Editing The Pen Addict 437/transcript (section)

== Dan's Sponsorship ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' I'm a Dan super fan. Yeah. I just want to be very clear. Dan has sponsored this episode of the podcast. Dan is currently sponsoring the Pen Addict blog this week for the launch of the Craftsman on Kickstarter. So, you know, Myke and I are very open about, you know, our advertising relationships. But these people are most of the time friends before they're, you know, sponsoring us. And I've worked with Dan since before the launch of his first product. And the Craftsman is the best product he's ever made. Without question.

'''Myke Hurley:''' And again, we'll just say, all the other ones are really good too. They're different kinds of products, I think. And the Craftsman, which is the Kickstarter campaign one, I have one. And it's in, it's concrete of a brass base, the one that I have. Yep. And I absolutely adore it. I adore it. It's fantastic.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, I just opened mine up yesterday. I just got it yesterday. And I have the orange one. What color did he send you? Like, we haven't talked about this. Blue. So, I've gone ahead and backed the Kickstarter for the blue one. Because I like it that much. I'm planning on doing it for the orange one.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. The Pinwell was such a cool product, right? It's a classic product that you've, that has been kind of modernized, right? For the way we do things nowadays with our pins. And it's turned out to be this really functional desk accessory. And, you know, he launched with the Pinwell. He started making that in different types of woods, different types of materials. Like you said, brass. And then he did some really cool lacquering ones. And did some very cool colors. And then he made the Traveler, which was kind of the portable Pinwell. And it was funny. You were talking about, you know, how you put them on your desk and use them for, you know, while you're doing your podcast. I have the Pinwell on my desk and then I have the Traveler where my photography setup is. So, I can put the pin, set the pin in the Traveler either to take pictures or to keep it from rolling off of where I'm shooting photographs. Yes. Which I've damaged a pin because it's rolled off there. So, I actually keep the Traveler where I shoot photos just to use because it works, right? Like I'm on this cool thing to keep my pins in. And then he comes out with this craftsman thing. And let me tell you, this is the best one out of the bunch. And I have them all. And, you know, Dan's been a good friend and sponsor over the years. And I've bought things from him over the years. But this is exactly what you like to see from companies getting their start in the way they iterate. And you can tell the improvements that are made. You can tell the refinement and the processes. You can tell the way the things are finished and the way the things are, you know, put together. That, you know, wow, this is something better every time. And that's what I want to see from a company.

'''Myke Hurley:''' This is it. It's like the original Pinwell was really fun. And it's a beautiful design. And it evokes a classic style of a Pinwell. But now the craftsman is like, you can see that this is a guy who has learned what his product is. And has made a version that is original. Right.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Right. So, yeah, this is the most standalone product, even though it's still traditionally styled. It is very modern. It is very cool. It is very functional. Let's talk about the function real quick. Do you know how much this thing weighs with the brass plate on it?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I don't, but it's heavy.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Almost a pound. So what I was laughing at earlier is I had to move this over to the left hand side of my laptop because I couldn't reach for it with my right hand and lift it with my cast hand. I had to move it over so I could have it near me on the left side because it's legit heavy. It's not a cheap product by any stretch of the imagination. But you can tell where the quality is and why it's the price that it is just in the way it's manufactured and how just substantial it is. It's like it is literally, you know, I don't even know how much these things are going to cost to ship. But, you know, that's it's a it's a big bulky product. But it's so cool. I don't know. I'm fawning over it because I legitimately love it. I'm not because Dan's a friend or Dan's advertising with us, but because I have it right here in my hand and I can tell what went into it to make it what it is. And I'm just very appreciative of that. I really like it.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, super, super good. So go check it out. Go check out the Kickstarter campaign. It looks nice. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So do you have the brass base on yours so you can get it? So this it's concrete, right? So you can use it just with the concrete part or you can add a brass base to it. Did you stick that on yours or are you using it separate?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Mine came with it attached.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' OK, so mine came disattached, which you can order it either way. And it's heavy enough without the brass to do a great job like on your desk. But that brass just kind of sets it off, right?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. For me, this is very, very much my aesthetic, the concrete and brass. He has definitely tapped into a specific type of Instagram, like Pinterest design style. Like it fits in that very well. Like I could have this could adorn many fancy Airbnbs, right? Like, yeah, you know, it would fit.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I didn't know the words. I didn't know the words to to put that in. But that's a thought I have. I was like, this is like the visual this is like perfect visual eye candy. Yeah. But for for people who don't know anything about fountain pens, but for people who love fountain pens or standard pens, you can use it for anything. You really it really sets it off like on your desk. It's kind of perfect. So, yeah, very much very happy with this. And great job, Dan. And I think this is the best design yet.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So I wanted to touch on a couple of items of follow up from last time.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Speaking of the best design yet.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. The 1911 Loch Ness Monster that we spoke about.

'''Myke Hurley:''' The Nibsmith posted some pictures of it outside. And the blue looks so much better than any other picture that I've seen. Mm hmm. But that like many other pens, it's like, oh, here is a bunch of pictures and it looks different in every single one of them. But if it was this blue, I like it more. But the points from last week still stand as to it's the wrong color for the name. And the name is weird.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I want to be crystal clear, which I feel like I have to be sometimes. I love how this pen looks. I love everything about this pen. Dan's pictures, I think, make it look even better. I just I'm just trying to figure out why, like the why the name and why. What is Sailor doing with their product offerings now as far as like standard editions and limited editions and regional editions? Like I'm not questioning how like how cool this pen looks. I think it looks awesome. And I bet this looks awesome in person. But just like we saw with the Pirate's Life, even Sailor had to redo their pictures on Instagram because people couldn't figure out what color it was. It's just one of those things that's difficult. But yeah, it's it's the Loch Ness Monster. It's blue and black and not very Loch Ness-y in my head. But, you know, it doesn't mean it's not an awesome pen. And I think it's super cool. I just I think I have the 4 a.m., which is blue and black to just translucent ear. So there you go. Great pen. Questionable. Other things. But yeah, it's pretty awesome.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So we also had to ask you a question about perforated notebooks. And something I never would have considered until you sent it to me is why not just buy a perforation cutter and do it yourself? You can turn any book into a perforated book.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I would have never considered this either because I didn't know this was a thing. It makes sense that this is a thing. But someone sent this to me and I was like, huh, I'll be danged. Look at this. You can just perfor your own notebook with like it's just like a rolling tool. Think of it like a box cutter, but with like a rotating blade to cut in the perfs. Right. So you just run that through, run that down your page, make your purse. I don't know how many pages this thing would cut through at a time, but you could do, you know, probably two or three at a time. It probably works pretty well. But there is actually a real life complete solution already built in for this mic. And I had no idea despite us reviewing Dingbat's notebooks on the Pen Addict before. They always get very good reviews. They're very good style, very well built. Good products, good notebooks, good paper. And they are perfed from front to back. So these are like, you know, the 184 page notebook, like your standard A5 thick notebook, perf right from the jump.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All of them?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep. 100. Oh, I'm looking at, okay. So like the wildlife collection. Yeah. It may not be in all their books. Yeah. So it's not all options. So like the earth collection, last 16 pages, micro perforated. Okay. Wildlife collection, 192 micro perforated pages.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, you know, there you go. So Dingbat's has this offering. And we've reviewed the wildlife collection. They're really nice. And I think everyone thinks of the very positively of the Dingbat's notebooks. I just didn't realize it was a front to back perforation. Like it says right here, 192 micro perforated pages. So I think that's your answer or that question, which I wasn't sure we were going to get an answer to. And honestly, I got one more. Someone sent me a notebook and I couldn't even read, couldn't find the link. I must not have saved it. It was from a brand I'd never heard of, but they had also done like a full perf type of notebook. But I would go with the Dingbat's because we at least have some experience and know that they're good quality stuff. But check, you know, if you're interested in this, make sure you're buying the correct model because they will not all contain the full perf perforated situation. But they're good. They're fairly priced, good quality, really good looking. So, yeah, highly recommend this. So that's a great, great answer and a great solution for a problem I didn't know we had, Myke. But, you know, apparently we did.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Graphon Faber-Castell has released their Pen of the Year for 2021. This name is such a strange thing because when you say Pen of the Year, you think like, oh, this is the one, the pen that they released and this is the best one. But it's not. It is the pen for the year 2021. So every year they release an incredibly expensive high end designed pen. This year it's called Knights. And the pen itself looks, evokes lots of knight and castle imagery. Like the cap has a, what is that thing called at the top of a castle? Is it a turret?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, but that's not the design feature being the turret, right? The, the kind of the up and down of the wall. I don't know the exact name. There's all kinds of terminology.

'''Myke Hurley:''' And the body is a nice kind of like wooden effect with it being a big jewel at the bottom. It's a cool looking pen.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Yeah. And this isn't normally like our, our arena to discuss, you know, 4,000 euro pens. That's not really our move here on the pen addict. But we do, we do, Myke, because of only one reason. There's only one reason we're discussing this pen, Myke.