Editing The Pen Addict 207/transcript (section)

== RoboGym Inquiry ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' You know, they don't do anything socially. They don't make anything necessarily interesting. They've had a couple good designs recently, but their price points are way out of line with what their competition's doing. So, that's like a standout. You know, some of the historical brands like Parker, Waterman, Cross, all those companies just don't get coverage because they're not making anything interesting within the price point that they need to compete at. And that's what it boils down to. I've enjoyed some of the Parkers that I've used recently, some of the current Parkers. They're just never going to compete with what else is out there on the market.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Couldn't agree with you more. It boils down to, do they make things that tick our boxes? Mm-hmm. And if they don't, then it's highly unlikely that we're going to talk about them. Right. Right.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, Tambone wants to know about pin purchase regrets. Um, her story is she got obsessed with getting her hands on a Sailor Pro gear, the all orange one, Myke, and ended up paying too much for one. So, she said, then it came and I was like, what is my problem? Any pins are that either you or I got caught up in the hype and were disappointed with purchase. You know, she's not necessarily saying like, that's a bad pin, but she got so obsessed with it, she probably overpaid instead of waiting. You know?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It is more like she had to have it now and then was disappointed. Is there anything you had to have now and was disappointed in? I'm trying to think myself.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I don't know in that exact way that like I maybe bought something that I shouldn't have bought. But I have definitely bought some pens that I've ended up regretting. Hmm.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' You know? Do you have a name?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, like the Vanishing Point. Sure. Okay. That's a good one for you. Yeah. I ended up like I kind of really put that pen on a pedestal without ever having actually used it. And after using it for a while, like I noticed immediately that it wasn't right for me, but tried to kind of like not think about it for a while. Right. And I was just talking about all the things I liked about it, but it was never comfortable for me to use. Yeah. Um, so, you know, that's definitely one, uh, outside of that, I think I would struggle to, I mean, I definitely got caught up in my, uh, custom made Edison. Um, and I paid more money than I should have, you know, like not that it wasn't a fair price, but like having a gold nib put on it was pointless. I don't know why I did that. Like I didn't necessarily need that. Um, their steel nibs are fantastic. Like I just went overboard. Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So you're not going to like this one, Myke. I think the one pen I regret getting is my orange Nakaya Nagoro.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Not because it's not a beautiful, awesome pen. It's because I did almost what you did where it was like such an impulse buy like, and I never use it because I don't love the nib on it. Like I bought it secondhand and I've never gotten the nib to where I want it to be to where it's my everyday carry pen. And that's what I want that pen to be. That's a pen that's made to be used. And I never ink it up because I don't love the nib.

'''Myke Hurley:''' What is the nib?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Um, it's a fine gold nib, but it just, and I've had Myke Masayama work on it and I've never gotten it to where I want it to. It's either not firm enough or not fine enough or not smooth enough or all of the above or none of the above. It's just, it's, it's in my head now at this point. Right? So I want to, I think I want to send it off and just get a new nib and that way it's mine. Right? That's the issue with buying something secondhand, especially something expensive secondhand. You'd never know. And while there's nothing technically wrong with the nib, it's just not mine. It's also gold, which is fine on that orange pen. It looks good. But I think if I had a rhodium plated extra fine or rhodium plated medium stub, I would use it so much more. So I don't regret owning the pen. I don't regret that it's sitting there on my desk. I do regret that I spent the money for something that expensive that wasn't like dead perfect for me. I like got caught up in like, there's one of the most amazing pens ever that looks exactly for me and I have to have it now. And that's kind of what I did. And I think that's kind of what Tammy did too. So I didn't have to do that at the time. It's like we talked about with your Nakaya. It's always, it's going to be there, right? There's going to be another opportunity. And I think that's one I regret a little bit, but I don't regret owning it. And like, but you know, I'm going to spend 200 more dollars to get it for me. You know, does that make sense?

'''Myke Hurley:''' That's the problem. That is the problem.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And I've been holding off on that because I don't want to spend 200 more dollars on it. So it's, I end up not using it because of that. So I don't know. I got to fix that. So, all right. Bellro wants to know, and I like this question a lot. Are you or Myke having any issues with limited edition fatigue? It seems like every vendor under the sun is releasing limited pens, limited inks. Heck, there was a limited edition traveler's notebooks for collectors. What say you?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I mean, luckily I don't buy into too much of it, right?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I'm shaking my head. Yes, vigorously.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So, you know, I like the limited edition of the things that I like. Yep. But the things that I like limited editions of are things that are already like collector's stuff, right? So when I came to Field Notes and when I came to Retro 51, they were already like had a history of making their like whole businesses around making things that are only available for a certain period of time. Like new items in their catalog. So limited editions fit within there. But I'm not a completionist of any of this stuff, so it doesn't bother me too much. But when there then starts to be like everyone jumping on that bandwagon, it gets a bit like I'm able to just be like, oh, this is ridiculous. But I don't buy into it. But I can see how it ends up being a problem. I wish that people wouldn't do it so much. Like I know that people really love the Blackwing, but it's just, you know, you look at it and you're like, what an original idea you had, Blackwing. You know, like it's like it's so clear that they, you know, that they looked at what Field Notes were doing and were like, we can get in on that action. Especially when I feel like a lot of the time, with like maybe one exception, in my opinion, they've not been very impressive. They're not impressive to new people in the way that Field Notes are. Field Notes can be impressive to people that don't care about notebooks because they do really interesting things. Not all of them, but lots of them. Yeah, but I do have the feeling of like, it's just too much.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I do think there's maybe some market fatigue. I don't, there's not any personal fatigue on my own because I don't buy, like you said, I don't buy into that. I'll buy a limited edition, not because it's a limited edition. I buy a limited edition because it's a product I already love, already use and know I'm going to use it. So, and I don't have to have it all, right? I've gotten to the point where, you know, maybe I used to, you know, have that fear of missing out on the limited edition thing. And I've gotten over that. So personally, I don't have limited edition fatigue. I like, I enjoy some of the releases of the products that I like in limited editions. And I'm happy to buy them and I'm even more happy to use them. I don't ever buy anything to collect and hoard, right? So, I mean, I buy it to collect it, but I'm buying it to use it, if you will. You know, it's not going to sit there and it's packaging. The market as a whole, maybe. I could see that where you're coming from with the comment. Maybe there's some limited edition fatigue within the marketplace as a whole.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I don't know if that's going to change. Maybe it will. Maybe it won't. We'll see. I mean, you know, things go in cycles right now. That's a pretty hot thing to do. You know, and we certainly do some of that stuff with Nock. And because we like making smaller batch things that are kind of cool. And so sometimes those things are limited. So, you know, I'm certainly part of that as well.

'''Myke Hurley:''' You're the problem, man.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, I know. Right. I'm playing both sides of the fence, Myke. All right. So Penhall wants to know what makes Customs Pen so good? Ignoring the fact that they are personalized to use, strictly looking at a quality and performance. Are they worth it? I find that they're very much worth it. And you can't ignore the fact that they're personalized to you.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. If you remove the fact that they're personalized, then there's no point in them existing.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Right. So I can pick out a material, pick out a barrel shape, pick out a design, and have the nib modified to fit into that and have it how I wanted and have that one-on-one service. That's what makes the Customs Pen so good. You can't ignore the personalization aspect of it. Quality and performance, they're just going to be different than if you compared them. Like, I have an Edison G10, the pens I've talked about today, the three pens I have inked up are a Pilot 823, which is a stock pen, a Pelican M205, which is a stock pen, and I have an Edison G10 Pearl, which is a completely off-the-charts custom pen. They do not compare at all. Like, you cannot put one of those pens up against each other. They're so different. Even though the Pelican has amazing quality and performance, the Pilot has amazing quality and performance. The Edison also has amazing quality and performance, but it has a material that I love and a shape that I love that's personal to me. That's what makes it such a good pen for me. That's why I paid $350 for it. It's not cheap. It's individually made. So, it is, they're so good because they are personalized to you. So, you can't really compare them otherwise. You know, you have to include that into comparing an Edison Pearl to a Pilot 823. You just do.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. Look, if you want to take all the personalization part out of it, then you are just paying for nothing.