The Pen Addict 332/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	332
Title:	The Big Little Pen Show
Release Date:	October 31st, 2018
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	Ana Reinert
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 332
Audio File:	Audio Episode 332
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 332
Length:	7979 min <br />1.317 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Introduction/Podcast Setup

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 332. My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined by Brad Dowdy. Hi, Brad Dowdy. Hello, Myke Hurley. How are you today? Oh, I'm great. My voice is a little sore. We'll get to why shortly. And Anna Reinert, welcome back to the show.

Ana Reinert: Hello.

Myke Hurley: Two in a row.

Ana Reinert: Wow, my voice is super scratchy.

Myke Hurley: Yes, we're all scratchy. This episode is brought to you by Blue Apron. We are recording live from Toronto, Toronto, Canada, on the final stop of the Pen Addict North American Tour 2018.

Brad Dowdy: What a fantastic tour it has been. So, we have lots of thanks and we'll get to lots of thanks in the show. But I think, first and foremost, we need to thank our Kickstarter backers for making this happen. Yep. You are in for some wonderful video treats that Mr. Hurley has been working on diligently for days. Mm-hmm. And that will be out in the near future. It's very soon, actually.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I'm hoping by either the time this episode is released, because we're recording a few days early, or at least by the time episode 333 is up, then the Kickstarter backers should have the video that I've been put together. So, we're going to talk about what we've been doing, but I've just been grabbing little video clips. I almost think of it like, you know, when somebody would come over to your house with their holiday slides. This is how I'm kind of thinking of the video. I've just been taking these, like, little clips of all the things we've been doing. Most of them is just you two walking into different shops. Lots of butt shots. There's, like, a lot of those. A lot of just the backs of your heads, a very bright blue jacket and bright pink hair, just walking into various stores around North America, the continent of North America. I know we're in Canada right now. I feel like I have to make that very clear that I don't think that Canada is in America. Mm-hmm. I know this, but I like to say when everyone was asking me what we was doing, the North American tour, because I was in Chicago before you guys came to meet me in New York. Mm-hmm. I've done a couple of live shows, which has been wonderful. And, again, we couldn't have done the tour that I have done without the help of our Kickstarter backers because it helped cover my airfare to get to America and back from Canada. So I want to give an extra special thanks to Panatic listeners, who, if you've enjoyed, like, the Live Connected or the Live Upgrade or the two Live Ungenius episodes, that is also because of your generosity that I was able to come out and do this. So, again, thank you so much for your help with all of this stuff. It really does mean a lot to us. But let's start. Let's do this chronologically. So we were in New York, and we were always planning on doing our stationary tour. So we were going to go around to different stores in New York and check out the various goods and sundry that were contained within. But we also had the opportunity to do a meetup slash in-store event, which I like that phrase a lot. It's like, oh, I'm doing an in-store event today.

Brad Dowdy: I love saying those words out loud to my wife. It's like, what are you doing? Well, we're doing an in-store from 6 to 8 p.m. It makes you feel super special. We'll be in the in-store event. Us and our two best friends.

Myke Hurley: So we got to go to the Fountain Pen Hospital.

Fountain Pen Hospital Background

Myke Hurley: Do either of you want to give a bit of a background about the Fountain Pen Hospital, like why it is an important store or kind of the significance of it, at least?

Ana Reinert: Well, probably one of the biggest things is that Fountain Pen Hospital has actually been in that particular location since 1946. And so they're pretty much an institution in New York, and the same family has owned the business the entire time. So this is like the second generation that's running Fountain Pen Hospital. So it's the son and grandson or son?

Brad Dowdy: Currently, it's two sons.

Ana Reinert: Two sons. Running the show. Yeah, running the business.

Brad Dowdy: From their father who founded it.

Ana Reinert: And his brother.

Brad Dowdy: And his brother. And then one of the son's sons is now working there as well.

Myke Hurley: So that's three generations.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, three generations. The third has started to work there. So it was a really special experience because none of us had been there. Nope.

Brad Dowdy: And while we may know the name, we didn't really know the story. And those are the things that always stick with you the most about all this stuff that we do. So going there, number one, knowing its importance in just the history of fountain pens in the U.S. or even the world. I mean, it's a worldwide known institution. They send their catalogs and mailers all over the world. They have shoppers from all over the world. And being able to go and learn from them why they're here and the things that they do and are doing, it was more eye-opening than I could have even imagined in a very positive way.

Myke Hurley: I don't know why, but I think I had the opinion that it was going to be a very different store offering very different products than what it actually was. I was expecting, like, Cross, like, maybe Pilot, definitely Mont Blanc, Montegrappa. That's it, right? Because I just figured it's probably an executive pen store. It sells to Wall Street. That's all it is. But as well as having not only just those companies, also some of the best displays I've ever seen for those companies in any store, and tons of other brands. Like, they had lots of Retro 51. They had lots of Pilot. They had tons of ink. Like, so much ink from everyone that you would expect. Lots of Sailor pens they had. They had Platinum pens. They had everything in there. Like, I was genuinely surprised at the breadth and depth of the products that they had to offer. It was like walking into a website.

Ana Reinert: Absolutely. And their prices were very competitive. Like, absolutely on par with most of the other pen shops that have brick-and-mortar stores. Yep.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So the way the shop was laid out, which, you know, not a lot of us get to experience a brick-and-mortar store anymore. But as you can imagine, it's kind of laid out by brand. And each brand has its sections. Yeah. And like Myke was saying, on top of that, they have what is called boutiques within the store. So like, Mont Blanc would take up like, I don't know how you would measure whatever unit I'm going to say. But like Mont Blanc would have four units of space in this wall, which is about probably 12, 15 feet long.

Ana Reinert: Like a little corner.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Like a little corner. Then Montegrappa had a space. And Aurora had a space. And these are like nice, like what you would think of as like at, I don't know, like at a huge department store where those people would come built in those areas.

Myke Hurley: Any of these companies' airport stores. It was like miniature versions of all of those. Yeah. Like they were all individually branded. And the cases were customized to fit the brand. So it was almost like walking into a pen department store, really, more than anything else, which is a super, it was just really interesting. Because it was so different to everywhere else we have visited over the last week, which everything else had a style that the store was representing that they put the pens in. And where Fountain Pen Hospital was really like a canvas for these companies to work with them to provide branding and materials to create their own little corners of the store. And I'm not, and I don't necessarily think one is better than the other. It was just really interesting to see because I have never seen a pen store like that that offers all of the stuff that I'm interested in. And usually these things are so specified, like so specific that they offer just like, you know, just like the stuff that I don't really buy, like cross pens, right? Like this is how it seems to be. So I know we were really surprised at how vibrant the place was. As well as just, you know, we had a bunch of incredible people there, like a lot of pen listeners that came out and wanted to just hang out with us for a bit. It was a really fun evening. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So the owner, Steve, one of the brothers was, you know, I'd never dealt with him before being there. I don't know that any of us had. He was number one, so excited and open and welcoming and willing to do anything for us. But number two was just so excited to show us around. Yeah. He was like so pumped. His energy was like contagious. And he was like, oh, I'm so glad y'all are here. And, you know, look at all these people here. And this is really fun. And come here, let me show you this. Y'all want to go see this? This is what we do. This is why we're here. And hearing all of his stories and just how excited he was, just like show us around. It's like, okay, I get it now. Like this, this store is like way, way important in like the grand scheme of like the fountain pen retail landscape. It was, it was eye opening for sure.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. And there was a bunch of interesting things that happened. We saw a chaos pen. So a guy by the name of Paul was, was attending, came to come to say hi. And he had around his neck a chaos pen. I mean, look, this is not a pen that I want, but I think I get it now. I think I get it. Like it was very nicely made. It felt really good to hold. And if that is your style.

Myke Hurley: Okay. Like everything around the pen, the whole marketing was wired. And the camera industries were there and they wanted the distributor because I think it's a Montegrappa pen. Montegrappa. Yeah. And they were saying that they seen renewed interest in the pen now because it's not made anymore. They're done. But apparently they were able to kind of like track down some that were unsold somewhere for some other clients because now that video has come out. People want it again, which I think is kind of hilarious that like it's actually selling the pen again. But, you know, it's not for me. It never would be for me. But I think I have a greater understanding now of why somebody would want to own it because it is nicely done.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I thought it was totally cool. Like I saw from the moment Paul walked in around his neck the tip of the chaos, what I thought was a chaos pen sticking out of its little case.

Myke Hurley: That's unmistakable.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. But, you know, only like about an inch of it was was poking out the case. And like I was busy, you know, talking to someone else. And I saw that and I basically like leaned over is like, we're going to have to talk in a minute. So I'll see. I'll see you there. And then by the time I got to him, Myke had already had it out and was taking pictures with it. So it was pretty funny. Did you get a chance to see the chaos? I did not.

Ana Reinert: But afterwards, Myke pointed out who Paul was. And just seeing him, he was the perfect person. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: He said he was like, this pen is my style. And he totally looked like the kind of guy who would have it.

Ana Reinert: It was perfect for him.

Myke Hurley: We were gifted some Aurora pens. Sheesh. Which was, everyone's so nice to us in a way that I can't fully understand sometimes. But the Steve Fountain Pen Hospital, and I think it was with Ken Rose, because they put the event on together. Yeah. They each gave us, what was the model that we got?

Brad Dowdy: So it's the Optima with Flex. Yeah. So it's the Aurora Optima Flex.

Myke Hurley: And so this was the one, if anybody remembers, that there were a bunch of Aurora Flex nib pens that came out at the same time in a vast selection of colors. It was that edition. And we all got a different color. I got a purple one. Brad got a gray one. And Anna got a red one. And I'm very excited to try it, because I know that you love Aurora's brand. And I haven't really found one that I like yet. Yet. I do love the color of this one. So I'm really keen to kind of ink this one up and give it a good shot. But that was very kind of them to do that.

Ana Reinert: I was completely blown away. I mean, I was absolutely speechless. And it was so kind of them to do it. And it was after they had completely blown our minds with a tour of the downstairs.

Myke Hurley: It was like, effectively, we were just taken around what is an impossibly large retail space, right? Like in New York. You can tell it's been around for 70 years or whatever, because they have so much space. And they had a bunch of rooms. And in these rooms were these high cabinets. And these cabinets had all these little drawers in them, full of parts for pens I'd never heard of, right? Like, which means it's probably some pretty great stuff. They had a lot of really amazing vintage parts, right? And Iwana, you were very excited about that.

Ana Reinert: Oh, yeah. There were drawers full of vintage parts for everything under the sun. There were new old stock parts for Parker 51s, 41s, 45s. I mean, you name it. They were in there. They were pulling out parts and showing them to us. And Brad and I were both losing our minds when they were pulling these striated bodies.

Ana Reinert: And we were just like, seriously? You guys just have these laying around? And they're like, oh, yeah. We have hundreds of these. And we're like, oh, my goodness.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, Steve would just grab a drawer at random. And it'd be like 20 Parker dual-fold big red barrels. Just like all brand new. Oh, yeah. Just in a drawer.

Ana Reinert: And he'd pull one out. And it was one of the yellow barrels. And he's like, oh, yeah. Occasionally, we'll take these to the DC show. And we'll put bags of random parts together. And we'll figure out this one. Maybe we should sell this for a little bit more. Or we'll do random parts for $50. And we're like, oh.

Brad Dowdy: It was endless. Those cabinets, they look like a card catalog at a library.

Brad Dowdy: And it was probably hundreds of drawers, a couple hundred drawers worth of.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. And meticulously organized. But they said, for the most part, they don't do any vintage repairs anymore. So there's no point in them kind of maintaining or organizing, keeping them. So they said, you know, every year for the DC show, they'll sort of randomly select a group of these and pull them out and put them into bags and take them to the DC show. And basically sell them and distribute them to dealers who do repairs and stuff. But we were just like, I can't believe this all still exists. And it's all new old stock.

Myke Hurley: But it is that thing, which is so funny. It's like these weren't expensive. Like at the time, these weren't necessarily expensive. Oh, no. Right. And it's just like holding on to them. The value that they have increased by is like exponential. And it's so wild to see. It's like, oh, we were just keeping drawers of stuff. But now each drawer is like worth $500 to $1,000. Easily. It's just wild to see this kind of stuff. They just sat on it. They just put them into drawers because they did. Right. And then all this time later, now it's worth something. Yeah. It really is hilarious.

Ana Reinert: You pulled one drawer open and it was all Estabrook nibs, which now for them, it's awesome because the SD is now something that they can put these to good use. But, you know, and they were all still in the little green boxes. And, you know, they're like, now we're pulling these out and we can actually use these.

Myke Hurley: These will be useful. They were selling the SD in the Fountain Pen Hospital and you could choose five vintage nibs in a little package to go with it. It's brilliant. Right. Like it's a brilliant idea because they have it. Not many other places can offer you that in a retail environment. Right. Where most places like, oh, you have to go to a pen show and find the vendor who might have a bucket full of these nibs. But this is just like you can pick the sizes. They'll put them in a little bag for you. You get the little adapter and you get to go. So it's really cool. Like this is the difference of a store like that.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. They get to go in the basement and be like, here, let me go and drawer C.

Myke Hurley: So, but this again, like this was part one of our New York trip. The second was the next day. We took an entire day pretty much to hit as many kind of of the big fun New York spots as we could. And we started off the day, I think the place that we spent the most time purposefully was at CW Pencils. Now, I visited the old store and the new store. Ana, you've been to the old store, right? No. So it was your two both first time to go there, right? First time. So Ana, what was your impression of CW?

Ana Reinert: It was as magical as I expected.

Myke Hurley: I will say their new location is way better than the original location. They have vastly more space. It feels like it's in a neighborhood that has kind of got more around it. Like the old one, it kind of felt like it was in a very residential area.

Myke Hurley: And just stuff like that. They've got much bigger windows. So there's a lot more natural light that comes in. Like it really felt like this location made a lot more sense for them than the previous one. So whilst from as little as we know, it seemed like it was a stressful time having to move at like very short notice. I think this has probably worked out for the best for them because it's a beautiful store.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Magical is the right word. Like I, there's a lot of places on this trip and a lot of things we've done that I haven't figured out the words for. Magical is a good one. And you just walk in and like someone that like me, who's been into this type of stationery their entire lives. And then to have stores that offer special things like this. And then also to know the people behind the store and how great they are. I walk in and I'm just like giddy. I, it's just like, I can't contain like my giddiness. Um, just being in the store and around Caroline and Alex, who was there at the store that day and getting to talk to them and seeing what's being built. It was just fascinating to be there. It was awesome to shop there. It was cool to hang out there. And, uh, yeah, I, there's, there's no words. I'm going to be at a lack of words a lot during this podcast and I'm usually not short on words, but that was one of those places where it's just words don't do it justice. It was amazing.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. They were so nice to us too. Like, you know, we, we spent a bunch of time there and they were really kind of inviting. We were just going through a lot of stuff together and it was really nice to be able to hang out as well. You know, it was, it was really, it just wonderful. Their stock is just, it continues to amaze me, you know, like with only a, I only ever very infrequently glance at the pencil world and I am always astounded by the sheer amount of things that happen in, with wood pencils, especially, which I guess is probably exactly what pencil fans say about pens. How many things can you really do with a fountain pen? But they found them all with pencils. It's wonderful. And there's so many, I love like all the little art pieces they have in there too. So, um, it's wonderful. It's just a beautiful place. It is like a real, I like that it's new, you know, and it's fresh, it's independent. And also Caroline is like the coolest person I may have ever met. Yeah. I don't, I can't fully articulate why, but she's just so cool.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I told Myke, I think it was probably that night, like after we were done, it wasn't right after. It was probably later that night. Well, or in a break some point during the day, I can't even remember half the things we've done and when we've done them. But I just looked over at Myke and said about Caroline, I said, I don't know what it is, but you know it when you see it and Caroline has it. Like, I don't know what it is or how you define it. Um, but she's got it and you just want to be around her and listen to her and learn from her and, you know, be a part of whatever she's doing. You know, like if Caroline says, well, yes, like she didn't even have to like, whatever you want, Caroline. Yeah. You know, like, uh, it, it was, uh, pretty cool. It was finally great to meet her in person. So, uh, that was, that was wonderful. Definitely a highlight.

Myke Hurley: And it's also like, you know, on that is, it's just so fun to see how they're expanding because they got the sticker store now. Yeah. Which I greatly enjoyed. Yeah. Um, they have like the CW sticker emporium, which is just tons and tons of stickers, just stickers everywhere. Um, and I got handfuls of them, which I was very, very excited about. So I'm, I was, uh, you know, I got picked up a couple of little pencils here and there, like there's some stuff that I bought for it. And I was like, I think she'll like this, but I went for the stickers.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I even broke down and got stickers. That was, uh, I mean, I knew I would, but I probably got like five packs. How many more stickers or more pencils? How many pencils did you purchase?

Ana Reinert: Um, since I bought one big box of pencils? Yeah. Um, I don't think that's a fair judgment to make, but I did buy several packs of stickers.

Brad Dowdy: Nice. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I had my shopping list pre-planned before our trip and spoiler alert, I pretty much knocked every bit of my shopping list out the park. We'll have to save like all like, I mean, we can talk about some stuff, but like all the things we got, we would be here for hours.

Myke Hurley: Frankly, I need to do an inventory. Yeah. Right. Because I can't fully remember everything. In case you hadn't noticed by now, we're all pretty tired. Yeah. At this point. Um, like we are recording this just as the Toronto Pen show is finished, which we are going to get to, of course. But so, just trying to remember everything I purchased three days ago or whatever, it's just not happening right now. Um, but we moved on, uh, from CW to Kinoki Nuya, uh, which is the Japanese bookstore, um, in Bryant Park in New York. And Kinoki Nuya is wonderful because it's in, there is about half of the bottom floor of the bookstore is dedicated to Japanese stationery. Including all of the weird, wonderful, and incredible things that you can find in a Japanese stationery store. Um, and I know, Brad, that you were enamored by some of the stuff that you were finding, including, um, finding a page, which I, many people have sent to you before, including me. Where you, a quote of yours is printed and laminated as part of an article next to, what was, what was it? The Jetstream?

Brad Dowdy: No, it's next to the gel pen display where the Uniball Signo DX slash UM151 are located. Um, so yeah, there was an article in New Yorker magazine. Yeah. Tom Vanderbilt, I believe was the author. And he asked for a quote for, cause he loved the pen and he wanted to hear why like Japanese gel pens were such a thing. So, and Kino Kania had them all. Like they had things that I hadn't seen. They had literally all of it. It's all there. We got yelled at for taking pictures. That was cool. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: Did they really yell at you? Yeah. I did not get yelled at.

Myke Hurley: It was just like, no pictures. And I said, okay. And then just walked around the corner.

Brad Dowdy: Well, you can hide in there pretty well. That place was a little claustrophobic to be perfectly honest. What did you think about it, Anna?

Ana Reinert: It was very claustrophobic. It was a little crowded and we were there probably right at lunchtime, which probably made it worse because people were probably out on their lunch break shopping as well as tourists. So it got a little where I just got to the point where I was looking at a lot of gel pens and a lot of things that I have to confess. I saw a lot of this stuff while I was traveling in Hong Kong and, uh, and China. So at a certain point I was just sort of was like, okay, I'm good.

Myke Hurley: I do. When I see selections like that, I do find it difficult to zero in on anything. It's like, here's this like sensory overload. And I struggle to like really know. It's like they have this entire back wall of notebooks, right? That you guys were looking at. When I see something like that, like literally hundreds of different notebooks, I just have no idea. Where to even begin. Like it's too much for me. Places like that, I think.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And it was just, it's packed so tight. Like I think you were being generous about the size of the stationary space. I think it was probably a quarter max of the bottom floor. The amount of inventory that was in that space was astronomical. Like when I walked in and didn't see the area right away and then saw the area, I was like, oh, this is it. This is what everyone's braving about. But then once I got mixed up in that area, they had literally everything.

Ana Reinert: Crammed into a shoebox size space. Yeah. And then you add in 40, 50 people crammed into that space. And many people with backpacks and messenger bags and stuff. And so you were bumping into people. It was just very crowded.

Brad Dowdy: Single threaded aisles for sure. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: And it was, so it was just, it was a little awkward and uncomfortable. And for people like Brad and I, who basically, we basically own a Kino Kanuya at home. It was like, yeah, yeah, I got all these gel pens. Like, can I, can I go now?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. But it was good. I definitely picked up a few things that I hadn't seen there before or like pens that I knew I like in different colors that I didn't have. So it was absolutely worth going to.

Ana Reinert: Oh, totally.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Ana Reinert: And don't think we didn't actually buy stuff there because we did. Oh, yeah. We, we elbowed our way through and we did buy stuff, but.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, absolutely. You know, absolutely. There's some really cool stuff.

Ana Reinert: If you don't own your own office supply store at home, like it's worth elbowing your way through. Just don't go right at lunchtime.

Muji Comparison

Myke Hurley: Yeah. So it's kind of funny to compare Kino Kanuya to where we went next, which was Muji. Because Muji, like their gel pen selection rivals Kino Kanuya and how many they have. But it is arranged differently with more space. Mm-hmm. So it was more pleasant to be in that environment, I think.

Brad Dowdy: It was completely different. Yes. Those two spaces. Like Muji's, you know, set up, designed to be that way. That's their thing. You know, it's.

Ana Reinert: Plus aromatherapy.

Brad Dowdy: Yes. That was a lot of aromatherapy.

Myke Hurley: They had like 70 different aroma balls. I don't know what they're called. What are they called? I have no idea. What are they? They've got a word. I don't know. I call them steamers. No. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: The, yeah. The, the, the water vapor. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Diffuser. Diffuser. Diffuser. That's the word I was looking for. Yeah. And they were.

Ana Reinert: It was a bit much. If you are, if you are not a fan, then maybe, maybe not the one near Bryant Park.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. They didn't have a sample going. They had all of them going.

Ana Reinert: They had them all going and all with different scents. So it was like aromatherapy overload.

Brad Dowdy: But once we got past that, you could see this, the, the stationery was beckoning to you. I was surprised. So the part of the store we were in, I was honestly expecting something bigger. Like square foot wise.

Ana Reinert: There was a downstairs.

Brad Dowdy: There was a downstairs.

Ana Reinert: Which is where all the clothing and stuff is. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So we didn't make it down there. I was actually surprised in the space that was upstairs, how much space the stationery took up. It was a very big part of their business. I didn't realize. I knew it was a part of their business. And I thought it was maybe like a small part, just like a side thing. It was like a front and center, huge display type of thing.

Myke Hurley: From being someone who has a large selection of Muji stores in their town. And just so I know people that go there. Muji stationery is one of the things that people go to Muji for. Right? Like if you have a Muji, it's like, oh, you, you'll go and buy the boxes and you'll buy all the office supplies and you'll buy all the gel pens. Like it, it didn't surprise me. And it doesn't, because every Muji store that I've been to is like that. Like the stationery takes up a huge part. And this is not just the gel pens, but say like filing solutions and just like staplers and everything they sell. And so it is very consistent with Muji's that I've been to in other parts of the world and in London as well. Like it is a huge part of them.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So looking at the pen selection they had now, they were always known for their gel pens. They're using Zebra and Pentel white label products as the primary.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Because it's the majority of their stationery clips are all over some of them.

Brad Dowdy: Which those are two really good choices. They've always used great choices. I mean, they've used Uniball and Pilot in the past. So they're definitely in with everyone they need to be. So I certainly picked up a bunch of those. And Anna and I, we were like looking at the storage. That's what I did not expect. Like I couldn't buy anything because I can't travel with the type of storage systems that they had. I was fascinated by some of their...

Myke Hurley: The storage is one of the other big reasons that people that like Muji go to Muji. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: As soon as Brad saw the like three and four drawer clear acrylic storage that probably most people use for paper. But he looked at it and he's like, oh, those would hold pens really nicely. And I'm like, oh yeah, that would be a really good way to store your pens.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. They're like slimline drawers, right? So you can't get too big of a container, but they're like perfect for pen storage.

Myke Hurley: And they're clear. They're clear. So you can see where the pens are.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. I was impressed. I was... When I walked into the store, I was like, okay, Muji. And then by the time I was done, I was like super impressed.

Myke Hurley: I did kind of have to drag you out. Yeah. Yeah. Because we were on a bit of a time crunch at that point. And we were going to one more storage that's a bit further away. And I, at that point, was having to drag you both away. I was like, come on.

Brad Dowdy: I will say Muji does have one problem that caused that is their paper selection is not well defined. It's overwhelming. And you have to hunt very specifically for a thing you're looking for. Okay. Like anytime I wanted to find graph paper in the size or format, I had to really pull out every... Go to like every individual shelf to find out which one was the one that might be the one for me. And I ended up buying no paper because I was never comfortable with finding the one. It was, I think that could be displayed a little bit better. It was overwhelming, the paper selection.

Myke Hurley: So then with the help of our New York subway guide, Tiffany Arment of Make Do here on Relay FM, which this whole trip did involve Brad's first subway ride. Brad looked a little bit lost on the subway. He was very cute.

Brad Dowdy: So I was excellent in the London tube transit. This was much more flying spaghetti monster than I imagined.

Brad Dowdy: This was like London tube. I could get to point A to point B through points, all points in between very easily. I'm glad I wasn't in control of the maps.

Myke Hurley: There's a little bit more of a learning curve in the New York subway system. So once you get it, it's doable, but it is trickier, I find. Both systems have their blind spots. I will make a stand. We can maybe talk about Montreal versus New York bagels shortly, but I will make a stand and say that the London tube system is far superior to the New York subway system. Come at me, New Yorkers. So we went to one final store called Goods for the Study. Now, what is Goods for the Study? Because it seemed like the way it was being described is it was like part of a different store. Like it has two names or something.

Ana Reinert: It's an offshoot of McNally Jackson. McNally Jackson.

Brad Dowdy: And what is McNally Jackson?

Ana Reinert: McNally Jackson is a map company. So people might know it as Rand McNally.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. Yeah. But then they built this huge store there, which we didn't get to like the flagship store that started to carry stationery. Then I think they broke off Goods for the Study.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. I think.

Brad Dowdy: I don't totally know, but it seemed like that was kind of the story we were getting. It's related to the McNally Jackson main store. And this was like the stationary part. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: So I'm a little, yeah, a little fuzzy on the whole detail. But what I was understanding from other people is that at some point, I think they're going to merge the two. So Goods for the Study and McNally Jackson will become one larger store that have sort of all of their merchandise. And I think it's probably got more to do with rent than anything.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. Because there were two goods for the study. So when we were mapping them, people said, well, one of them's now closed, you know? So we could, it was a recent thing. So we had to go to the one that was still open. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: The one on Mulberry Street is closed now.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Store Aesthetic Shift

Myke Hurley: So what I didn't expect is that we were going to walk immediately into my personal aesthetic because that's what we did. Oh, yeah. My gosh. That store was like, it was like stepping into part of my own brain. It was very peculiar. It was everything I like all laid out in these beautiful ways. It was hipster paradise, I think is probably the nicest way to describe it. It was stunning. Like everything in that store was laid out so incredibly well. I loved it in there.

Brad Dowdy: From front to back. And this was a large space. Like for New York, I felt this was a large retail space. From front to back, they nailed everything. Like the good, sometimes, you know, retail stores will hide the, hide some products in the back that aren't like the best sellers. They like from the front door all the way to the back wall was like premier products throughout. Yep.

Ana Reinert: I think they had some Moleskine in the back.

Brad Dowdy: Moleskine was in the back. But I'm not going to lie. I bought a Moleskine pen.

Ana Reinert: It was a cool Moleskine pen. It was a cool. I had never seen this. I will give you that.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. But Moleskine was in the back left corner. And like I was okay with that. Yeah. I didn't look at the paper, but I did see a pen that caught my eye.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I mean, to be honest, they had like, there was stuff all over, right? Like, and, but it was all laid out in nice ways. It was laid out logically. You know, there was like, you kind of walked into greetings cards and random things, right? Like they had those, um, that's a selection of those note blocks that you could pull away and they would reveal something, right? They were like a topographic shape or. So they had a little trinkets and kind of gifty items like that. And then they had a bunch of pens on the wall with these beautiful cabinets that display.

Ana Reinert: They were like apothecary cabinets.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. That displayed a wonderful selection. Like again, like a very large selection of stuff. And then you kind of move through into paper and just books. And it was just, everything was really just, I was very impressed. I was very, very impressed. That, that place spoke to me. Uh, I loved it.

Brad Dowdy: I didn't expect the number of brands that they carried.

Ana Reinert: And brands I'd never heard of.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. It was, someone did some good work there in stocking that store. The curation. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: It was, was on point. Oh, totally. Yeah. I haven't, it's one of those things where like I look at it and I can't even understand, I can't fathom how somebody was able to do that. Yeah. Uh, but it was, I was very, very impressed with that place. I liked it a lot. I really did. It was beautiful.

Ana Reinert: The crazy thing is I don't think any of us really bought a whole lot. I think we were all so blown away with just the level of curation. We were all just like, I, I don't even know where to start. Yeah. Like you guys have all just, you, you blew the bell curve. Right. We're just walking away.

Myke Hurley: I needed about four times more time. Yeah. We had to spend in that store to like fully get my head around what I was looking at. Like I know that that would be a place that if I lived in New York, I would just go to for no reason. Like we'd just be like, I'm just going to go see what's good for the study. So if you are in and around New York, I personally, I recommend CW and good for the study is like from our trip. They are the two that you should 100% make sure that you go to. If you're just looking to browse, you know, like I think that they were really great for that. I mean, all of the places that we mentioned are great for specific purchases, but those two were just nice environments to be in and really to just peruse and find something that maybe you hadn't considered before.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. It was, it was fantastic. That was a hidden gem, even though it's not really tiny. It was really sizable.

Myke Hurley: But again, both of those stores, they're out of the, they're off the beaten path a little bit. Yeah. You know, like Kinokunuya and Muji are in Bryant Park, which is a block away from Times Square, right? Like, you know, they're in and amongst it, whilst these others are more making it happen type places. So they are in newer retail environments, which are hidden somewhere, even amongst apartment buildings and stuff like that. So that was New York. And then we got on a plane and came over to Toronto, Canada, which we'll talk about after I thank our sponsor of this episode, which is Blue Apron. You can skip meal planning and get straight to cooking with Blue Apron. It doesn't matter if you're looking for quick and easy meals or for a full culinary cooking experience. You can choose from a range of recipes bursting with flavor and Blue Apron will deliver fresh, seasonally inspired ingredients with step-by-step recipes right to your door. You can get rid of your grocery list and let Blue Apron do the meal prep for you and cook and you'll be able to cook incredible meals in as little as 20 minutes. You can get out of your cooking rut and experience the joy of chef design recipes with restaurant quality meals like stir fried sweet chili chicken with broccoli and rice. Or what about seared beef dumplings and jasmine rice with sesame garlic bok choy salad? I've been traveling for two weeks, dying for a home cooked meal. Like I read stuff like this. It's like, I know what I remember why I like to cook because I can control the whole thing. And that is what is so wonderful about a service like Blue Apron is that you will get these incredible fresh ingredients sent to your home. You can prepare them, you can cook them and you can eat them. And there is nothing like a good home cooked meal. And food in all of these places that we've been to is wonderful. They are not a good home cooked meal. And so I will say I miss it. And this this ad is making me want to go home.

Myke Hurley: You can check out this week's menu and get three meals for free at blueapron.com slash pen addict. That is blueapron.com slash pen addict to get your first three meals for free. Blue Apron, a better way to cook. So we arrived in Toronto on Friday and we decided that we would visit one store here before our second in-store event, which happened on Saturday before the Toronto Pen Show. And that is Lay Wines. Brad, can you enlighten me to why specifically Lay Wines? Like what is what is the store all about?

Brad Dowdy: So over the years, you know, you get to see all your friends traveling to different places and hitting up pen shops. And I've always heard, you know, the name Lay Wines, you know, it stands out as a name you that's kind of sticks in your head. It's not very generic name or anything like that. And in Toronto, it was and has been always the place like in the downtown area, you know, where you would imagine kind of like a fountain pen hospital would have that, you know, level of respect and name recognition in the area. Well, Lay Wines is that store for Toronto, even though it's much more newer and much more modern. So I had no idea what to expect when we went there. And we strolled up and I got outside of the store and, you know, just the pinch picture I painted in my head was I thought it would be bigger. Like it's big. It's plenty big. But I, you know, looking at pictures and hearing all people talk about it. But once we got in and got to browse around and got to talk to the employees there, once again, it like exceeded any like picture I had painted in my head. It was a fantastic, fantastic shop that I see why it's got that name recognition in town and, you know, starting to spread around the world even more. I thought it was just wonderful.

Ana Reinert: I had a friend who lives out in California who, when I told her that I was coming to Toronto, said, oh, you have to go to Lay Wines. She's like, would you like me to call them and provide you an introduction? I said, no, no, no, no, no, it's okay. I said, we're just going to sneak in.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Yeah. I really like the store. It was stuffier than some of the other places that we went to.

Brad Dowdy: If you were going to write a book representation of what a pen store would look like, you know.

Myke Hurley: You will write Lay Wines. Yeah. Everyone was super nice, but everything was really quiet. It was formal. Yeah, formal is a really good way to describe it, but it was just that made it very different to all of the other places we've been to. Because Fountain Pen Hospital, you felt like you were walking into a family business, you know. Everyone was loud and like super welcoming and like they want you, you know, come on in, you know. And then the other places that we went to were like cool or they were parts of a bigger business. And you kind of felt like you were walking into a corporate monolith. And Lay Wines was just like, shh, kind of when you walk in, you know, like it was very calm and quiet and very well lit. And there was a lot, it was very, everything was really nicely arranged. And all the staff were very nicely dressed. They were all incredibly polite. It was like the most like, hello, sir, kind of pen store I could have imagined. And this is not a criticism. It's just that's the style that they were going for.

Ana Reinert: The flip side was that when someone else came in, they immediately were like, hello, David. Yeah. And so like they know their customers. Oh, absolutely.

Myke Hurley: There were multiple people that came in. Well, we were not there for very long. And it was like everyone knew who they needed to see, both the customer and the people in the store. They all were like immediately going to each other. It was like, oh, you've come for your order that you've come to collect. Or like, oh, welcome back. You know, that kind of thing. It was very.

Myke Hurley: So we may have that relationship is fitting of the style of store that they've created. Right.

Ana Reinert: So we may have caught them off guard because we came in and they did not know who we were. And we immediately started looking around and we seem to know something about fountain pens. So they were like, wait, these are fountain pen shoppers, but they we've never seen them before. And so I think we maybe confused them or like, wait, they they've never shopped in our store before.

Brad Dowdy: People in the store started saying our names.

Ana Reinert: Yes.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: I think it was a little bit strange. But they were as well, though, the most knowledgeable sales representatives. Oh, absolutely. Of any store that I maybe have ever been to. They all really knew their stuff. Yeah. You know, like I was throwing some stuff out there and they like they knew everything.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. And what was funny was once they heard somebody in the shop call out your name. Because as soon as we walked in, Jacqueline was in the store and she was like, Brad Doughty. And then I think the shop staff was like, who is this person? Um, so then, um, I think they all immediately like somebody in the shop must have started Googling. Because after we were in there for about 10 or 15 minutes, I was standing talking to one of the shop staff. And they sort of, I think it dawned on them that there might have been, they might maybe have, who are these people? And I, and they finally, it was like, hmm. And I finally said, did you figure out who he was? And they're like, yes, we know who he is now. So someone Googled who Brad was. That's too funny.

Brad Dowdy: So it's like, you know, and you know, to them, I'm, they shouldn't know who I am. Like they are like, they are the perfect big city store that has a customer book. Yep. Right. They know their market. Their market knows them. And it's a fine tuned, well oiled machine. Right. It was like a perfect shop for their location and their clientele.

Myke Hurley: And they had the store selection of brands that backed that up. Right. Right. Like having that level of service that they provide to people means that they can carry effectively anything. Right. Because they have people that they know that will, will buy it. And I think kind of, you know, I've mentioned all these places having great selections of stuff. I think for a breadth of selection in just purely pens, Laywines had the best selection that I've seen over this trip. There are other places that had altogether more stuff, wider variations in certain things. But Laywines had the biggest selection, the broadest selection of fountain pens of anywhere that I've seen on this trip. It was, it really was kind of breathtaking what they had. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Right. Yeah. I'll take fountain pen hospital in that argument. Yeah. Yeah. I felt they had a little bit more, but Laywines took that and refined it a little bit.

Myke Hurley: I think that might be what I'm going for. Like it was maybe in the specialized category, Laywines have more. Cause fountain pen hospital have more brands. Yeah. But they were going for, I think a more general feel. Sure. Where Laywines was kind of going across some spectrums.

Ana Reinert: Sort of curated. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Curated is a better way to put it. So it made it feel to me like, oh, they have everything. Yes. Yeah. But they had less stuff, but maybe more brands, different kind of price points and stuff like that. But it was a, that was a great store.

Brad Dowdy: It was fantastic. Bought things there too.

Myke Hurley: Of course you did. Yeah. Did you buy something in every store? Yeah, you did. Didn't you? Yes. Yeah. I didn't. Yeah. Maybe just a couple. Aren't I? There's one place where I didn't.

Ana Reinert: Every store?

Store Purchases

Myke Hurley: Yep.

Brad Dowdy: There's one place where I didn't make a purchase.

Ana Reinert: Which one?

Brad Dowdy: We haven't talked about it yet.

Ana Reinert: Okay.

Myke Hurley: Wonder Pens? No. No.

Brad Dowdy: Toronto Pen Show.

Myke Hurley: Oh, yeah.

Ana Reinert: No, you did buy stuff. I bought it for you.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, that's true. I bought ink.

Myke Hurley: Wonder Pens. So this is our second in-store event.

Myke Hurley: Wonder Pens are just amazing.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So Liz is another one of those people that I was dying to meet in person after knowing them online for what seems like forever. They've been around for five years. Can you believe that?

Ana Reinert: I didn't realize it was that long.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, me neither. It feels like three at the most.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. So were they...

Myke Hurley: Because I remember we spoke about them a long time ago, right?

Brad Dowdy: So my whole reason for following them was, one, it's somewhere I'm not familiar with, being Toronto. Two, putting forth an aesthetic that I love that's different than what a traditional pen shop may or may not carry. And three, the way Liz handled the business as someone who essentially myself runs their own business, I get a lot of insight from how other people run theirs. And the things she was doing and the words she was saying were really resonating to me from a business perspective. So I was dying to get there. And I just want to say that Liz is like a five foot tall whirling dervish of amazement. She...

Ana Reinert: Four foot ten.

Brad Dowdy: Four ten. I was being generous. She, as far as I'm concerned, she's a seven foot tall superhero. Absolutely. Because she is. She is like literally superwoman. And I came away even more. I had Liz built up big in my head before. Oh, totally. She blew those thoughts. Like she just kicked them right out of my skull. Like physically, like she pushed me on the ground, kicked me in the head, said, listen up, Brad. I am way better than you think I am. I was like, okay. No, I'm just kidding. She'd be mad at I'm saying that. But no, she... I told her like, you know, one of the reasons I wanted to come on this trip was to meet and see her in action. Holy cow.

Ana Reinert: They... Both she and John are absolute angels.

Myke Hurley: As are all of the people that I met that worked at both of their locations. Oh, absolutely. Like, they were just so nice and welcoming and helpful. Just really great people. Like everyone that works there. And I mean, I can only imagine that if you have people like Liz and John at the top, like they're just gonna have... They're gonna invite basically nice people around them. And I think that that is definitely the case. Right?

Ana Reinert: Absolutely. And they're... I mean, every customer that we talk to who comes into the store are completely loyal to Liz and John and the shop.

Myke Hurley: Yep.

Ana Reinert: You know, they were... They're thrilled to be able to come into the store and shop. And they were so excited about their new location because, you know, they were talking about how much bigger the space is. And then it, you know, it's so much brighter and there's so much more light. And, you know, I mean, Liz and John were talking about, you know, it was bittersweet having to change locations. But, you know, there were good things about their new space as well. It's, you know, it's bigger, it's more light. And they've done beautiful things with the space. It was just... It was a fun... Just a fun space to be in. And then...

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So they put out for us amongst their community that we'd be there for like a certain amount of time, like a one to five event on Saturday afternoon before the show. And that event, you know, I didn't know what to expect. We don't know what to expect on any of these things. This is all new adventures for all of us.

Myke Hurley: Like how many people know who we are in Toronto? Okay.

Brad Dowdy: Right. And like Liz was like super sweating it. She's... I talked to her tonight. And, you know, just as we were saying our goodbyes, and she said, you know, I was really worried about the event. And I was there, you know, getting ready for the event in like 12, 1230 on Saturday in our shops, normally a busy time. And she said, and it was dead. And she said, then one o'clock came and I realized why I was dead because everyone was holding off.

Brad Dowdy: Like she was super worried, like, is no one going to show up? Like I have ruined this, you know, I'm a failure. And it was just, people were waiting to come during that time window. It was packed.

Myke Hurley: So I'm super tired today. I'm super tired today because yesterday was madness. It was amazing. Like, I think all of us just spent like four hours just talking to people and hanging out and answering questions. And I learned a bunch of stuff about Canada, which was amazing. Do you know that in Canada, milk comes in bags?

Ana Reinert: I did not know that.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. And you buy like a jug and you cut the corner of the bag off and that's how you, that's how milk is consumed. I also learned that, this all started, I learned a lot of Canada facts because I was told that Canadian money smells like maple syrup.

Ana Reinert: No one will change my American money for Canadian money so I do not know this.

Myke Hurley: Right. It doesn't. This is an urban legend.

Ana Reinert: Wow.

Myke Hurley: And then, this started a whole chain of things.

Ana Reinert: Can I tell people that American money smells like mint so they'll switch money with me?

Myke Hurley: Sure.

Ana Reinert: Okay.

Montreal Bagel Discussion

Myke Hurley: Because I was stopped from sniffing money basically is what happened and then it started this long, massive chain of things that are wonderful wonderful and unique to Canada which was really great and it was amazing. It was a really, really wonderful, fun afternoon. I got to meet a bunch of wonderful listeners of this show and other Relay FM shows as well. People that I've been speaking to online for years who got to come out which is a wonderful and very nice surprise for me to meet some of these people. It was really, really great but it took everything I have away from me in energy. But, I, it was all because of the environment that, that WonderPens had set up for us. It was, it was magic. It was wonderful. It was really, really great.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, they've definitely built a community not just a store. They have. So, you know, I was just endlessly impressed with John and Liz and the staff and of course the kids. Their kids are amazing. Adorable. They're the best. They are the best. We had all kinds of food and drink and just good times. Montreal bagels, Brad.

Myke Hurley: All right.

Brad Dowdy: So,

Myke Hurley: our friend Mikey brought us some Montreal bagels.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so I was, I told Mikey that after I, like, I didn't get in hardly enough to get my jacket and bag off before Mikey was shoving the Montreal bagel in my hand and he'd already gotten you before he'd even gotten to me.

Brad Dowdy: I told him after I was done that I was willing to go on record as the Montreal bagel is the best bagel on the planet and I will stand by that and, you know, I'm sure that will cause problems just like any of our, any of our side adventures do, whether it's hamburger joint or whatever you want to do, you know, pizza style. I'm, I'm gonna throw down that gauntlet and I'm gonna shove all my chips in on Montreal bagels and that's, that's it.

Myke Hurley: Okay. I really, really enjoyed the Montreal bagel and that's that.

Ana Reinert: I am so disappointed that I don't even get to play in this game cause I didn't even know that the Montreal bagels came into Wonder Pens. Yeah. Didn't see them.

Brad Dowdy: There was a whole tray of them at one point.

Myke Hurley: Yep. Brad ate them all though, I think. No.

Ana Reinert: Pretty much. No.

Myke Hurley: I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed it as a bagel. It's different. I, I wouldn't want to say one is better than the other. You know, I wouldn't want to play that game. I wish you the best of luck. You already played the subway game. I feel like the subway game is, is less contentious than the bagel game because New Yorkers don't like their subway system, right? Right. They love their bagels. Yes. All right. So, good luck to you, I suppose.

Ana Reinert: All right.

Myke Hurley: So, the, the, that was wonderful. The, the, the in-store event at Wonder Pens was wonderful. And then we had the Toronto Pen Show. The one thing that was really stood out to me from spending, so the Toronto Pen Show was a one day show pretty much completely, not entirely, but pretty much completely Canadian exhibitors. Yes. And we can maybe get into why if you, if you want to talk about that. That's true. But one of the, one of the things that was really surprising to me is every single person I spoke to said how small it was or how much smaller it must be to the American shows that we're used to. And I can only assume this is like part of the Canadian temperament of like, oh, but we're, you know, we're so happy you're here, but this surely, you know, come on. We're just like, you know, oh, don't worry. Like this kind of like the same thing that feeds into the apologies. Like they're almost apologizing for the fact that they brought us out to this tiny show. The Toronto Pen show is as, at least as big as the Atlanta show. Right. And pretty much any show I've been to except for DC, like size wise, exhibitor wise, it is as big as basically any of them unless it's a show that stands out for some specific reason. Like DC is being the biggest.

Ana Reinert: I would probably say like comparable to Colorado, to St. Louis, to maybe Baltimore.

Brad Dowdy: I threw Baltimore as like my closest comparison.

Ana Reinert: Triangle.

Brad Dowdy: It's bigger than Triangle.

Myke Hurley: It is a more than comparison. Like it is a definite show. You can count and add a tons of variety. One of the things that it did not have, the only big difference to me was there were not as many independent pen makers at this show as I have seen at other shows. my expectation is just because the US landmass gives more opportunity for there to be many more companies and they will travel within the US to the other shows. So you have the entire country of America at your disposal with any of these shows where Canada is smaller and they had some. There were definitely some but not as many and there were more kind of felt comparable in vintage like there's battles much vintage as I see at any other show and then there were some like wonder pens and lay wines they had their tables and stuff and they were really big and well stocked and stuff like that.

Ana Reinert: I didn't see a single fishing vest.

Myke Hurley: There were no fishing vests no fishing vests in Canada. Is that a good thing

Brad Dowdy: or a bad thing? Oh it's a good thing. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: All down vests though no fishing vests. No because it's cold here. Yeah. But so on that point about like the size and the exhibitor makeup Yes. Brad you were not selling anything here.

Toronto Show Viability

Brad Dowdy: No. So I was not selling anything here and to cut to that chase I think I could make a one day not co event in Toronto feasible from what I saw today.

Myke Hurley: That's different to what you were saying before you went to the store. 100%. To the show. Because before you were saying one day is not enough time if I'm going to make the trip like to cover and the expenses you want to be able because the expenses are mostly the same. The biggest expenses are the flight.

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: The flight's the same right wherever you're going for a one day show or a two day show. Right. It just costs what it costs. So you would want to do two or most even like three days to make sure you're maximizing the amount of money that you can bring in and a one day show you get like a half or a third in theory opportunity to make money. Right. So this is what you were saying beforehand kind of when people were asking you about like why aren't you selling anything. So what has changed now that you've seen it? Like what did you see today?

Brad Dowdy: The amount of people and the size of the show there's not one person I talked to before the show that didn't undersell it. Like I'm almost mad at them. Everyone is under like you need to

Myke Hurley: Toronto is doing a bad job of pitching its show to the world.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. You need to understand where this show lies in the grand scheme of things and outside of DC and San Francisco this is right there with any other show I've ever been to as far as size scope.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. It's smaller than Dallas but I mean yeah it's definitely plays it with all of the mid tier shows.

Brad Dowdy: I bet they might draw more people in Dallas.

Ana Reinert: Oh no Dallas is a big show. Maybe not.

Brad Dowdy: Dallas is a good show but you know my point stands and I even chastised you know jokingly one of you know the friends we made you know Sim who was you know part of the volunteer group and he was hitting me up today he was like so what do you think you know what do you what do you think about our little show? I'm like I said what I just said to y'all I said not one person has has given me an accurate representation of what this show is not one person knows where this show is he's like okay so maybe it's a medium show that's what I got him to.

Ana Reinert: Yes. They're definitely humble. Yeah. Yeah. The Torontans Torontonians Torontonians are humble they're very very humble but this show is definitely comparable to any mid-sized American show.

Brad Dowdy: Without question and like I was like chastising him and the best I could get him to was medium and I was essentially yelling at him.

Myke Hurley: I would say that for like a lot of if you are an independent maker like you or like many of the pens that we know this is actually a very good opportunity potentially because you would be in a minority so you would maybe stand out a little bit more in this show.

Ana Reinert: And they would I mean the Torontonians and all of this running it would like lose their mind if someone like Jonathan Brooks came up here to sell his pens or any maker of that caliber that was making hand-turned resin pens like that would

Myke Hurley: Well you can see it in the perception they've given us. Oh totally. Like they're so excited that we've made this trip

Brad Dowdy: to their little show and we're not like

Myke Hurley: you know we're not contributing anything more than just being there and you know they like laid out the red carpet for us so I can only imagine how excited they would be like if Brad was to bring Knock to the show but so do you think then even with a one day show like you could turn enough of a profit that it would make it worth it for you?

Brad Dowdy: Yes.

Ana Reinert: They would lay out those maple scented bills.

Brad Dowdy: From what I this crowd was intense. We rolled show opened at 10 we were rolled in at 10.05 10.10 all I saw was heads. I couldn't see table.

Myke Hurley: It looked like it had been open for two hours.

Ana Reinert: It looked like it looked like Friday morning at most of the shows anywhere in the US. Yeah. That Friday morning frenzy that you see in Atlanta in Dallas in I mean any of the shows where people are like

Brad Dowdy: all day long.

Ana Reinert: Like yeah what you see at a Franklin Kristoff table at Friday morning at 10 a.m. Exactly. Yeah. That's what it looked like.

Myke Hurley: So we were mostly stationed at the Wonder Pens table because it was really busy and as we were bumping into people we were kind of holding up the corridors so we kind of found our way to the Wonder Pens table. there was a line from 10 a.m. to 3.30 p.m. That was the first time it broke. This was a line to just get to the table. I've never seen that before. Like for that length of time at a for a table that is for a store that is 10 minutes away from the venue. Right. So it's like they just want to support the people that are doing the thing. It's wild. Like it was really good. I've never seen this kind of support that it seems like the people want to and I think one of the big differences is it's free and I think that makes a big difference. It allowed and everyone that I spoke to all of the people that were involved in the organizing they were so proud of the fact that their show is free because it allows them to bring people in and they can spend all of their money on stuff. They're not paying like $5 that they could use somewhere inside. They're not giving to the vendor and I'm sure that it means that they have a good deal with the library which allows them to do this because I would assume that it's not being run at a loss to the people organizing it but that kind of mentality I think is really great and everyone seems super focused on trying to make sure that this show was enabling the future. I kept hearing this like we want to get people in now so they can see this and start to get excited so then in 20 years they have much more money to spend and it was really heartwarming to see that kind of focus put on the show it was wonderful it really was really just a great environment it was a big open space they had every single table was full I had no

Brad Dowdy: complaints so I had a couple of recurring themes one at the Wonderpens event a lot of people there were going to their first pin show and traveled to get here which brings me to point number two which I think is even more important is that so many people today said they're here because this is Canada's only pin show

Myke Hurley: yeah it was like repeatedly we want to support this yeah right

Brad Dowdy: yeah so I mean people were traveling hours and flights and you know booking hotels to be here for what our good friend carrie at kenro industries dubbed six hour scriptus this thing is open for six hours on a sunday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. it was nuts like people from all over the country were making it a point to be here for this show because this is their one chance a year to see all these people under one roof

Myke Hurley: so put like if you say that to put that into perspective people are taking tomorrow off work for this right I spoke to a bunch of people that are doing that it means that much to someone from calgary that they will travel in stay in a hotel stay with a friend take monday off work so they can come to a six hour pen show that is super different yeah where like I've been to pen shows they're like oh it's raining today so no one's gonna come right

Ana Reinert: yeah sunday in in atlanta if it's raining people bail they don't come to day three because never mind it's raining yep but yeah people really make a commitment i did also

Myke Hurley: it's been raining here too

Ana Reinert: it was it rained all day and that did not stop a single person from coming nope um i i actually talked to several people who came in all the way from buffalo new york they were really willing to cross international lines to come to this show because for them it was the closest pen show they're like yep i'll come to canada to come to a pen show i mean well we came to canada to come to a pen show but yeah they were super excited to come to toronto to come to a pen show so and they said you know this was a big deal for them too you know they love to come up here for a show so i thought that was really cool

Myke Hurley: i'm really pleased we did this

Brad Dowdy: yeah i am too um you know it was uh eye opening from the jump yep and it never stopped yep which is like one of our goals right we want to see these new things learn about these new things meet new people try to you know enlighten ourselves on these you know these ideas that we've had built in over the years and our market and the things we have experience with and see what these new experiences are and you know have our minds changed you know willingly you know it's like please mold my little clay brain you know teach me your ways toronto and it ends up being that way and it was fascinating um from like the moment i got in new york and we got to fountain pen hospital until this show ended it was my eyes were just constantly opened the whole time and kind of

Myke Hurley: nothing was what i expected it would be yeah and everything turned out better

Shopping at Scriptus

Ana Reinert: right yep so you guys said you didn't really buy anything at scriptus but i did actually buy a couple of things um that really surprised me oh yeah um and one of the things i bought was some folded nibs nice that were made here oh nice um from and i wish i could remember his name i will look it up and make sure that we get the information in the notes um but he particularly made folded nibs small enough to fit into sample ink bottles oh uh which was epic because

Myke Hurley: usually that is such a smart thing

Ana Reinert: to do i know and that was well i was like i'm sold how many like how many designs do you have yes i'll take them all yeah um but yeah they were um wonderful and then he also had um larger designs and he had one that was called a three-way folded nib where depending on whether you use the top the side or the end you would get different results and i looked at it and then never made it back over to his table because just things got crazy busy and everything but i found that was like again not things that i normally find at other pen shows and not something that i was expecting to find here with someone who is hand making folded nibs and then making folded nibs specifically designed to be small enough to fit into sample ink files yeah which i thought was really cool

Brad Dowdy: the mix of vendors was really good like we talked about there weren't necessarily a lot of pen makers that we're used to in the u.s. that are you know you know making acrylic or ruchy pens you know like jonathan or woodshed or edison even you know those type of makers weren't here but there were a lot of just individual selling either vintage or doing pen repairs or you know there were a lot of woodturn pens and handmade pens and there were a lot of art companies here with a more artistic focus you know there were a lot of book binders yeah binding and

Ana Reinert: they were specifically making handmade books for that had like timoey river paper in them some had leather covers some had very in the far back corner they were making sketch books with hand-drawn covers on them and then they had samples that they had actually drawn in and it was almost i had more fun looking at the drawings that they had done yeah because they were fantastic and there were

Brad Dowdy: multiple artists

Ana Reinert: yeah there were tons of artists and so that was really interesting and that was one of the things someone um uh stopped and asked me like you know they kept asking me how is this different than american shows yeah and i said you know one of the things particularly was a lot more handmade books yeah um and that's not something because because usually we have vendors like anderson and vaness that have that bring you know rhodia and leuchtturm and things like that so having vendors that are selling handmade books is um i don't know it just seems to be less common like san francisco had several handmade book binders but usually there might be one

Brad Dowdy: yeah

Ana Reinert: in this case i saw at least four different handmade books easily at least which i thought was really cool

Myke Hurley: i walked past one of the tables and it was a woman selling her books and she just said i was unhappy with what i found in the world so i made my own and i was like yeah you did right on you mentioned i didn't buy anything i didn't buy anything at scriptus because the day before at wonder pens i bought another sailor and just decided i couldn't keep doing this to myself because there was a sailor that i wanted to see scriptus but purposefully didn't go look at it so i can't keep doing it i bought a 1911 highlighter pen we'd come with highlighter ink yeah

Brad Dowdy: just super cool it's a great color yeah why didn't

Myke Hurley: you buy anything

Brad Dowdy: um because i bought everything before like because i bought something the day before and the day before that and the day before that so i had a shopping list for all of these places that i knew where we're going to go and i executed my list perfectly i got everything that was on the list like that began with like cw pencils and a lot of things that were not on the list that place like i didn't have a list for kino kiniya that's a place you don't have a list you just go figure out like i i have all the japanese stuff what japanese stuff don't i have

Myke Hurley: so if you and if you had a list you wouldn't know where to find anything

Brad Dowdy: true um so by and then you know wonder pens i had a list i got the things i wanted there and so by the time i got to the pen show i was like super content with the things i picked up along the way so i got the ink uh thanks yeah we all got

Myke Hurley: the ink thank

Brad Dowdy: you honor

Myke Hurley: you're welcome she waited in line for us kwz inks uh northern twilight and maple red

Brad Dowdy: yeah sold out uh quickly as they anticipated and so yeah i didn't have any particulars that by the time i got here that i was looking for so you know i walked around and you know browsed and you know did some window shopping but you know i was uh content with where i was at i didn't need one more thing so yeah i'm i'm super happy with how i i rounded out the trip from a shopping perspective by not actually going overboard today so as you

Myke Hurley: mentioned we recorded this uh immediately after the pen show so a few days so once the time this comes out we'll well i'll be on my way back home you guys will be back home again and then i i guess this is is this our last pen show for the year yes yes yeah

Brad Dowdy: yeah so i'm starting my next year early in philadelphia which is earlier than ever before which at this point is only about two and a half months away but yeah this is it for the year and so vending there i am vending there okay first time visit and first time visiting vending there so yes knock will be in philadelphia so

Myke Hurley: again this was all thanks to our kicks our tobaccas so thank you so much to everyone that has uh donated their their time and their money and their efforts into helping us get here my understanding from brad is that we're ever so close to finishing up

Brad Dowdy: yeah so by the time i get home i should have most of the remaining tollulis at my house waiting for me or at least uh arriving this week so hopefully by next week i'll have good news that everyone's order has been fulfilled or a backer reward has been shipped from the kickstarter campaign so thank you for your patience with that

Myke Hurley: yeah you're you're all very very patient very kind um you'll have our uh video out with you very shortly if not already and i'll say that we've got 2019 underway yeah planning i think we don't want to say anything yet yeah way too soon we think that we've got our idea set which is very unlikely for us to have it set so far in advance but i think we're finally getting this under control so i think all i will say is another new city yes for the kickstarter campaign is what we're doing next time but we have some fun stuff built around all of that so more to share uh sooner than we all think it will be as is usual right where it's like whoop better get that started yep it's february so thank you so much for listening to this episode of the pen addict thank you so much to blue apron for their support of this episode if you want to find our shots you can go to relay.fm slash pen addict slash three three two if you want to find brad online you can go to twitch.tv slash pen addict pen addict.com knock.co dowdyism on twitter pen addict on instagram you can go and find anna's work she is well appt desk on twitter and instagram right yes and you can go to wellappointeddesk.com uh anna's great products the coloring products are all available from wellappointeddesk.com

Brad Dowdy: too and your favorite retailers they're all

Myke Hurley: the rage favorite retailers because i was going to say i keep seeing them popping up it was funny today i was standing right in front of them on one of the pens table and people like oh what a good idea i'm like yes it is a good idea nicely spotted uh and you can find me online you can follow me on instagram i am i mike i m y k e and we'll be back next time until then say goodbye brad and anna goodbye brad and

Brad Dowdy: anna