The Pen Addict 374/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	374
Title:	A Well-Appointed Recap
Release Date:	August 29th, 2019
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	Ana Reinert
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 374
Audio File:	Audio Episode 374
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 374
Length:	5555 min <br />0.917 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 374, and today's show is brought to you by Pen Chalet. My name is Myke Hurley. I am joined by Brad Dowdy. Hi, Brad Dowdy. Hello, Myke Hurley. How are you? I am very well indeed. And of course, for our Pen Show wrap-up episode, we are joined once again by the wonderful Anna Reinhart. Hi, Anna.

Brad Dowdy: Hello.

Myke Hurley: So, we are, we're not together anymore. I think I got lost somewhere. I'm still in San Francisco.

Myke Hurley: What happened? Well, I just stayed around for a couple of extra days, so I could record this show as normal. We went to my normal shows. We're leaving later on today. Okay, so it wasn't the traffic or anything. No, traffic's been fine. Staying an extra couple of days. Traffic's been fine. But yeah, so you're both back home now. Feeling okay?

Brad Dowdy: Uh, yeah.

Myke Hurley: Mostly?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Pen Show Logistics

Anna Reinhart: Neither of us sounded very convincing there. Yeah. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: The guys rolled in last night about 11.

Myke Hurley: Oh, yeah, of course, because they drive, right? Yeah. So, it's both Bob, your partner, and Myke of Van Es, right? They both drive.

Brad Dowdy: Yes, they did. That's wild. Isn't it crazy? Because Myke then had to get up at like six this morning and head down to Little Rock.

Myke Hurley: Whoa.

Brad Dowdy: So, he still had another six hours to go.

Myke Hurley: Oh, my word. Oh, my word. No, thank you for me. I don't think I could do that. Yeah.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah, I was home by nine Monday night. Couldn't sleep, of course. Like, I tried to go to sleep like a normal person. That just didn't work. So, I was just out of it all day yesterday, but feeling pretty good today. But yeah, it's not too bad. Jet lagging. No con crud or anything like that to speak of. So, overall, pretty good.

Myke Hurley: So, there are two videos still incoming. The episode that we recorded last week was videoed like our Atlanta episodes are, right? So, there's some video for that. That's on the way. There's also, let's say it's a vlog. I think more of like a video slideshow is the way I'm thinking of it, of kind of my experiences of going to San Francisco. There's stuff from our live show, our big live show that we did, and then all of the stuff, some shots from the pen show. Lots of vertical videos shot by Brad. So, that's something to look forward to.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. I'm not going to live that one down. That's fair. That's fair because I just got, you know, I just overlooked it when I was like busy. It was mostly because, you know, Dina and I were walking around the show and I was mostly listening to her and helping her out. And every now and then, I'd just break out the phone and shoot some video and it's all vertical. It's just because you're so, you know, you're so with the kids that you shoot in vertical. That's what it is. Right. That's the new, it's just the new old. That's what the kids do. Everything old is new again, right?

San Francisco Pen Show

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm. So, let's now, because last time we all spoke on the show, we'd only been at the San Francisco pen show for a handful of hours, really. It was only one day, which is very different to normal for us. We usually record the pen show kind of at the end of the second day, which by and large, that's a lot of the pen show feels over by that point, right? Because Sunday tends to be a quieter day as it was in San Francisco as well. So, I kind of wanted to get everybody's thoughts about this San Francisco pen show, not just this year, but like maybe the San Francisco experience in general, right? Like what it's like to be at that show. So, Anna, how was your show overall? What were your big takeaways from the San Francisco pen show?

Brad Dowdy: The show was really consistent to previous years. Probably the biggest difference was we set up on Friday morning instead of on Thursday night, which is how we normally do it, partially because Bob and Myke got in late. Matt from the pen habit got in late. And then I went downtown to see you and the whole relay team do their show. Sorry, my voice is still a little rocky. And so, as a result, the way that they had set up Friday morning to start, basically they let vendors in only an hour, I think, before they let three-day pass holders in. So, we ended up basically unpacking essentially the same time people were shopping. So, we kind of spent the entire day on Friday feeling a little bit behind and like spent all day feeling like we were trying to catch up, which was a little stressful. I can't entirely blame the vendors for that. I think some people were able to set up on Thursday and had we timed things differently, we probably could have had at least some of the, some, something set up. But overall, one of the things I found really interesting was that I did have a chance to talk to Sid, one of the organizers, earlier in the day and found out that they had set up the show where each of the organizers was responsible for one particular part of the show. So, like Sid was responsible for like food and beverages. I think Todd handled all the like PA and like picking the band and some other like had very specific tasks. I think Ricky was handling a lot of the vendors. I think Todd probably helped with that too. And then this year was the first year, Franz was responsible for all the classes and workshops. So, by giving everybody very specific tasks, they could really focus and make sure that those things were handled. And you could really tell. Like everything was super organized and when anyone had any problems with any one part, you knew who you needed to talk to and you knew what needed to be, you know, like how to get those things taken care of. So, I mean, San Francisco really sets the bar for how pen shows should be organized.

Myke Hurley: Especially because like it's not only just well organized, it's well organized and they do more, right? So, like there is more available to attendees at this show than there is a lot of other shows. So, it's like, you know, you could do less and run it better, but they do more and run it better, which is that's the double here, right? Like that's a double whammy right there.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, totally. And then you have other people from their pen, the San Francisco pen posse who volunteer at the front desk to people like Kimberly who on her own volition decides she's going to start her own pen show Uber and she picks people up at the airport. And she picked many of us up at the airport and gave people's rides to the airport. I mean, like just really, really awesome stuff like that.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. You got to go see the pen show Uber hashtag on Instagram was awesome. Like everyone, every, all the riders got their picture. It was great.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, yeah. Some of us were a little worse for the wear that morning.

Anna Reinhart: Probably not the best timing, but yeah, it was fun.

Brad Dowdy: But it was, it was so awesome and it was so kind of her to do it. And, you know, so it's like, again, even the people in the community in San Francisco step up. Kimberly and several other people who helped her also arranged to bring sandwiches on Friday on Saturday and Sunday for people, for vendors who were working in the show. So again, found a way to make sure that people got lunches that didn't necessarily have to order from the, you know, $20 for a sandwich from the hotel kind of thing. So, I mean, just lots of different things that really helped make that show amazing. And then people like Alexander who put together the pen show map.

Myke Hurley: How cool was that?

Brad Dowdy: The interactive pen show map that went up pretty much, I think, late Thursday night or first thing Friday morning. So a lot of people were able to find that and use the interactive map to find vendors and where they were located on the show floor. Amazing things. And the fact that he was able to do it and the show gave him access to that information so that he could put it together. And I mean, it was just, it was freaking phenomenal. So those were my big takeaways just about the show itself. Personally, we had a really good show. We sold out of the coloring and the coloring on Saturday, by Saturday morning at 10 a.m. Amazing. I mean, like we had no coloring. Like we were running around asking other people if they had any left. So just stuff like that. And then there were other like super awesome moments, like Yukio Nagahara spent time with both Audrey from Franklin Kristoff and with Ralph. And there are photos on Instagram that people capture these moments.

Myke Hurley: Just for context, could you tell, in case listeners don't know, explain who Yukio Nagahara is?

Brad Dowdy: Yukio Nagahara is the, he was the nib, he is the nib grinder. And maybe Brad, you can clarify for me, was for Sailor. And he does all of those amazing like specialty nibs for Sailor that no one else really knows how to do. But I mean, he is so skilled and is like literally zen-like when he's grinding a nib. I mean, like just to watch him work is pretty spectacular. And the fact that he sat and spent time with both with Audrey and with Ralph. And I know that both of them had really great experiences talking with him through the interpreter that just gave them, like really empowered both of them to continue to do what they're doing as, you know, new nib grinders in our community. I just think it's so amazing.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. That made me smile so big when I saw that he was sitting with them and spending time with them. I was like, yeah, this is great.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, one other thing I forgot. A woman came up to the well-pointed desk table and she showed her coloring that she'd been using and she had been painting teeny tiny little plants on the coloring. They are amazing. Please, please, please include the link for them. She's actually a video game artist. And so she was like working up like sketches for like artwork that might go in this game. And so she was just doing her like sketches and stuff in the coloring. And there are these like absolutely amazing teeny tiny illustrations. And she showed it to Bob and he was so blown away. He started to cry. And she's like, she's like, oh my gosh, don't cry. Please. Like I didn't, you're gonna make me cry. And then it's like, why are you guys all crying? And then I saw them and I was just like totally blown away. Like I didn't even know what to say. I was so speechless. They were so stunning. And it just sort of showed that people are starting to do these creative and amazing things with this little book that we made. So those were my moments.

Myke Hurley: Really stunning. Yeah. I'll put the link in the show notes. They're very beautiful.

Anna Reinhart: Artwork is amazing. Yeah. It's wonderful. Yeah. So I, I mean, I echo most of everything that Ana says there, the show promoters and the volunteers are amazing. You know, with our setup for the podcast, we dealt with Todd mostly. And you could tell like I never had to deal with Ricky or Sid, like that was Todd's realm. So whenever I needed something about the room, it was Todd that handled it. And if I ever needed Todd or had to find Todd, Todd was there and he showed up. So it was like, they're just super on top of things. The way the entire event runs and the volunteers are amazing. They have a huge group shout out to the San Francisco pen posse for all of their help all weekend. Um, it was a packed house Friday and Saturday, pretty much all day long. Both of those days, it got really hot on Saturday. It was so full, um, which is okay. Like I, I'd rather be just completely packed like that all the time. And, you know, the ballrooms keep expanding every year. I guess it's been two years since I've been, there's more tables in the foyer, more tables in the outside space. Uh, they have one room out, uh, out off the foyer to use. And then the main ballroom is just wall to wall vendor tables. And, you know, they were all taken. Sometimes you'll see pen shows where the room might be completely set up and then it might be, you know, handfuls of tables, you know, where vendors didn't show up or just didn't get sold or whatever. And not here, they use pretty much every square inch of available space. And it just kept rolling through with the, with the people. I do agree with Ana about the setup. It would been nice to have a little bit of buffer, even though I didn't get there until about seven 30 or eight in the morning, um, with the passes weekend passes, getting there, allowing access at 8.00 AM as well, just made it a little bit tougher. Um, it was easier for me obviously than Ana and setting up the whole van S table. Um, so, you know, if that could be pushed back to like 10 o'clock and then public at like one o'clock, something like that, I don't know, maybe a little bit worth it or ensure that we can definitely set up Thursday night. Um, which I couldn't either for the same reasons. I love the hotel. Um, the space is great. It's expensive for food and beverage. Of course, not only is it hotel prices, it's Silicon Valley prices. So it's mega expensive, but I will say at least it's good. Um, it's good food. I had good food, good drinks the whole times. I, it bugged me that the market shut down, you know, like the little, uh, kind of coffee and, and deli cooler space, um, that most, that most hotels have this one shut down at like three o'clock ish every day, some two, three o'clock. So I would like that to be open till at least I finished the show. I was desperate for like, you know, a diet Coke or a water or something like that after hours. And I'd, so I'd just, I'd leave the show, walk over to the market and it's closed. And I felt that was a little bit weird because there were no other options except the bar or the restaurant. So I would like to see that open later. Um, the bar did stay open late though. We had, uh, we had no problems in the bar in the evenings. Um, they stayed up until at least midnight. I'm pretty sure. And I love seeing all the Asian vendors, you know, I've been able to make friends with so many of them over the years that make the trip, you know, Bungu box, Stilo art, a boy, uh, on and on and on. And there were new ones there this year. And like, that's just right up my alley. And I just didn't get enough time with any of them or anybody this weekend. Um, really until Sunday, I was able to walk around a little bit and, uh, and talk and greet everybody. But, uh, some people I didn't even see for the first time until Sunday, just cause we were so busy, which is great. I mean, you know, if the show's set up that well, the hotel's nice and the crowds are big, you know, there's not much I'm ever going to be able to complain about. So it was just a really great

Myke Hurley: all around show. I would say that for me, uh, it felt a lot more like of all the pen shows that I've been to, it felt more like the DC show than anything else. It was big. There were lots of people. It felt represented by all walks of the pen community, right? From, uh, you know, people selling vintage pens to artisanal makers, to some weird and wonderful things, to big brands, you know, like nibs.com were there. I've never seen, I don't think I've ever seen them at a show before. Um, and they had some wild stuff. Uh, I would say from a setup perspective, natural light is a wonderful thing. Cannot be, uh, underestimated. So many, uh, pen shows are in rooms that don't have windows. And this one having windows was very nice. Um, plus the weather was good in San Francisco, which helped a lot. I met way more first timers than any other show that I've been to. Like people that were, this was their first ever pen show. That was really amazing. There were also a lot of people that were like talking about coming to the pen show for the first time because they heard last week, the episode two weeks ago, which was super amazing. Uh, I met a lot of new people and I got all the pen shows that I've been to. There's like an overlap of, of people that I've seen at other shows, right? Like people that will travel for shows or it's like, uh, it's possible for them to be able to make multiple shows because of like location. But this show, I met more new people than I've ever met before. Um, I was exhausted to two live shows and the pen show with a broken spine. Bad for me. That was a bad set up for me. Um, so I apologize, Brad, I wasn't very helpful for you. Uh, you were more than helpful, more than helpful, but, uh, that I'm very, I was very tired after that. It's made me realize that if I'm ever going to do multiple live shows in multiple days again, um, I need to make sure that I don't have anything else around it. Um, I think overall as well, the hotel was excellent. It's the best hotel that, uh, I've been at a pen show for the food was great. Like I thought it was really great. It wasn't cheap, but it was great. If it's going to be expensive, then I wanted it to be good. And it was, and the location was brilliant too. Like it was just a few minutes, like in a lift to San Carlos, which is this really nice town. We went for dinner there a couple of times, had a ton of great options. So I would definitely happily go back to San Francisco. Um, so, you know, like no, no disrespect to any of the other shows that we've been to, but if we were going to return to one sooner rather than later that we've been to before, I would, I would return there. I think like I'm way more keen to go back to San Francisco than to

Anna Reinhart: go to DC. So, yeah. Yeah. I mean, here, here to the San Francisco pen show. Yep. So a lot on last

Pen Purchases

Myke Hurley: week's episode, we spoke about some things that we purchased and I bought the, um, the limited edition bung box. Hello friend, San Francisco pen. Aside from that, I didn't buy any other pens at the show. I looked at a bunch of stuff, but nothing that I was really too drawn to buy. Uh, I bought a small handful of the Monteverde Suite Life inks. I got those from Van S. They were really great. Uh, and I've tried a couple of them. I heard really good things about them. Like I'd never really considered Monteverde that much before for ink, but these colors are amazing. Uh, so I'm very happy with those. Um, and then outside of that, uh, my entire budget or our entire budget, I should say, was saved for Adina. She got excited about a few things. So I was like, great. I want to encourage this. So I didn't buy anything else and we put all of the budget in there. And I think maybe, uh, where I don't think we've completely finalized this yet, me and Brad, but I'm thinking maybe in the next week or two, we could have Adina back on and she could talk about what she bought and how she's using it. Is that good? And how she, and how she blew the bird, her budget, except she used

Anna Reinhart: some of yours. So it all worked out well. She tripled the budget. She went crazy. Yeah. She seemed

Myke Hurley: like she had so much fun. Yeah, she did. She, she definitely had a first pen show fever, right? This is, you know, she, she had that for sure. So, uh, I, I want to give her some time to use the, the stuff that she's bought. Um, but she was very excited about it. And so maybe in the next week or two, we could have her back on and she could, she could talk about that. Yeah. And I'd like

Anna Reinhart: to get some show feedback from someone who was there for the first time and it was such a big show. So that, and like, we haven't spoken specifically about that. Like me and Adina have not spoken like directly. Okay. How was your first show? What were your thoughts? So maybe we can get that.

Brad Dowdy: Uh, from her. I think that would be great. Yeah. Well, um, one of the things that Dina didn't get to buy, which I think she was looking at, um, one of, um, I bought two pens from woodshed from Myke. Um, one of them was a translucent coral material with like glitter chips in it. Um, and then I also bought a lime green surprise lime green pen from him. And it was a, like a Sunday afternoon. And from what I understand, everyone who's seen the photo that I put on Instagram of some of the pens that I bought said they looked at that coral one and said, Oh, I almost bought that. I almost bought that one. Yeah. I was like, what was there on Sunday afternoon?

Anna Reinhart: So no one else jumped and did it. So. Yeah. When I was taking a Dina around, um, we went early Sunday and she saw that pen and was, was checking out, checking it out. And, uh, so yeah, by the time he got there, it was still there. So that's great. And, uh, on Sunday I also went over and

Brad Dowdy: saw straights pens, um, because all weekend they had been feeding me photos on Instagram of all of the inks that they brought. I mean, like literally just like, Hey, what about this one? Hey, what about this? What about this? So they brought a whole bunch of ink from Taiwan called eye paper. And so I bought literally a metric ton of ink. And then I also brought back another metric ton of ink for Jesse, which she could not put in her suitcase. So I have to mail it to her later. And I got a straights pens, a rosé by the box, which was their show ink, which was a sort of a really bright corally reddish pink. With an amazing name. It is so good. It was so good. They actually had a box of rosé box wine behind the counter that they kept holding up. Like if you walked by and I asked them if they drank it and they said they did, I said, how was it? And they're like, meh, it's okay. The ink's better than the box wine. Um, but, uh, I bought a, uh, gallon leather, uh, washi tape dispenser because, um, it was on the table the entire weekend. And once I put, I grabbed two rolls of washi tape from Nick Pang's table, I think his girlfriend had made them or I don't know how they were on his table. I grabbed them because we had the dispenser out, but no tape on it. So people didn't know what it was. I'm like, can I borrow these rolls of tape? And they're like, uh, sure. As soon as I put those rolls of tape on there, we, we were selling them. People are like, Ooh, this is really cool. And so then, um, and then they'd be like, where'd the tape come from? And I was like, over there, go get it. So I hope, hopefully we sold some tape for them too. Um, and, uh, I did go over to a bung box and I bought a, um, their Sapporo mini Gemini, um, because I'm a Gemini and it was blue and it's cute.

Anna Reinhart: And that's the blue one. Yeah. It's super, super pretty.

Brad Dowdy: And I bought a couple of bottles of bung box ink and I got a Musubi refill journal for the soon to be available covers whenever those are ready. And a stupid, ridiculously pink, sparkly pen sleeve from Rickshaw and a bunch of stickers. I bought, I just got a bunch of little stuff. Like, um, this is a big list. It's so ridiculous. I know it's crazy. Um, I got an Ingersoll vintage, uh, green ring top fountain pen from the auction. It was in a lot of pens that Jesse bought, which then I sat at the bar and I'm like, what are you going to do with that one? She's like, I don't know. And I'm like, can I buy it for me? Cause I didn't get to go to the auction. She's like, yeah, sure. So she did a little after auction horse trading. I got a retro 51, um, the century of progress pen from Atlas stationers. Um, this is beautiful. It is really good. So I have a big, I have a big, really, really big thing about the century of progress Chicago expo. And so when I heard that Atlas stationers was doing a special pen for this, I got super, super excited, but the deal was they weren't going to be released to the public. They were only available in their store until Friday, but I knew that Carrie was in Chicago doing a in store for, for Kenro. And so I texted him and I'm like, Hey, can you do me a favor? Can you grab one for me? Because there was, I knew there was no way on Friday that I was going to be able to remember to get on Atlas's website and try to get one of these pens. So good friend that he is, he picked one up for me and he brought it out to San Francisco. So I, I, I feel blessed to have friends like that.

World's Fairs

Myke Hurley: Yeah. See, we just did a, on a genius, we just did like a double episode about world's fairs. So really I should have, I should have got this one. We did, uh, the history of world's fairs and then, uh, an episode about the first world's fair, which was in England.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, cool. Yeah. I'm, I have so much memorabilia from the 33, 34 world's fair in Chicago. I kind of have like stupid knowledge about it. Um, Bob got the discovery retro 51. That was the he did. He, he managed to get a pen for the show and, uh, for like the entire weekend, there was a shelf on the Venice inked stand of new old stock Pelican 4001 that nobody noticed. I don't know what they thought it was. I didn't even know what it was. And then I finally asked Lisa, I'm like, what's this? She's like, Oh, it's new old stock Pelican ink. I'm like, what do you mean? New old stock? She's like, we found it in the basement. You have got to be kidding me. She's like, no. I'm like, how much are we selling it for? She's like 20 bucks. I'm like, I'll take

Anna Reinhart: two. Yeah. I saw the old bottles on top of the rack. I figured it was something new that

Brad Dowdy: they were just like relaunching. Nope. That was actually old. Nice. I know. So I got some of that. And then another friend of mine was selling, um, old Waterman vintage bottles. So I bought that too. And then I muleed a mug for, um, one of Julia's Scott's mugs for Laura. Man. I, I know it's crazy. And I didn't, I would like went with the intention of not buying anything. Yeah. And then it exploded.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. I didn't have anything on my shopping list. I knew there were plenty of things I was going to check out. And I came home with plenty of stuff like for review and for giveaway and stuff like that, which we'll, we'll talk about in a minute. But for stuff I bought specifically for me, I bought a pen wrap from Bungu box. They make these cool fabric wraps that I bought the first one in DC when they were there, whatever it was four or five years ago. And then they had a new, a different color this year. So I had to get that. And then I got a needle point nib grind, um, from Nagahara on my sailor Rialo, which was awesome. That's what I'm using today. I've been writing a bunch with it. It's really, really awesome. It writes like a 0.25 pilot high tech C, which is kind of amazing. Maybe a 0.3, nothing, nothing, uh, wider than that. So I am super happy. I got to sit with him and, uh, have a nib grind up funny story about that pen. So that was the YY pen club and there was only 50 of them made. So it was just as Japan only really specific thing. And so I sat down for my, my time, my appointment and handed him the pen. And he just looked up at me and like held the pen out me like, what is this? So basically he asked the translator, he said, how did you get this? And, uh, I said, I know some people. And he says, who do you know? Uh-oh. And I told him, I told him, I told him, um, well, I'm friends online with Jacob who goes by food, a fan on Instagram. They're like, ah, Jacob. Okay. So apparently, uh, no, no, no, no, no. He was just very serious. He's like, how did you get this? Um, so it was funny. And, um, I know Myke, you're not a huge fan of the cap band, uh, fonts on there, but Nagahara, uh, it was translated to me that he told them that they had to put the 10th on there for the 10th anniversary. So he was part consultant for this pen as well. So that, that was my good little story.

Myke Hurley: I am perfectly fine with them, like putting something on there, but just not that fun. Sorry. I just can't abide by it.

Anna Reinhart: I know I'm with you. But anyway, it was just a funny story is like, we were just sitting around, he wasn't paying attention until I handed him that pen. Then he was like, what is this? Like, where did you get this from? You shouldn't like, basically like, you shouldn't have this kind of thing. So it was, it was kind of funny. Um, all in good fun type of stuff. So yeah, that was great. So those were the only two things that I bought for me. I didn't buy any pens or inks. Um, despite the fact that I came home with a bunch of inks. So we'll talk

Myke Hurley: about that in a minute. All right, let's take a break. If you've been hearing us talk about all this wonderful pen show action and couldn't make it to a pen show of your own, then just go to penchela.com. It's like a pen show constantly all the time. You can just buy whatever you want. Isn't that an amazing thing? Go to penchela.com. They have everything you're looking for. They have all the brands you're looking for. They have all of the types of pens you're looking for, and they have all of the extras too. So it's not always about the fountain pens and roller balls. It could also be carrying cases, especially if you're going to be going to pen shows in the future, you need a good carrying case, but also pen holders and refills and fountain pen converters and so much more. Penchela are always adding new styles of pens every single month. They have discounts every single month and they have constant fast and reliable customer service. That's what they believe in over there. Penchela is sent internationally and they have great shipping rates, but they also do free shipping on orders of over $50 in the United States. So you want to go to penchela.com right now. That's P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T.com. Click the podcast link at the top of the website and enter the password penaddict for this week's special offer and to get the code that you need to save 10% on anything at any time over at Penchela. There are a selection of great discounts, which Brad might touch on a few of those in a moment, but also Penchela wanted me to let you know that if you buy one of their new Estabrook SD pens, which are the fountain pens, which are really beautiful. I saw a couple of those in San Francisco. They will ship you a free Penchela water bottle. Ron said that they have a low stock of the water bottles, but they are going to send one to everybody that buys one. So they may send it separately, but if they do, they'll let you know. So if you ever purchase any of the Estabrook SD fountain pens, you will get a free Penchela water bottle, which is I saw Brad had one and they are a quite significant thing. So it's a pretty fun

Anna Reinhart: little gift. Yeah. It's a really solid, well done water bottle. It's like, you know, the metal aluminum, you know, tall flask probably holds 28 ounces or some 32, something like that. It's very large, very heavy, very significant. It's got Penchela logo, Estabrook logo, and they're not really stickers on them. It's the way it's, I don't know what the, what the process is to, to do this. It's almost maybe like a screen print. I don't know exactly, but it looks, it looks fantastic. And that was definitely something I took home and I really enjoy that.

Myke Hurley: But yeah, I saw the SD, the Honeycomb SD, and that was a pretty beautiful looking pen. I was very tempted by that on a couple of occasions. Totally agree. There are some great Aurora and Retro 51 deals over at Penchela this week. So that's a- And Lamy. Oh, and Lamy too. Yeah. They're right at the top. So make sure you go to Penchela.com. Hit that podcast link at the top of the website and use the password Penaddict to get your hands on these special offers. Our thanks to Penchela for their continued and wonderful support of this show and RelayFM.

Anna Reinhart: All right. So lest we think, I came home with very few things. I was given a bunch of stuff and I bought some other things for giveaway. So these aren't really all necessarily personal use things, but stuff I got given to review on the blog or stuff I bought to give away. And Anna and I were lucky enough to be around some awesome vendors. We got to hang out in their area as much as ours throughout the weekend. One of them being Galen Leather with, we both got their prototype writer's medic bag, which is the new hotness they shared on their Instagram. It's really great. And I think both of us will be fair to say that it needs some work before there is a final release version of this, but we each have one to play around with. I got mine in the traditional tan leather. Anna got hers in what color, Anna? Green. Green. It's fabulous. Yeah. I'm just sitting here

Myke Hurley: with my mouth open. Brad told me because apparently he got first pick and he said that he was extra happy that he chose to tan because of how mad you would have been, Anna, if you got the green. Oh, I totally would have traded. I totally, yeah. No. You're just a nice guy. Yeah. I also got a purple

Anna Reinhart: Galen Leather five-shot pin case from Van S to review. Anna and I also talked, with Ahsan from Coal Creek Leather, who was next to the knock booth all weekend. I think Friday, he was a little confused on like what was going on. And then this was his first pin show ever. And then by Saturday and Sunday, he was like all in with like the pin show experience and vibe and

Myke Hurley: all the people and stuff. Yeah. Like he came up to me on Sunday and he was like, oh, Brad was talking to me about what you guys do. And I listened to the show and it was really good. So that was awesome.

Field Notes Covers

Anna Reinhart: Good, good. So I got a, you know, a field notes cover and an A5 color to, to review from them. I got the bung box sailor San Francisco as well. Myke, um, I'm going to use that one for a giveaway.

Myke Hurley: Not that one's not for me. Isn't that an incredible pattern? Like I've really enjoyed it. Like I, the, the, the images that they've shown make it look way more like Spider-Man red, but it is way closer to Golden Gate red, which is more of a, like a, it's a very subtle red with some orange in it.

Brad Dowdy: Um, I'm very excited about that pen. Did you see the picture that Jesse took? It matched her nail polish. She actually had. Yes, her nails were awesome. Were that color. Yeah. She's on point.

Anna Reinhart: Uh, Yamamoto paper was there. I love, uh, talking with Taizo. He's always doing neat and interesting stuff with paper. So I got the A4 fountain pen paper sampler. I actually, this was my, the second one he gave me. Cause the first one he gave me, I gave away, um, after the, um, after the show, after the live show and he was in there listening. So he came to me the next day. He's like, here, you keep this one. I'm like, okay, I'll keep this one. I won't give it away. Um, I got handed, um, by a friend, the Midori 10th anniversary MD a five notebook. The neat thing about this one is it is in a white grid. Myke, I'm going to have to show this to you. How does that work? I don't know what that means. I didn't even know this was a thing. So it's that ivory paper and there is a white grid on it. So I found a review of it by good San Francisco pen posse members at hand over that pen. So we'll put that link in the show notes. You can actually see what this is. Cause it's kind of hard to explain. Um, it's very interesting. It kind of rejects the ink, but is that the feature? I don't

Myke Hurley: know. Isn't that, isn't there a significant issue in that, that the only time you see the grid is when you go over the lines? Maybe. So it's like something cool. I want to play around with

Anna Reinhart: like, if I knew this existed, these don't exist anymore. I guess 10th anniversary was last year, maybe. Um, so I don't know that you can get these anymore, but I, if I knew this was a thing back then, I totally would have bought this and try to figure it out myself. Then I got a bunch of, a bunch of inks. I got, uh, brought a kingdom node ink. This is the high nobius to senior. It looks like a orange salamander, um, ink. So, and I got a couple of Venta inks, pen BBS inks. I've of course got the Joey Feldman ink and just an entire half of my suitcase was basically filled with all the stuff I brought home. Just swag and notes and gifts. Um, my Kinder surprise eggs, which, uh, are very contraband. I'm surprised they didn't take an, I didn't get pulled removed from the plane for carrying those home.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Can I explain kind of surprise in case people don't know what they are? Sure. And we put a link to the show notes into why this is a, an important deal. So, you know, like Americans know what Kinder is, right? Like it's, it's, I think German, uh, the German chocolate brand and they're typically like white chocolate and milk chocolate, right? So like the, the Kinder egg is like a white chocolate inside of a milk chocolate outside, but it's like super thin. And inside the chocolate egg is a little capsule that has a toy inside. So it's like a large orange capsule, like a pill, which you crack open and there's a toy inside and you either get like little statues or things you can build. I grew up like every child in Europe adoring kinder surprise. It's like one of the best things ever, but it is banned in America because there's a toy inside.

Brad Dowdy: We live in a litigious society.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Choking hazard. I mean, I'm just going to say for a Kinder surprise egg to be a choking hazard, you have to work very hard. I mean, by, by that, basically everything in the world is a choking hazard, honestly, because these things are huge, but yeah.

Anna Reinhart: This sounds like a future episode of Ungenius to me.

Myke Hurley: It might actually be, I might, you know what? I'm actually just going to put, I'm going to open Slack right now and I'm going to paste in the Wikipedia link to Kinder underscore surprise for Steven to look at for him to peruse at his own leisure.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. So my, my coffers were full on the way home. Both of my suitcases could not have held one more ounce of product. It was a great trip for, for all the things. So yeah, it was very fun. How about you, Anna?

Brad Dowdy: I'm surprised you didn't give me a bag to take home.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Remember I had a whole van.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah, that's true. That's true. I didn't even think about it. And like, if I, if I couldn't have actually gotten all the knock product in because I shipped out some boxes. So like I had to sell enough to get into the suitcases because I had already overpacked on the way out. I definitely would have hit you up for that. Yeah. You got some more stuff too, in including this first thing I want

Pentel Pens

Brad Dowdy: to talk about with you. So, um, I got a bag of goodies from Pentel from the poor Penman. So I'm very excited about getting a chance to review some cool gel pens and Hey, I didn't say fountain pens. I got a bunch of cool stuff and there were some brush pens and a bunch of other fun stuff. The green medic bag from Galen leather, which you already mentioned stole my thunder.

Anna Reinhart: I just happened to go first in the second.

Brad Dowdy: That's okay. Um, I got a couple of the Euchre's pens, but I think I mentioned that on the podcast. Um, I did get an SD, um, honeycomb to review that Myke mentioned. And somebody asked me if I got the regular size or the large. And honestly, I do not know. Brian from Kenro just handed it too many. He goes here, do you need a box? And I'm like, does it come in the same size box as all the other SDs? And he's like, yeah. And I'm like, no, then I've got one. So they were packing up and I was like, I didn't want them to have to like try to sort all that out. I'm like, I can use one of the boxes I already have for the review. It's fine. One less thing for me to pack. And, uh, I got an Aurora duo cart in Vespa green. Nice. And Brian was so excited from Kenro cause he was like, I really wanted you to review the green one cause it looks like a Vespa. Okay. I can't wait. Um, and Nick from Blackwing came by and, um, just came by to say hello. And then he gave me one Blackwing 54, the sort of like pinky purple one. Yep. He just came by to say hi. And I've been having weird technical problems on their website. And he's like, he's like, you didn't call me back. And I'm like, okay, I'll call. And, uh, I'm trying to, there's so much stuff we, um, Bob and Myke unpacked the truck at six o'clock this morning cause they got in so late last night. So I'm pretty sure I got everything unpacked before the podcast. I am not entirely sure. There's probably more stuff.

Anna Reinhart: So real quick on the Pentel stuff. I also got the swag bag from Paul, um, which is awesome. Like he came prepared and he's like, you know, here's the tester bag of all the cool Pentel stuff. And one of the things I got to do, and I'm not sure if you got the chance to do it, but I don't know, but there'll be other times there's the, did you take the Pentel glide, right? Challenge?

Brad Dowdy: No.

Anna Reinhart: So it's a blind. Yeah. It's a blind ballpoint pen test where basically their new glide, right? Is coming out this year, I guess, uh, their new ballpoint pen. And he has four basically unmarked pens, just, you know, like the Coke or Pepsi challenge where you go through the four pens and you rank them in order of smoothness. And, uh, to Pentel's credit, I went through the test and the pen that I picked was the smoothest was the Pentel glide, right? So it apparently worked on me. So the Pepsi challenge, right? Yep. Yep. Exactly. So trying to figure out the, like the taste test. So this was a writing test. It's really hard to take four reasonably good black 1.0 millimeter ballpoint pens and tell a difference. Like one was very bad. And then the other three were like really close. And then, uh, I was able to nail it down. So that was fun. Cool.

Myke Hurley: Probably for good reason. People don't give me stuff like they give you two stuff. I don't get this. I don't get all these, these wonderful review things. It just doesn't happen to me, but that's fine because, uh, I can't cope with more than I already have. So it's the best for everybody. I have no space to put new things other than the stuff that I'm already buying. Um, so Brad, where does the, uh, where does this specific pen show, the 2019 San Francisco pen show, where does it rank for you, uh, in your pen show history?

Anna Reinhart: It's gotta be like, you know, top three, top five, like it's way, it's way up there. It was just when it's this easy to attend and this fun and this successful from, you know, either personal and business perspectives, it's going to rank highly. Like I like the facility. I like the promoters. There's no challenges that, you know, ruin your day type of, you know, level of challenges. You know, there are always going to be some challenges and the way that promoters handle them is, is just wonderful. You know, the Atlanta pen shows are special to my heart because, because that was some of our first live shows and just, just really home and, you know, get to meet a lot of locals there that are like close personal friends. So those are always going

Myke Hurley: to be like at the top of my list. And you don't have to get on a plane.

Anna Reinhart: And I don't have to travel as across the country. Yeah. So like the Atlanta shows are always going to be favorites, but I mean, I have a hard time, you know, saying anything bad about the show that we just attended. And as insofar as like, it just may be one of the best pen shows I've ever been to.

Myke Hurley: It was really good. I am in complete agreement with you. I thought it was fantastic. It's the best non Atlanta show that I've been to, but I can't, I can't put anything. Atlanta's home, right? Like Atlanta's the reason we do this. It's like, I can't, you know, I, I can't really stack anything against that, but this is the best non Atlanta pen show that I've been to without a shadow

Brad Dowdy: of a doubt. What about you, Anna? I would have to say, yeah, this is probably, this is my favorite show. I mean, no offense to Atlanta. I love Atlanta. Oh yeah. It's a different scope for sure. Absolutely. Um, but yeah, this is a very, for the most part, a very frictionless show. And the fact that there's a well-appointed desk table, you know, in Atlanta, I'm still working for other people when I go to the show. So it's a different, for me, it's a different vibe, but you know, I mean, it also was always a show where we do the live podcast and this was the first time we got to do it here, you know? So it's just, it, again, it's really hard to like compare in this case, it's like plums to pluots. It's not the apples to oranges. They're close, but they're a little different, you know? So, but, um, for San Francisco shows, this was the best San Francisco show I've been to, um, despite a little rockiness at the beginning, but like, we didn't have all the weirdness we had last year with like the van breaking down and like all the drama that went with that. So like, stress-wise, it was lower overall. Just, I was really tired. And I think to Myke's point, like, you guys did two shows, which I can't even imagine, and then worked the show as well. Like, I only had to do the one and work the show and two tables. Um, and that was just exhausting. So, but yeah, that's probably the, I mean, for San Francisco, this was the best San Francisco show they've ever done. So it keeps getting better. Is it my favorite show? That's really, really close.

Anna Reinhart: Right. It's, it's hard. Like you said, there's so many differences between so many shows and each, you know, have their pros and cons and, you know, size and scope and scale and just busyness and schedule. So it's hard to compare them in a direct manner. Exactly. Like, how do you compare tacos to

Brad Dowdy: pancakes? I mean, really. Right, right, right. Waffles. I'm sorry, waffles. Well, I like the

Myke Hurley: comparison of tacos and pancakes in that situation. I get where you're going with that one. I actually

Show Comparisons

Anna Reinhart: quite like that. As hard as it is to compare the shows, we're going to make you do it even further, Ana. Because you, out of the three of us, were the only one that went to the Washington DC pin show and the San Francisco show. So I don't want to make this like, uh, Hey, this one's great. And Hey, this one's terrible. But I thought we could make, you know, a concerted effort to kind of hear from you what you found to be the differences, what these shows do good, what they do right. Can you walk us through a little bit of just being to these really probably the two biggest pin shows in the world? I don't know if that's fair to say or accurate, but it's at least in our realm, the two biggest pin shows on their calendar are within a three week span and you were at both of them. So I want to know how they compared. Sure. Now, you know why I'm so tired. Yeah. Right. But now, you know,

Brad Dowdy: why I didn't go. Totally. Um, well, okay. This year was the first year where the DC organizers did actually let us set up on Thursday night, which was a huge benefit. So we were able to kind of hit Friday with our feet on the ground, which was huge, um, for us just because, you know, the Van S table is a massive undertaking. Um, and there was fairly decent delineation between the time that vendors had and the time that, um, pass holders and the public were allowed in. Um, there was only a little bit of like wonkiness on Saturday because the fire marshal stepped in and said there were too many people in the hallway and they had to let people in early, but it was really only by about a half an hour. So that is what it is. Would I prefer that we had like, I mean, we knew where our table was, but the fact that San Francisco provides the table, like the table map, um, at least it was uploaded a couple of days before the show on their website, um, which then Alexander turned into an interactive map. Like, would I like DC to have that? Yes. You know, I mean, cause it's such a big show. I've, I want attendees to be able to like map out their route, figure out where they want to go. Do you want to get to the Franklin Kristoff table right away? Where the heck is it? Like those types of things. I mean, I think it would be, it's important for people to be able to figure out like who's at the show and where are they going to be. And if you don't know who someone is being able to find out before you get there, like if you don't know who Yukio Nakahara is, you know, like those types of things, being able to like look that up before you get there and be like, Oh, famous dip grinder. Maybe I can schedule an appointment, you know, or who are these people? Oh, this is someone who specializes in vintage pelicans. I would like to go see that table, you know, that, that type of thing. Again, I don't know that we can fix these things, but it sure would be nice. Sure. Sure. What does San Francisco do? Right. We've sort of talked about it already. I think they do a lot of things right. And just on Sunday night, I sat and talked with Franz and he was already asking like, what classes can we offer next year? How can we make this better? So it's like, they're already ready to like do more next year. So the fact that they're already asking those questions shows their motivation to continue to grow and improve.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. I have emails for 2020 in my inbox from Todd already. So yeah, they are just, they're on top of

Brad Dowdy: it. Yeah. Well, and I imagine for, for both the vendors and the organizers, they're, they're still riding that high. People are still thinking about it. Why not get people while they're still, Hey, you still remember how much money you got in your pocket. Let's talk about next year. So.

Anna Reinhart: So if you could impart some of this wisdom, say to other pin shows, maybe DC specifically, what type of things do you see that might work in DC that they could, they could improve?

Brad Dowdy: I mean, I think we've all said it over and over again, promotion, like mailing postcards is not 21st century.

Anna Reinhart: Do those postcards require the correct date of the show on the postcards? I would think so. I was curious. Okay.

Brad Dowdy: That might be a really good start. If you are going to mail postcards, maybe put the right date on them. Just an idea. Sorry. Um, but if you're not, I don't know an Instagram account that, that you are feeding regularly. Um, there's so much more. And I mean, even promotion from within the event itself, like once people get there, there's the signage at DC was as bad as it's ever been. I mean, it was literally somebody pulled a piece of paper out of a copy machine and wrote with a, with a Sharpie insulting. Hmm. I mean, come on, how hard is it for somebody to sit down in advance and, you know, generate signs and have them printed at a local copy shop that, that points to where all the ball, you know, a map of the, of the venue explaining where everything is because people still didn't know from the registration table to the, there's a second ballroom. There's not just the main ballroom and the people all the way back in the back hallway. And some of the people that were in the far back hallway were people like Musubi that people came to see specifically, you know, I just, you know, and stuff like that. And it's like, so have signs on the wall. It's like more vendors back here with a big arrow. It's not that hard. It's a 24 by 36 piece of poster board.

Anna Reinhart: Right. So maybe it's an awareness that we, we may never get out of DC to be, be perfectly honest, without some assistance or an awareness of what the current attendees are looking for, as opposed to your standard classic pen show.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. But I mean, it's, it's as important to the vendors too, who paid for those tables and they paid the same amount of money as the people in the big ballroom. And yet they got way less customers and that's not fair. And we talked about, I talked with other vendors in DC about that. And it's like, if you're going to stick somebody in the crappiest spot in the entire facility, then I don't think they should have to pay as much. Right. Right. If you're getting, if you're getting, you know, C seating, you should be paying C rate.

Anna Reinhart: Yeah. Well, let's, let's we blow too, too much smoke up San Francisco's, you know, where, what, what can the San Francisco, yeah, up the golden gate, unless we, you know, remove the fog from the golden gate. What can, what do we want out of San Francisco? What can San Francisco, what can they do to improve in your mind, especially as it relates to say this year's show or other pen shows?

Brad Dowdy: Well, I mean, you know, we did talk about like just improving the overall, um, scheduling like on Thursday and Friday night. Yep. How did you guys feel about it? I mean, what would you like to see improved? I mean, a lot of people were asking about being able to pay for their passes, uh, digitally. I mean, they do sit in Silicon Valley. People should be able to pay for things with Apple pay.

Anna Reinhart: Yep. That was one thing that I did catch, um, a few people saying, so, you know, digital payments, um, I, they're going to have to have a room expansion here pretty quick where I think we're maxed out. Um, and they're already looking into, into that right now. Um, you know, I just think I would personally like extra facilities outside the pen show to be available at the hotel, but that's a hotel issue, not necessarily a pen show show issue. But, uh, yeah, I mean, it's kind of hard. We just came off this high of such a fun show. It's kind of hard, but you know, they are open and, and available to any comments anyone has, including any attendees or anyone hoping to attend the show, um, hit them up on their website and tell them what you'd like to see. I'm sure they'd be interested in that feedback.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, absolutely. If there's something that we forgot, I mean, certainly contact any of us and let us know if you have ideas. Um, one of the things that I spent a long time talking with Franz about was like possible ideas for future classes and workshops. You know, what are things that, that are not being offered at pen shows, you know, classes, workshops, um, seminars that people are not, are just not being offered. And whether that's in San Francisco or at any pen show, you know, I mean, between Brad and myself, we pretty much hit every pen show in the United States now. And if we don't, we know somebody who does, and we have contact with most of the organizers. If the classes aren't being offered, let's, let's make them happen, you know, or at least put it in the ear of the people who can, you know, and same thing with the events in general, like all of these pen shows, like if we don't start saying something to people about what it is that we want these events to be, they won't ever be what we want them to be, you know, and it might, might not happen overnight, but, you know, with little changes and little suggestions, I think we can slowly make these events better and, San Francisco is proving that and Chicago is proving that and even St. Louis, I mean, the changes that happened between the first year and the second year were dramatic and they're constantly, they were constantly looking for more feedback and the improvements there showed. So, I think each, there are shows that are showing that they, they definitely want to be better and draw more people. And the more people they draw, the more vendors come, more vendors, you know, like get them to spend money, more vendors keep coming.

Anna Reinhart: Exactly. Well, I know this one was a blast and I, yeah, it's hard to ask for much more, but we'll, we'll keep going and keep pushing. And I just know we had fun, right, Myke?

Pen Addict Links

Myke Hurley: We sure did. If you want to find links to all of the stuff that we've spoken about today, you can go to relay.fm slash pen addict slash 374. Anna, thank you so much for joining us again. It's always a pleasure to have you on the show.

Brad Dowdy: Thanks for having me. Thanks, Anna.

Myke Hurley: Thanks to Penn Chalet for the support of this week's episode. And until next time, say goodbye, everybody.

Brad Dowdy: Goodbye, everybody.