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No More Fountain Pens In Mexico


hecya

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Like many I'll have to disagree... fountain pens in Mexico City are pretty much in any convenience store, stationary and art materials store and the specialized ones, the few which focuses on vintage pens and the ones which sells only new stock (at least 6 of them). There's a lot of exposure considering that Mexico does not have a fountain pen culture... Isn't and haven't been mandatory at schools for learning cursive and only certain engineering and art careers at college promote their use, so, if you ask me that's a lot of offer considering the market available.

Exposure and availability aren't the cause for the almost nonexistent presence of fountain pens at schools, colleges and offices, prices are; they're ridiculous... Everyone wants to get rich with their second client in almost every product or service, it's a cultural thing, the least important part of any productive process are the clients.

 

So, the market 'perse' for fountain pens is quite small and the prices cause that it reduces itself even more. I just can't understand why a Mexican can buy at better prices from a British or an American store, which obviously pay better wages for its employees, higher amounts on every sqf they rent or own, higher rates for every service they have to use for their business and still adding shipping costs and the import custom fees that may apply... for a single product, against a store or distributor that may import larger quantities of the same product.

I would personally recommend Miguel Angel Shop on 5 de Mayo, the best catalog, service and prices of them all... they have such a healthy and successful business that they commission special designs based on Mexican historical or cultural motifs from Tibaldi, Montegrappa and If I remember well, Visconti. The second store I could recommend would be Plufi at San Jeronimo, not for price but for availability on certain lines, specially Caran d'Ache. A store which I love is Harten Design, they're based on Merida (... hopefully the city of my retirement!), which have a decent lineup from Wörther, a brand I'm mad about!

;)

Edited by coppilcus
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This is all wonderful information, I will definitely check those places out next time I'm in the city.

How's their ink selection?

The man in black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed.

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Miguel Angel does not have an online shop, but they've their catalogs online, you can order buy e-mail or phone and shipping is through DHL... They're great!

 

They have pretty much every ink from any pen manufacturer, from Sheafer to Waterman, from Pelikan Edelstein to Mont Blanc... I think they didn't want to carry anything from Pilot, though they are available in all the other stores mentioned here and Lumen, but at their usual stupid high prices, a Iroshizuku bottle is tagged at $590 ($44 usd). Avoid them at all cost! I do, ordering online...

 

If you don't see what you want from their catalogs, you can ask them for a special order...

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Solution.....

Get thee to a pen show. Please. No excuses unless you live in Guam

Jerry

 

That would be lovely... another excuse to go to San Francisco or Washington!

 

Mmmmmm where should we go... The Library of the Congress or the DC Supershow?

 

:D

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In Guatemala City (in a country to the south of mexico), you can find fountain pens on almost any big office supply store but the supply is very limited, a couple faber castell, parker, sheaffer and lamy and all in Medium. Then you have the Montblanc boutique and a Lamy kiosk both in the same mall, and that's about it. Taxes here are 32% (12%VAT and 20% import taxes on office supplies) the latter presumably to encourage local production, but that is mostly for paper (notebooks and such). Inks are cheap no import taxes i presume, though you can only find sheaffer, lamy and montblanc.

 

I was in Mexico City some years ago, and in Madrid more recently, i'm part glad i didn't wander into one of the stores mentioned, probably would've spent all of my vacation money in them :)

Edited by jsolares
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Miguel Angel does not have an online shop, but they've their catalogs online, you can order buy e-mail or phone and shipping is through DHL... They're great!

They have pretty much every ink from any pen manufacturer, from Sheafer to Waterman, from Pelikan Edelstein to Mont Blanc... I think they didn't want to carry anything from Pilot, though they are available in all the other stores mentioned here and Lumen, but at their usual stupid high prices, a Iroshizuku bottle is tagged at $590 ($44 usd). Avoid them at all cost! I do, ordering online...

If you don't see what you want from their catalogs, you can ask them for a special order...

Miguel Angel Pen Shop is a great store, they also do 6-month free-interest sales when paying with CC. Even thou, they sell many ink brands, their color variety is quite limited, no yellow or orange inks for example.

 

Also, they stock many different limited editions at once.

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Amigo,

 

En el DF hay (por lo menos que yo conozco y he visitado) 4 tiendas especializadas,

 

Plumas Miguel Angel (en el centro), la casa de la pluma en nuevo león casi esquina con insurgentes, la casa de la pluma en plaza inn y Plufi en plaza san Geronimo.

 

Watch-out with la Casa de la Pluma in Nuevo León, they couldn't careless about their customers, prices are incredibly expensive and they don't have a clue as to what they're selling -anyone fancy a Chinese-made Cross Century Classic for the price of a Montblanc 146?

 

I do recommend Miguel Angel Pen Shop!

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Solution.....

Get thee to a pen show. Please. No excuses unless you live in Guam

Jerry

 

... or Puerto Rico. :crybaby:

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The local Office Max had a Parker pen. An hour and a half away here is my favorite art supply store (Wet Paint) in St. Paul with a selection of pens and a couple of brands of ink. Then there is the Paradise Pen store with a full range of fountain pens and inks in the Mall of America in Bloomington, MN. Guess I'm lucky.

Oooh. Only three hours away, and I'll be down to the airport in a couple of weeks.

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There are what...11, maybe 12 stores in Ljubljana that sell Waterman's, Parker's, Lamy's, Schneider's, Pelikan's, Online of Germany, Bic fountain pens and many more. I don't see much ink, though... anyway, back to the topic, the sad truth is and remains; ballpoint pens are taking over rapidly. Small societies like us refuse this modernizing but there are thousands, millions of people in every country using ballpoints. So, slowly, fountain pens are fading away... but our duty is to fight it!

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There are what...11, maybe 12 stores in Ljubljana that sell Waterman's, Parker's, Lamy's, Schneider's, Pelikan's, Online of Germany, Bic fountain pens and many more. I don't see much ink, though...

I am embarrassed to say I had to Google "Ljubljana" to find out it's the capital of Slovenia. Isn't this the place where Sheaffer Skrip inks are now manufactured?

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There are what...11, maybe 12 stores in Ljubljana that sell Waterman's, Parker's, Lamy's, Schneider's, Pelikan's, Online of Germany, Bic fountain pens and many more. I don't see much ink, though... anyway, back to the topic, the sad truth is and remains; ballpoint pens are taking over rapidly. Small societies like us refuse this modernizing but there are thousands, millions of people in every country using ballpoints. So, slowly, fountain pens are fading away... but our duty is to fight it!

Ball point and rollerballs have dominated the pen market for many decades now, combine that with the fact that electronic devices can replace pen and paper altogether and you've got the perfect recipe for fountain pen extinction. They will not fade into oblivion completely but the market is practically a niche now. Thou, it's really interesting that even as a niche, so many retail outlets exists today -specially online- and that the market is pretty diverse in terms of price points.

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I am embarrassed to say I had to Google "Ljubljana" to find out it's the capital of Slovenia. Isn't this the place where Sheaffer Skrip inks are now manufactured?

Don't be embarrassed, nobody knows Slovenia. In fact, there was a TV show where random people from Italy and Austria and so on were asked where Slovenia is. One answer: go round the corner and take the first left :P Anyway, I have no idea about Sheaffer inks being produced here, but if it's true, I'll sure be glad!

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For most people the fountain pen is a technology that became obsolete fifty years ago. It should be no surprise that retail outlets for them have largely disappared. Fountain pens are a niche product, and this is reflected by the companies selling them. They are niche players, often of luxury goods.

 

Many products can only be found through the internet today, because they are so low in demand or in production that retailers cannot economically carry them. Store space is limited. It's a different world today and product life is short before being clearance sold and something new moved in.

 

The last time I can remember buying a fountain pen from a local retailer was from an office supply in Pensacola, Florida, in 1983. He had two pens, both Montblac 144Rs, the red 144, in medium. The store now sells kitchen goods only.

 

After this it was all internet. Thank the Lord for ebay. At least you can find something you never tried before at a possibly reasonable cost. Yes, it's nice to browse locally. It's been a long time since I have done it. The world has changed. Today you all know you can do almost everything electronically. Who needs pens at all? There are probably enough on ebay to satisfy any real need.

"Don't hurry, don't worry. It's better to be late at the Golden Gate than to arrive in Hell on time."
--Sign in a bar and grill, Ormond Beach, Florida, 1960.

 

 

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In Los Angeles choices are limited. There's an MB boutique in Beverly Hills, Flax in Westwood, a nice though limited selection of pens at Vroman's in Pasadena, the above-mentioned Pen Shop in Montrovia, and Classic Fountain Pens (aka nibs.com), though this is not a retail shop.

 

I believe that only the MB boutique and The Pen Shop focus on pens exclusively. Flax also has stationery and carries other pen-unrelated itesm; Vroman's is a (rather nice) book store which has two counters of fountain pens.

 

There were 2 or 3 other nice shops in the area that I was aware of and that have closed over the past 15 years, including a very nice one whose name I've forgotten in Century City.

Écrire c’est tenter de savoir ce qu’on écrirait si on écrivait. – M. Duras

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:D I thought the US was a paradise for this kind of items, I guess penmanship and handwriting in general is a dying art; good thing we can at least supply from online stores even though we might get disapointed when the item arrives and performs not as expected :D
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