I am going to visit home in May and I have always wondered if there are any Omas dealers in Germany. My family lives in Northern Hessen (in the vicinity of Marburg) and I could possibly make a foray by car into cities as far as Cologne, Frankfurt, Hannover or Stuttgart.
Maybe any of the German members on this site could point me to an appropriate store. I am especially interested in older pen stores, the ones that might have lots of old stock that they've never sold (I know they exist, still being operated by the octogenarian storekeepers! ). Since I have discovered my love for Omas in the U.S., I've never really probed into the availability of Omas pens in my home country. By hearsay I've learned, however, that they are not very popular or even known in Germany.
I am especially looking for older (celluloid) pens from the early 90s (Arlecchino etc.).

Maybe it´s because of the name. The German word for grandmother is "Oma".
Not actually enticing to have a pen by that name?

I read about the poor quality in a German pen forum, but I cannot say anything about it.
I have never seen an OMAS pen in real life.

Concerning dealers try and check out their website www.omas.net

Heres the two in Stuttgart that were posted on the Omas website. No web adresses given - try google

Manufactum im Magazin
Lautenschlagerstr. 16
Stuttgart
Telephone: 07144-5055//0711-228

Schreibgerate auf der Brucke
Innere Brucke 18
73728 Stuttgart-Esslingen
Telephone: 0711 - 577 44 3
Contact: Mr. Martin Lesny


Good luck
Unic

Actually, I've always thaught that's the real meaning of the brand's name.

No, the company name is an acronym: OMAS (Officina Meccanica Armando Simoni), the trade name of the founder.

Thanks for the answer, unic.
Actually, the acronym sounds kind of stupid in German, indicating the presence of grandmothers (the s denoting plural) but I doubt that this is the reason for Omas not being more popular in Germany. I also doubt that it is the lack of quality. In general, there are only few Italian pens in German pen stores according to my experience.

Laura, thanks for clarifying the meaning of the acronym to which some people might not be aware.

The same is true for Dutch, same meaning of the word "Omas", "grandmothers". Omas has not a good reputation in Belgium because of the poor service for repair. Many shopowners did not get good service and hence disgruntled customers. Also the salescontacts were very poor too. This is surely the principal reason why many shops sold out there Omases. Currently you find Omas pens only in a couple of shops. I hope it will change but haven't seen any significant progress yet.

Dear Omasfan,
Omas had some troubles with the after sales service in Germany and for this, the shops don't like the brand.
In Stuttgart, Manufactum is not the best adress for older omas pens. Try "Haufler am Markt", Marktplatz. Perhaps they have one or two Omas left.
Martin Lesny in Esslingen near Stuttgart moved to "Hafenmarkt 5", his email is info@lesny.es
He may sell you some newer pens at good prices, e.g. some yellow emotica. He also has Marlen and Montegrappa.

Try to find some Omas in Wiesbaden. There in a small shop I saw some 5 years ago all of the real expensive Omas pens like the Arleccio. Wiesbaden is a rich city so the people can buy Omas pens


Best
Dirk

Take a look at Glenn Marcus' page, a fellow Canadian with a great pen site.

http://www.marcuslink.com/pens/stores2.html

Cheers,