Your pen collection

January 15, 2005

Just wondering how you fine folks keep track of your collection? Write it out manually in a journal? Keep track of it in your mind? Use some sort of software?

I'm already starting to lose the details on my 6-pen collection!! :blink:

Help!

January 15, 2005

Just wondering how you fine folks keep track of your collection? Write it out manually in a journal? Keep track of it in your mind? Use some sort of software?

I'm already starting to lose the details on my 6-pen collection!! :blink:

Help!

Dear Cam,

Wait til you have literally hundreds of pens and the problems expand beyond merely "keeping track" and into broader problems like storage and "spouse acceptance factor."

I do the inventory literally using an inventory system in Excel. Stuff for sale is in a more formal inventory in QuickBooks. Storage is accomplished using the kind of cheap trays all pen makers use to rack them in pre-ship, unless they are in my nice wooden pen case. The "SAF" is managed easily in my case - Barb runs the pen business! She's also my best pen picker.

January 15, 2005

The "SAF" is managed easily in my case - Barb runs the pen business! She's also my best pen picker.

:blink: Very clever...

January 15, 2005

I do the inventory literally using an inventory system in Excel. Stuff for sale is in a more formal inventory in QuickBooks.

Is there a template that can be downloaded? Does QuickBooks allow an entry into the system of each item or is that more for the financial side of the business?

Cheers!

January 15, 2005

Hi Rob,

I presume that all that work is saved on several computers, CD-ROMs, USB drives, etc....

Denis.

January 15, 2005

Wow, Rob -- sounds awsome! Just like what I was contemplating creating but was hoping would already be out there in some fashion. Is it something you're thinking of making available, by any chance?

January 15, 2005

Write it out manually in a journal?

Ah hahahahhahahahahaha!!

Ummmm. No. I'm still dinking around with a spreadsheet in Excell (Well Open Office.org, to be exact) only because I'm not switching over to a true database until I can build one for myself that I like.

I'm going to be changing my storage scene here within the next couple of months (hopefully) as I am busy restoring/converting an old printers chest into a pen chest. Once done, the 24 drawers will hold me for about 2600 pens, and I'll be able to put everything in one place (except for my POS displays).

The next step will be to tag everything, I'll go through and get little tags to put on/with each pen, photograph them and then I'll HAVE to switch over to a database. Of key importance is being able for someone to identify what all this stuff is if I should die. Doesn't do any good to have it all in a spreadsheet/databse if there's no corresponding marker/identifier on the actual pen. My wife has no idea what the actual imprint variations are for Esterbrook.

Best-

Brian

January 15, 2005

Just wondering how you fine folks keep track of your collection? Write it out manually in a journal? Keep track of it in your mind? Use some sort of software?

I'm already starting to lose the details on my 6-pen collection!! :blink:

Help!

I've a glass top pen chest so when I want to inventory I just look to my left!

But I also keep two notes in MS Outlook of 'present pens' including manufacturer, model, color & nib size then a 'sold pens' list where I move it out of the present list. I've sold 62 pens and have 12 going on 13 now!

K H

January 15, 2005

Those systems sound great, but I'd just have to have a hardcopy with pics if I had that many pens. *That* would be great. But like Kurt, I just look through the top of my pen chest to do my inventory.

January 15, 2005

another glass top here. Though I am working on typing up descriptions and approximate value along with pics. I'm not using a particular database at this point. I just don't have enough pens to do that.

I can't imagine trying to keep track of hundreds of pens. Just the 20 I have is confusing enough.

January 15, 2005

I have six in a glass top case on my desk; twelve others are in briefcase and/or box on my night table. During the day, two or more are in my pocket.

The number is small enough that a simple listing of the pens and ink used in each kept as a note in Outlook is sufficient. I also wrote the list by hand with each pen to show a sample of what each ink looks like.

I am congenitally incapable of doing things in any simple and straight-forward way. I'm getting close to the point at which I have created a satisfactory database for my pen collection in MSAccess. What that means is that I've created a relational database with thirty-four tables to house information about pens and pen related items.

Rob, you sound like a man after my own heart. Right now, that would be absolute overkill for my small collection, but if you wouldn't mind sharing, I would really like to look at the structure of this database.

January 16, 2005

I have about 150-200 pens and, believe it or not, I write everything down in these two notebooks---one for my vintage pens and one for my moderns. I don't trust computers---they tend to crash and lose files and get viruses, so I want to have a manual copy. Now, once I whittle my collection down to a manageable number, I will then enter them into my computer.

January 19, 2005

I have a relatively simple Excel spread sheet that I use that includes the make, model, circa, from where/whom the pen was purchased, cost, and general comments about the pen. I then sum one of the columns to get the number of pens I have and I sum the cost column to get the amount I have spent on pens (not for the faint hearted).

David