Vintage Inks: Why Does So Much Skrip And Quink Survive But Others Do Not?

[eharriett]

This is bugging me a little bit. Im trying to build up my collection of vintage fountain pen inks. Ive almost got the whole collection of Skrip and Quink inks from the 40s to the 90s. Still missing a few, but Ive seen so much of it come up that Im sure Ill get there eventually. Waterman is a little harder to come by, but still I can find a lot of it.

 

But smaller ink makers. Carters and zhiggens especially. I see empty bottles for them EVERYWHERE! But never with ink still in them. Why is that? Why is none of the other ink-only manufacturers product surviving into today?

[pajaro]

There was a great deal more of it made by Sheaffer and Parker. Especially Sheaffer.

 

I used Carter red for letters to the fiancée. Those small bottles got used up fast. That ink was twenty-five cents back then. So it was used widely. I was looking for the Carter's red in the early nineties, for nostalgic reasons, and found none. Then I met my wife, in my forties then. Of course, Sheaffer's Skrip was a quarter a bottle too in the fifties and sixties. There was a great, great deal more of it than Carter's.

 

Good luck.

[Inkling13]

I suspect that it was just due to the sheer amount made that resulted in the relative ease at which filled bottles can be found today. If it wasn't a workhorse ink, it wouldn't have been ubiquitous, and certainly wouldn't have survived all these years. An example: MB Racing Green, while only recently extinct, is nowhere to be found.

[amberleadavis]

I would disagree - in part - because Pelikan made lots of ink as did Carter and those inks did not always survive.

 

My guess, Sheaffer and Parker had more surfactants and a lot more biocide.

[eharriett]

I would disagree - in part - because Pelikan made lots of ink as did Carter and those inks did not always survive.

 

My guess, Sheaffer and Parker had more surfactants and a lot more biocide.

 

That's kind of what I was suspecting. I find tons of empty bottles, just none or few with anything in them.

[ParkerDuofold]

Hi all,

 

It could also be that Carter's Inx were superior and got used up in short order; while the bilgewater that Sheaffer and Parker pumped out just sat unwanted on the store shelves.

 

Because even if Carter didn't use sufficient surfactants and biocides... you should still have a lot of bad bottles of ink laying around,... but you don't... what you have are a lot of empty bottles laying around. Think about it.

 

 

- Anthony

 

 

P.S.: Sorry, I couldn't resist.

 

 

Typos.

Edited February 28, 2018 by ParkerDuofold

[ParkerDuofold]

Just to follow-up... and egged on by insomnia,... it could just be that Sheaffer and Parker over-produced.

 

It was a common business practice at the time,... especially for larger companies... to flood the market, (no pun intended), with your product for name recognition.

 

They considered this a form of advertising back in the day... and back when labor and materials were cheap... it actually had some viability.

 

Be well all.

 

 

- Anthony

[ParkerDuofold]

Just to follow-up, again...

 

This is why you can find so many NOS products from the '50s and '60s,... but thanks to inflation, rising labor and transportation costs, etc.,... those days are gone.

 

Future generations will not be able to enjoy the NOS El Dorados that we do.

 

 

- A.C.

 

 

EDITED to clarify text.

Edited February 28, 2018 by ParkerDuofold

[Drubbing]

This is bugging me a little bit. Im trying to build up my collection of vintage fountain pen inks. Ive almost got the whole collection of Skrip and Quink inks from the 40s to the 90s. Still missing a few, but Ive seen so much of it come up that Im sure Ill get there eventually. Waterman is a little harder to come by, but still I can find a lot of it.

 

But smaller ink makers. Carters and zhiggens especially. I see empty bottles for them EVERYWHERE! But never with ink still in them. Why is that? Why is none of the other ink-only manufacturers product surviving into today?

 

For the same reason Parker 51s are still in abundance and relatively cheap to buy good examples of, yet niche and micro brand makers' products are extinct.. .

 

...they made a damn sight more of it than anyone else on the planet. And probably still do.

 

Not only that, they had established, high profile products already out there, and a massive distribution chain. Who was competing anywhere near that level until not that long ago?

Edited March 1, 2018 by Drubbing

[Bluey]

I'm not sure about Skrip but I suspect it's for the same reason as Quink - because nobody wants it. It's probably the most boring ink on the planet.

It's not like it's hard to get as they even sell it in WHSmiths, where the perfectly manicured display never changes because nobody ever buys even one. It's likely been there since the 1930s.

Edited February 28, 2018 by Bluey

[welch]

I remember that,in the late '50s and early '60s, Sheaffer Skrip and Parker Quink were everywhere...for instance, my local drugstore carried Skrip and Quink in its school-supplies section.

 

Ballpoints began to edge out the fountain pen in the early '60s, but the fountain pen was not yet an oddity or a retro item. I never saw Carters or Waterman inks. Or any inks from smaller companies.

 

It seems likely that Parker and Sheaffer sold far more ink than the others. Incidentally, Carters ink was no big deal. I found bottles of Carters American Blue and their Midnight Blue: each is less than special.

[eharriett]

Just to follow-up... and egged on by insomnia,... it could just be that Sheaffer and Parker over-produced.

 

It was a common business practice at the time,... especially for larger companies... to flood the market, (no pun intended), with your product for name recognition.

 

They considered this a form of advertising back in the day... and back when labor and materials were cheap... it actually had some viability.

 

Be well all.

 

 

- Anthony

 

Oh, now that's interesting! I did not know that at all.

 

I'm not sure about Skrip but I suspect it's for the same reason as Quink - because nobody wants it. It's probably the most boring ink on the planet.

It's not like it's hard to get as they even sell it in WHSmiths, where the perfectly manicured display never changes because nobody ever buys even one. It's likely been there since the 1930s.

Have to disagree. Today, they're incredibly boring because we have an embarrassment of choices and ways to get them. I do not believe choices were that varied 50+ years ago when there was no Amazon and the local drug/stationary store only had so much shelf space they could fill.

[Bluey]

 

Oh, now that's interesting! I did not know that at all.

 

Have to disagree. Today, they're incredibly boring because we have an embarrassment of choices and ways to get them. I do not believe choices were that varied 50+ years ago when there was no Amazon and the local drug/stationary store only had so much shelf space they could fill.

There's probably some truth in that, in which case they are relatively boring. Many brands from pen manufacturers such as Lamy, Pelikan, Parker are boring because they have to be(boring but well behaved and squeaky clean), but Quink takes it to the next level. Strangely, MB inks aren't boring but I would expect that of MB given their target market.

 

I used a fountain pen when very young because most people used one and I don't remember anyone using anything else. Quink was the ink of choice, but I don't recall there being anything else available. I remember wondering why Quink was so cheap and ubiquitous when their pens were so out of my financial reach as they were considered the bees knees then along with Sheaffer. I somehow felt honoured to be using Quink. Nowadays I would rather use bleach in my pens.

[johnboz]

Years ago I went on a quest to try and round up as many different vintage inks as I could find. Like you, I didn't have much trouble with Skrip, Quink or Waterman (although Patrician Purple and Aztec Brown took a bit of time). Other inks like Sanfords and Carters were much harder to find. There are plenty of bottles out there, but not much liquid ink.

 

I think most of it has to do with sheer volume of ink produced. I don't think it's a stretch to say that Parker, Sheaffer and Waterman each produced tons (literally) more ink than all of the other companies combined. It only makes sense that more of it would survive. Another reason I believe you come across so many more empty bottles versus full bottles from the other brands is because people saved them. I'd imagine Skrip, Quink and Waterman bottles were ubiquitous, but a Carter cube bottle or Sanford Penit bottle were more unique, both in the shape (square) and the label in the case of Carters. This might have caused people to save them more often, which means more have survived for us to find.

 

I hadn't really given this much thought before today, so thanks for asking the question!

[Noihvo]

 

[inkstainedruth]

I'll agree with the comments of there just being more available for brands like Sheaffer and Parker. They were both 1st Tier companies, and I think both had an international presence (Parker certainly did, with factories in England, Denmark and Argentina as well as in the US -- and those are just the ones I know about).

It's probably a matter of economies of scale -- bigger companies could afford to get the component materials in bulk, and probably produced a lot more overall. I mean, I had never really heard of Carter's ink before I started reading FPN (although I have vague recollections of stuff like markers and glue under that brandname. Whereas, even as a little kid, I had heard of Parker and Sheaffer (I'm not sure I'd even really heard of Waterman, except in passing).

Another possibility is that there are people who collect bottles. And while Sheaffer and Parker bottles might be prosaic to those people, I've seen the fancy Carter's bottles -- both the cathedral design ones and the really old ones that look like the little old people, on places like eBay. And I'm betting that bottle collectors don't really care about the contents. As opposed to pen people, who DO care if there is still ink in that Sheaffer bottle with the built-in inkwell.

As for those inks being "boring"? Clearly whoever said that hasn't seen Skrip Peacock or Quink Permanent Violet up close and personal....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Runnin_Ute]

More made, more left. Seems pretty simple to me.

[Mr. Pink]

Yup, if you went into a drug store or stationary store in 1965 in the USA, they were sure to have Shaeffer's, usually in all of the colors.

[Drubbing]

I'm not sure about Skrip but I suspect it's for the same reason as Quink - because nobody wants it. It's probably the most boring ink on the planet.

It's not like it's hard to get as they even sell it in WHSmiths, where the perfectly manicured display never changes because nobody ever buys even one. It's likely been there since the 1930s.

 

Not all FP users are gear or ink nerds.

 

Back when FP were more popular, there was little choice. Quink and Skrip was practically everywhere. It was utilitarian, just like the pens.

 

When I bought a few vintage pens 15 or so years ago when internet shopping was still mostly an idea, guess which ink was easiest to get? Or, I could find a real live pen shop and go 'top shelf' and get Waterman and Montblanc...

[Dip n Scratch]

I have bought a bottle of Quink, but not from W H Smiths. Smiths used to have a display of expensive Watermans, around the seventy pound mark or more in 2005.

The only pen I bought there was a Parker Reflex that was twelve pounds.

I bought the same Waterman Expert on the Net for less than the shop price after staff discount.

The other brands we were Sheaffer & Cross, and I thought that was all that there were.

As for ink. Yea Parker Quink. But in 2005 it was different. It didn't have The Smell I remembered from school days: Blue/Black (with Solv-X) in a no-name FP.

 

The situation hasn't changed that much, they don't have the high end stuff any more.

No call for it. Ink choice is much the same.

The blue they do have is usually the washable stuff. So you need to be careful.

The Parker permanent blue is more saturated, according to the colour charts.

I never used blue in the Reflex, just blue/black.

 

When looking online in recent years I discovered makers of pens & ink I never knew existed, apart from Diamine. I would't think of using WHS now, not unless I was truly desperate.

My latest ink purchase was a NOS sealed full bottle of Parker Permanent Blue.

The old stuff I remember with Solv-X in.

The opinion on here suggests it is a safe choice with temperamental pens and on papers little better than the TP.