Pelikan Changing to Non-translucent Binde

[Mercian]

25 minutes ago, JulieParadise said:

 

Well, when I had the chance to visit the factory in Vöhrum/Peine some years ago, it was said that this binde material was sourced from one small manufacturer, so it probably was beyond Pelikan's means to change the amount that could be produced or even acquire the rights to manufacture these sheets themselves.

Yes - it’s the fact that a large office-supplies company couldn’t justify acquiring the production facilities/rights from a small manufacturer that is the dispiriting part of this.

 

Have I ever mentioned that we’re all doomed? Dooomed I tell ye! 😉

 

Edit to Add:

I have just remembered another possible (economically-driven) explanation that could be the reason why Pelikan are having trouble sourcing the stripe material and/or acquiring the means/rights to manufacture it.
But it is at least as dispiriting as the ones that have already been mentioned ☹️ As such, I won’t publish it.

[Bo Bo Olson]

21 hours ago, JulieParadise said:

it was said that this binde material was sourced from one small manufacturer, so it probably was beyond Pelikan's means to change the amount that could be produced or even acquire the rights to manufacture these sheets themselves.

Ah Ha....then what happened to the small company?

And if it was going under, why was it not bought up...The family of the man Malaysian billionaire who saved Pelikan back in '96 should have thought ahead.

[oregano]

On 3/16/2022 at 10:59 AM, JulieParadise said:

It's ... interesting to read how people react to this business decision that apparently was necessary because the material for the binde was becoming hard to get for Pelikan. The supply issues of the last months are, as far as I recall, caused by the lack of that very material in its various colour ways.

I would have liked some clarity about this being a temporary supply issue. What bothers me is that they have made—it seems—a permanent decision about the design as a result of this issue without acknowledging the huge change that it is. It may be splitting hairs from a practical standpoint, but releasing some sort of statement would at least clarify that the company has some sense of its heritage, perhaps offer some clarity about whether they could ever return to former stripes, and let Pelikan fans so know what is going on.
 

Last week I just received the Pelikan newsletter about their heritage that made no mention of this change. Making this change silently to me signals that they do not respect their customers. We have to scramble to find information from retailers.

[Mercian]

3 hours ago, oregano said:

Making this change silently to me signals that they do not respect their customers.

To be fair to the people running Pelikan, it could also be a sign that the reason behind the change is one that they find to be embarrassing, or which they recognise as being one that might annoy/upset/offend their customers.

 

Either way, it - like their sudden removal of all mention of differential-piston-fill pens from the ‘History’ section of their website - is certainly not a good ‘look’.

 

[Just in case anybody can’t tell, I am still muttering-in-to-my-beard about that, like the misanthropic old curmudgeon that I am.]

[Karmachanic]

Well, Duesenberg's gone.  The British empire's gone.  Soennecken's gone.  Spats are impossible to find,  and now it's the Pelikan transparent binde.  

 

[Mercian]

1 minute ago, Karmachanic said:

Well, Duesenberg's gone.  The British empire's gone.  Soennecken's gone.  Spats are impossible to find,  and now it's the Pelikan transparent binde.  

 

I personally also lament the passing of the glorious Trabant, and that of the trans-Atlantic Zeppelin service 😢

[Bo Bo Olson]

1 hour ago, Mercian said:

the trans-Atlantic Zeppelin service 

First class today, makes it harder to get taken by top flight card sharps.

[Haptograpsus]

I guess, this is a rumor that has taken on a life of its own and is now big, strong and grown up.

I looked through all my striped Pelikans I bought between 1995 and 2021 and could see that they all had different transparency, regardless of the year of manufacture.

 

The green one is the most translucent, the brown ones are the most opaque, the others are so in between.

 

The next few days I will raise the issue in our German Pelikan forum. Pelikan employees are  there present as well. Let's see what they have to say about it.

[langere]

I'd love to hear what the Pelikan employees say...

 

Erick

[Uncial]

We do have a slight tendency to jump the gun on these forums. Not very long ago we were looking at coffin prices and arranging flowers for the company.

[jmeldorf]

Recently ordered an M600-series black Souverain with the green window.  That was last Saturday; hope it arrives with a transparent window.

[dftr]

Just now, jmeldorf said:

Recently ordered an M600-series black Souverain with the green window.  That was last Saturday; hope it arrives with a transparent window.

 

They aren't doing anything to that line?  I assume it 's the  striated green/black or blue/black barrels that are losing their opacity?

But who knows?  

Well Coke survived New Coke... I'm still worried for the brand; so far the three new things I know for 2022 is that they have labor disputes, are releasing an apathetic ink, and are dropping the charm of their traditional barrels.  I'm not counting re-releasing 800 red/black since it's not new.  

[Bromio]

On 3/20/2022 at 11:15 AM, Haptograpsus said:

The next few days I will raise the issue in our German Pelikan forum. Pelikan employees are  there present as well. Let's see what they have to say about it.

 

Any news on this? A few days ago I ordered a green-black M800 and should arrive by Friday... The vendor said that it was one of the new Pelikan versions (I doubt that, though), but that the black stripes were not opaque, just darker while still translucent. He assured he could see the piston go up and down through the barrel even without a direct source of light. I will let you know what I get.

[pix]

2 hours ago, Bromio said:

Any news on this? A few days ago I ordered a green-black M800 and should arrive by Friday... The vendor said that it was one of the new Pelikan versions (I doubt that, though), but that the black stripes were not opaque, just darker while still translucent. He assured he could see the piston go up and down through the barrel even without a direct source of light. I will let you know what I get.

 

From the pictures I saw from an eBay vendor of the new M800 black red, it looks that (at least in this first batch) the material between the red stripes is indeed not opaque.

[Bromio]

I have received my new black-and-green stripped M800. According to the vendor it was the new model, but happily it is translucent. So probably shops will be selling the old version for a while.

[Doggy Daddy]

Within the past week I attempted to purchase a M805 Gray Stresemann barrel only on Ebay from both "missing-pen" & "pentastic". I can't afford another pen right now, but I figured I'd at least get a translucent barrel & worry about the nib & cap later. Although at first both vendors thought they had the translucent versions, after checking they confirmed that, though they had received the barrels at the end of 2022, they were the opaque versions. So, I declined the purchase.

[Bromio]

 

2 hours ago, Doggy Daddy said:

Within the past week I attempted to purchase a M805 Gray Stresemann barrel only on Ebay from both "missing-pen" & "pentastic". I can't afford another pen right now, but I figured I'd at least get a translucent barrel & worry about the nib & cap later. Although at first both vendors thought they had the translucent versions, after checking they confirmed that, though they had received the barrels at the end of 2022, they were the opaque versions. So, I declined the purchase.

 

That is in good agreement with the information I have. The vendor I purchased the green M800 from told me that, the day before I ordered mine, he had sold a Stresemann he had received in January 2022 and it was indeed opaque.

[Doggy Daddy]

And this from the 05 March 2022 "The Pelikan's Perch" article:

     "According to Pen Chalet and others, the change has already come to all new production of the Black-Green and Stresemann models. The changes will soon roll out to the Black-Blue and Black-Red, expected within the coming weeks to months."

It will be interesting to see what effect this has on prices in the used market.

[Haptograpsus]

Some time ago, I had put the matter up for discussion in the German Pelikan forum. For a long time there were no technical, but rather philosophical answers.

In the meantime someone asked Pelikan because he had noticed the difference in transparency between a previous M605 and a new M805. Here is the answer from Pelikan:

"This year we have a material changeover for the Souverän fountain pens, which is being implemented gradually. The new material is opaque and therefore the ink level is no longer visible. So the pens you mentioned are one fountain pen with the "old" material and one with the new. The new material has been used before for some special series and was already used for ballpoint pens and pencils. The reason for the change is to improve color uniformity between fountain pens, ballpoint pens, rollerball pens and pencils. Unfortunately, the side effect is that the ink level is no longer visible without direct illumination. "

We also find the change unfortunate

Helmut

[Harold]

2 hours ago, Haptograpsus said:

The reason for the change is to improve color uniformity between fountain pens, ballpoint pens, rollerball pens and pencils.

Was anyone asking for that; seriously, anyone? I'm going to be cynical here and say that this is just a post hoc rationalisation to lend plausible deniability for the real reason why they changed it. In reality, they probably couldn't get the old material anymore, or they wanted to cut costs because either the fountain pen material was more expensive, or it was simply more expensive to keep making a special variant just for the fountain pens.