100th Anniversary editions

[Arcadian]

On 7/10/2024 at 4:32 PM, digitorum said:

A fountain pen with a quick-filling coupling is proposed, comprising a nib assembly, a housing with a main tank and a writing tank formed therein, a rotatable finial at an end of the fountain pen opposite from the nib assembly, and a coupling for placing the housing on an ink feed device, wherein a first sealing unit is arranged between the writing tank and the main tank, which first sealing unit can be selectively opened and closed for filling the writing tank via the main tank, wherein a second sealing unit is arranged between the writing tank and the nib assembly, which second sealing unit can be selectively opened and closed for supplying ink to the nib assembly, wherein a third sealing unit is arranged between the main tank and the coupling, which third sealing unit can be opened and closed for filling at least the main tank, and wherein the finial is coupled to mechanics which are configured to control the opening state of at least the first sealing unit and the second sealing unit.

 

Can you imagine trying to flush that thing when you want to change ink colors? 

 

 - P. 

[Karmachanic]

1 hour ago, arcfide said:

Each of these solutions comes with trade-offs

 

The endless search for the elusive perfection continues.   The flies have been forewarned to stay well away from the ointment. 

[JCC123]

Too late guys, they've already shown you what they will release for the 100th. Clearly, the Montblanc product managers there know nothing about what their customers want. Everyone hanging out here for many years knows exactly what will sell but those execs clearly do not. They're only interested in selling to the few who will buy anything with a Montblanc logo.

[Seney724]

54 minutes ago, JCC123 said:

Too late guys, they've already shown you what they will release for the 100th. Clearly, the Montblanc product managers there know nothing about what their customers want. Everyone hanging out here for many years knows exactly what will sell but those execs clearly do not. They're only interested in selling to the few who will buy anything with a Montblanc logo.

Sad but true.  I agree 100%

[Heinkle]

A re-release of the 139 would have been nice.

[helloMB]

22 minutes ago, Heinkle said:

A re-release of the 139 would have been nice.

 

That was the Hemingway. 

[Karmachanic]

or Dumas.  Alternatively do a @zaddick and have your favorite pen turner make one for you.

 

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/349124-tribute-to-139/?do=findComment&comment=4247528

[Heinkle]

2 hours ago, helloMB said:

 

That was the Hemingway. 

 

Sure, but that was in itself 32 years ago!

[Centurion]

On 7/11/2024 at 7:54 PM, JCC123 said:

Too late guys, they've already shown you what they will release for the 100th. Clearly, the Montblanc product managers there know nothing about what their customers want. Everyone hanging out here for many years knows exactly what will sell but those execs clearly do not. They're only interested in selling to the few who will buy anything with a Montblanc logo.

I ask this sincerely (no sarcasm), what do we consumers want in the 100th Anniversary editions? What designs and features will sell? 

[JCC123]

On 3/10/2024 at 12:56 PM, JCC123 said:

I want a striated/swirled/marbled all-resin model. No bling...

Folks have discussed what they would like to see. For example, I mentioned earlier my preference.

[JCC123]

You can read through earlier posts which show some other people's preferences. But the gist is that if they would have reproduced a few of their earlier models rather than go for the bling, they would sell more pens.

[JCC123]

On 3/16/2024 at 7:12 PM, Todor said:

There was a grey marbled 146 decades ago, golden trim: 

http://www.collectiblestars.com/Montblanc-Meisterstueck-Nr146-Kolbenfueller-grau-gestreift

 

On 3/17/2024 at 12:02 AM, JCC123 said:

Yes, something like this would be a huge hit! 

Gray with Platinum trim or Green with Gold trim or Brown with Rose Gold trim. That's how I would pair them. I would buy all three. So would many others buy at least one of those. Let's see if they're smart enough to do this.

 

Please take my money!

 

So they did a bit of this on the caps of the pens but it really should be the entire pen like the original version. Also, the style of this new one is too subtle, you can't really tell that it's marbled unless the angle and light is just right.

[Centurion]

1 hour ago, JCC123 said:

 

 

So they did a bit of this on the caps of the pens but it really should be the entire pen like the original version. Also, the style of this new one is too subtle, you can't really tell that it's marbled unless the angle and light is just right.

Oh, that is pretty without a lot of bling! I should have at least scanned the other 18 pages of the thread. Thanks for summarizing. I thought it might have been some kind of unspoken but widely known desire that I didn’t know about, e.g. with aficionados like us who have been in our hobby a while many of us desire to have vintage flex nibs. 

[eidola]

139/136 reissue in PL and Green Striated.

 

It's fine to do the bling, but they haven't done anything for the collector base in around about a decade (or more).1990s into the 00s was the golden age:

 

Hemingway, Christie, Proust, Medici, Kafka, Karajan, Poe (a stunning pen in real life), Octavian, Carnegie.

 

Sterling Silver and Vermeil were common even in the Writers Series.

 

The Heritage line started well, but seems to have lost direction. The serpent in coral was the last I bought.

[Arcadian]

13 hours ago, eidola said:

 

 

It's fine to do the bling, but they haven't done anything for the collector base in around about a decade (or more).1990s into the 00s was the golden age:

 

 

 

I really agree with your sentiment regarding past issues, and the desire for a 139 tribute. However, I don't think it's accurate that Montblanc has not done anything for the collector base. It seems their collector pens are doing very, very well. They are being bought in droves by collectors who stack boxes of unopened pens and, in some cases, just wait for them to increase in value. Montblanc staff like to mention to customers that their special and limited edition pens increase in value by about 10% a year. 

 

However, for the segment of the collector community that actually use their pens, Montblanc's Writers Edititions, Patrons, Great Characters etc. of the last maybe ten years has offered very little. 

 

Just my too cents. 

 

 - P. 

[AndyLogan]

1 hour ago, Arcadian said:

 

I really agree with your sentiment regarding past issues, and the desire for a 139 tribute. However, I don't think it's accurate that Montblanc has not done anything for the collector base. It seems their collector pens are doing very, very well. They are being bought in droves by collectors who stack boxes of unopened pens and, in some cases, just wait for them to increase in value. Montblanc staff like to mention to customers that their special and limited edition pens increase in value by about 10% a year. 

 

However, for the segment of the collector community that actually use their pens, Montblanc's Writers Edititions, Patrons, Great Characters etc. of the last maybe ten years has offered very little. 

 

Just my too cents. 

 

 - P. 

 And choosing to go all metal is a Big "NO" for me who likes to use their pens, I once wrote with my Great Characters Ferrari for 2 hours and it actually hurt my hand, mind you I was not doing fancy penmanship but more like chicken scratch as I am a doctor. I used to have such lovely penmanship but taking notes while topics were being discussed back in the early 2000 in medicine forced me to write like a stenographer. 

[JCC123]

8 hours ago, AndyLogan said:

 And choosing to go all metal is a Big "NO" for me who likes to use their pens, I once wrote with my Great Characters Ferrari for 2 hours and it actually hurt my hand, mind you I was not doing fancy penmanship but more like chicken scratch as I am a doctor. I used to have such lovely penmanship but taking notes while topics were being discussed back in the early 2000 in medicine forced me to write like a stenographer. 

Exactly, form must follow function. First and foremost, these need to be the fines WRITING instruments. Often that means no bling as bling throws off the balance of the pen and will often make the pen too heavy. Unfortunately, we have a lot of folks entering this market as collectors purely to collect the bling. And, doubly unfortunate that these are the people that Montblanc is paying the most attention to as they have the most money to throw at them. But it's a slippery slope to the bottom. They will have fewer and fewer customers causing them to embrace more of more of these collectors which in turn, will cause them to introduce more bling in order to maintain the same level of revenue from fewer customers. Fewer customers means that they will have to charge more for each item which in turn means more bling in order to justify the astronomical price of the pen. It's a vicious cycle.

 

Leica comes to mind here. As they continue to raise prices to sell to ever fewer customers.

[dbs]

49 minutes ago, JCC123 said:

Leica comes to mind here. As they continue to raise prices to sell to ever fewer customers.

 

The falling of Leica is not due to the rising of its price tag. But the extreme challenges brought in by the new technologies -- or, the alien species into the old fashion camera eco system.

 

We had a few "alien species" in fountain pen market, for example, Visconti was the one. But they never realized they are the "alien species" and always kept 100 thousand miles distance to we the customers in the pen eco system, eventually failed and nobody wants to mention them.

[eidola]

10 hours ago, Arcadian said:

However, for the segment of the collector community that actually use their pens, Montblanc's Writers Edititions, Patrons, Great Characters etc. of the last maybe ten years has offered very little. 

 

 

Yes, I think we agree - a collector to me has the intention to use the pen (or at least unseal it).

 

A speculator (/hoarder?) buys for those other reasons.

 

As a collector in the first sense, I have indeed been little served for the last dozen years.

 

 

[JCC123]

5 hours ago, dbs said:

 

The falling of Leica is not due to the rising of its price tag. But the extreme challenges brought in by the new technologies -- or, the alien species into the old fashion camera eco system.

 

You just described fountains pens. They are a dying tech. Most young folks don't even know how to read or write cursive. They pretty much know just how to type on a computer. So, they way Leica dealt with it is by raising prices and going upstream to keep the business going.