Has Waterman stopped making bottled inks‽

[Mercian]

  

I wanted to remind myself of the names that Waterman uses for its different colours of ink, so I have just looked at the Waterman website.

https://www.waterman.com/inks/

 

To my horror and disgust, I found the following:

There is NO mention of ANY ink in bottles, ONLY ink in cartridges!
Even worse, ALL the colours appear to have been discontinued, except for:

• 'Intense Black';
• 'Serenity Blue' (whose name still appears as 'Florida Blue' when one clicks on the swatch that indicates its colour);
• 'Mysterious Blue' (whose name appears as 'Blue and Black' when one clicks on the swatch).

 

Furthermore, 'Mysterious Blue' is NOT listed as being available in the 'extensive' range of inks that are available in Waterman's short cartridges!

 

 

We are currently living in the 'golden age' of inks.
More companies that make fountain pen ink are appearing, existing ink makers are producing ink in more colours.

 

But, if the company's website is anything to go by, it seems that the genius Executive class at Newell-Rubbermaid has decided to wave a little white flag, and abandon making nearly all of Waterman's offerings - just as it has with the varieties of Parker 'Quink' other than 'Black', 'Washable Blue', and 'Blue and Black'.

🤯

 

So, if you are especially fond of any of the bottled inks that Waterman has made up until now, I advise you to buy one soon!

 

Unless, of course, the fact that their bottled inks AND most colours of ink have recently been deleted from the Waterman website merely indicates the unique level of competence of the Marketing and/or multimedia employees who have been hired by Newell-Rubbermaid.

 

Do any of you know which of the two possible interpretations is the correct one?

 

Slàinte,
M.

 

 

[InkyProf]

Horrified, I went to look, and saw that there is a nearly hidden link at the bottom of that page to "ink bottles" (it's in the paragraph that begins "Waterman inks and refills," just under the product listings), which points to this page: https://www.waterman.com/inks/ink-bottles/ink-bottle/SAP_S0110710.html.

 

I'm therefore cautiously voting for "indicates the unique level of competence of the Marketing and/or multimedia employees," because my goodness that is a badly designed webpage! The trouble is that both interpretations could be true at once...

[langere]

Well, when I looked at that page, it only showed the black ink bottle and then a page with eight different colors, though the description remained the same of the black ink.

 

I wonder if they continue to sell bottles at all...

 

Erick

[InkyProf]

Two more small pieces of information: a US wholesale distributor of Waterman products currently lists stock of between 2 and 10 dozen of each the 7 remaining colors in 50ml bottles. And the page to which @Mercian linked appears to have stopped listing all 7 colors some time between April and July 2024, according to what I can see via the wayback machine. Not conclusive; just information, though I find it *very slightly* reassuring that the webpage change is around a year old, and there doesn't seem to have been any interruption in retail (and apparently wholesale) availability. Though who knows how much Tender Purple there is in a giant steel tank somewhere... 

[IThinkIHaveAProblem]

… I love tender purple. May have to stock up.  

[lapis]

Yup. Me too. Waterman's "Purple" is my all-time purple fave. Original name was "Violet". You can mix it with a anything. Got the idea years ago from Richard. Good thing I stocked up since then.

[Sailor Kenshin]

🙀

 

1. I never saw a Waterman SHORT cartridge.

 

2. Glad I bought some full vintage bottles of South Seas, Florida, Black and BB.

[davisgt]

I've already purchased 4 bottles of Waterman ink in 2025. That might not be enough if they are planning to stop. I hate cartridges.  Blegh. Maybe I should buy 4 more. Definitely purple.  

[davisgt]

4 hours ago, lapis said:

Yup. Me too. Waterman's "Purple" is my all-time purple fave. Original name was "Violet". You can mix it with a anything. Got the idea years ago from Richard. Good thing I stocked up since then.

Two of my favorite inks of all time: Binder Blurple and Binder Burgundy. Both use Waterman Purple.  ❤️

[Black16]

I just ordered a bottle of Harmonious Green today to try it out and seeing such news got me nervous huh. Gotta stock up if I'll really enjoy it, just in case... Never tried their inks as the only colour from theirs that got me interested appeared to be the green one and I realised I want a green ink only a week or so ago.

[inkstainedruth]

I recently picked up a backup bottle of Waterman Mysterious Blue someplace (maybe at the B/W Pen Show?  I forget now).  Was totally bummed when Absolute Brown was discontinued (I got a bottle a couple of years ago and really liked the color -- but then nobody had it when I wanted to get a backup bottle of it).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Mercian]

On 5/10/2025 at 6:46 PM, InkyProf said:

Horrified, I went to look, and saw that there is a nearly hidden link at the bottom of that page to "ink bottles" (it's in the paragraph that begins "Waterman inks and refills," just under the product listings), which points to this page: https://www.waterman.com/inks/ink-bottles/ink-bottle/SAP_S0110710.html.

 

I'm therefore cautiously voting for "indicates the unique level of competence of the Marketing and/or multimedia employees," because my goodness that is a badly designed webpage! The trouble is that both interpretations could be true at once...

 

Thank you for finding that!
I had missed it. (I had used the page's 'search' function to look for "bottled ink" and for "ink bottles", and both times it returned no hits, and asked instead if I had meant to search for "ink" )
 

But it appears to be an old and broken page (because of the 'symptom' described above by @langere).

 

Of course both of those things might also 'only' be symptoms of how badly-built (& utterly neglected) the company's website is.

So I have now used the 'contact' form on the Waterman website to ask them let me know exactly which inks they are still making, and in exactly which formats they are making them.

 

When (if?) they reply to me, I shall post what they tell me here, in this thread.

[inkstainedruth]

Hmmm.  Just clicked on the link that InkyProf provided.  And it's DEFINITELY out of date, since it still lists Audacious Brown AND does not actually give the bottle sizes or prices.... 

Of course, I'm still trying to figure out why a company that makes storage tubs decided to buy a couple of pen companies in the first place....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Misfit]

9 hours ago, Sailor Kenshin said:

🙀

 

1. I never saw a Waterman SHORT cartridge.

 

2. Glad I bought some full vintage bottles of South Seas, Florida, Black and BB.

I bought Waterman Radient Pink, and it came in short cartridges. First Waterman ink I’ve seen that way. 

[I-am-not-really-here]

1 hour ago, inkstainedruth said:

Of course, I'm still trying to figure out why a company that makes storage tubs decided to buy a couple of pen companies in the first place

Probably for the same reason that a company better known for razors and razor blades (Gillette) had purchased prior: diversification.

[Misfit]

And now Gillette is a Procter & Gamble brand. P&G is very much about diversification. They sold off all their food brands. It seems like health and beauty aids are where they’ve been buying companies. My Dad worked for them for 15-20 years. But that was awhile ago. I just went to their website, and clicked on Brands. 

[InkyProf]

@Mercian, thanks; I also emailed that US distributor and will report back if I hear anything useful from them.

[Sailor Kenshin]

2 hours ago, Misfit said:

I bought Waterman Radient Pink, and it came in short cartridges. First Waterman ink I’ve seen that way. 

 

Thanks. I will need to rummage through my Waterman carts.

[davisgt]

Two Waterman Green and two Waterman purple bottles on their way. 😁

[lapis]

W's Pink has always been available only in carts. Since at least 10-15 years.