The other day I reached in my pocket looking for my pen and I couldn’t find it anywhere. I am terrible at hanging on to writing instruments. 
That is why I have about 14 different pen and pencil sets in my desk drawer. I don’t want to use them because I’ll lose them. Not a great reason but it works. I used to use them and at one time I had 27 half sets in my desk drawer. I would always lose the pen of the set because I never liked to use the pencils. I would always run out of pencil lead and I never carried any extra. It was a real hassle.
Tom Caufield, who works at our Merrillville store, is notorious around the store for losing his pen. He lays it down or gives it to a customer to use and forgets about it. It is a gold cross pen that has lasted a long time. It’s funny to see the look on his face when he realizes he doesn’t have it and starts to search for it. We have started picking up his pen when he has left it laying and I will put it in my pocket. He will be glancing around looking for the pen while he is talking to you and then he realizes it’s in my shirt pocket. We have started to hide his pen in new places. He also leaves his keys all over the place but ever since the day someone hid them and then went home without telling him about it, he’s been more careful.
After all the problems with pens, I would just look around the counter and use one of the pens that we would lay out. They wrote pretty much the same and I didn’t have to worry about keeping it on a leash. It was still a pain in the neck to try to find a pen to use. I decided to go the office supply and try to find a solution to my pen problem.
Nowadays, all the stores seem to be superstores. You know, they have hundreds of items of all the things your looking for, which then clouds your decision even further. I was directed to the area which constituted the writing instrument section. With everything being politically correct these days, I guess writing instruments would be right instead of ballpoint, or pen.
I went to the area and turned the corner and I was amazed. It was at least eight feet high and 16 feet long. My first thought was "Do they sell this many pens (writing instruments)? Does the ink ever dry up? What happens to the pens that don’t sell?" As I looked at the vast array of writing instruments I was becoming confused. Should I go retractable ballpoint? I could get a 4 color or a 2 color pen. A Parker T-ball Jotter or a clear clic. Flexgrip or classic stic. I could go gel ink. There was eraser mate and the gel writer. One was particularly attractive because it was on a string that you could hang around your neck.
As I walked down, I came to the rollerball section. Superball, rolling writer, Uni-ball, v-ball, metal point roller and who knows what else. There was a section of permanent markers. Dry erase, marks-a-lot, grease marker, sharpie, mean streak, magic marker, king size and fiddle sticks. Highlighters and porous points. Flair, zazzle, and glidestick. Which to choose?
Then came the specialty section. Stick-tite chains and memo. Don’t forget the countertop model. A small section of mechanical pencils was next. I really didn’t spend much time in this part of the display. I didn’t want to mess around with regular pencils because then I would have to go to the sharpener section. I was already confused enough.
In the front of the store was a display case filled with fine writing instruments. These were the expensive ones. The Watermans, Sheaffer, Cross, Pelikan, and Parker. After 3 and one half hours, I still was not any closer to a solution. As I was standing there, the familiar voice of one of my customers was heard. Dave Huering of Huering Ford, asked what I was doing and I told him all about losing my pen. He reached into his pocket and brought out a promotional pen from his business and gave to me. It looked like a retractable ballpoint. I put it in my pocket and figured, “what the heck.”
Until later………………………………………….ciao. E-mail at fred@idplus.biz
Fred is part owner of John Cicco’s Menswear and ID Plus Marketing Solutions.