Chinese Pens -- Too Many Look Like Counterfeits!

June 1, 2014

In what way are they hurting the original brands?

Even if not so much in terms of money, it is identity theft. We recognize a Parker by Arrow clip. Every other good company avoided any similarity in their clips. The clip of Montblanc Meisterstuk is unique. It is their idea to make a clip with broader end. It is not a "Commonsense design" and hence a patentable shape. None should copy (or should I say emulate) this shape. When a pen is in someone's pocket we recognize it from the clip that only is visible.

June 1, 2014

Hi

If you think about it everything made today is a copy of something. I have no issue with Chinese Pens as long as they are being sold as Chinese Pens at Chinese pen prices. Its also not an issue if it even looks like something from another well known maker (Hero 616 looking like a Parker 51 or Baoer 388 looking like a Parker Sonnet or even a Jinhao 159 looking a bit like a Montblanc 149) my only issue is when they are sold by unscrupulous seller as the original or as in the case of some of the out and out fakes sold as Montblanc, Dunhill, S.T. Dupont etc at near there price of the originals, that's where I have issues with them.

Paul

Hi Paul,

So many opinions have been expressed (even by me) and many are repetitions ; but you have really hit the nail. What hurts us most is when paying $500 plus for a Duofold or a Meisterstuk but getting a fake made in (probably) China. The fakes are so close to the authentic but not deserving the price commanded by the brand's goodwill.

But why blame the Chinese? Just because they make! What about those who sell?

When I began buying pens in Ebay I was not aware of fakes. I bought a few reputed brands from sellers in USA, UK, France and Greece which I now know are fakes.

My money has gone down the drain. Having known that those are fakes I cannot use them lest my colleagues think I am flaunting them for false prestige.

June 1, 2014

Thanks for this thread. I am a collector of Chinese and Indian low cost pens and I do sometimes make kit pens. I feel this way : Very simply put, a buyer looks for two things in a commodity
a) the physical shape , form factor, material feel -all the physical aspects
b)the prestige aspects like the originality, the material purity and the ownership pride aspect icluding how much is the money cost. A

All material things have come to Asia from the western countries, starting with the original, until local collaborative technology could develop. This collaborative technology branched into stronger Asian brands, and one sub-branch went to fakes and counterfiets.

But to an Asian mind the acceptance of a copycat technology comes much easy primarily due to reason of poverty. I my city, though there are thousand collectors who would take pride in owning a Montblanc Meisterstuck 149 original for USD 400, there are a million fountain pen users [ including the vast student community] for whom a $12 Baoer 79 or a $28 Crocodile 232 itself would be a very expensive pen- feel and functionality difference may be no more than 15%!

In Kolkata a vintage Parker51 gold cap cost Rs 5000/-[ about $85] but a WningSung 613 based on the same pen cost rs 60/- [ Hero 616 are not available nowadays, I buy mine from e-bay]. In fact the student community goes for the Gel pens costing between Rs 3.0 to Rs 30, functionally far superior to the FP's.
Come to the Indian made higher end pens, most people can not afford a $ 70 ebonite pen including collectors like us. indian made Parker Urban [ with a crude local converter and steel nib ] sells for Rs 1500/-[about usd 23] while the $45/- variant from Greece/ Malaysia are no better- an these are licenced makes.

The major non US-Europe user/collector of fountain pens are from China and india, and as i visit China also, i may say that the domestic sale volume is much much more than what is sold through e-bay/ amazon etc.

But affluent collectors from these countries would always choose to buy the original expensive ones for the prestige factor- but these two are mutually exclusive domains.
Back to my mention of pen making- let me tell you that, In India pen-kits per se' are not available for sale. So either one would need to make a kit-less pen or buy a kit from US/UK/Canada sites.

But the amusing part is, none of the kits sold at these portals are actually made in these contries. These are made in Taiwan and South China. And funnier still, the sub-components of these kits like tubes/clips/cap bands etc - a large volume is made in small shack in India and bulk supplied to china. This is one area where the retailers prefer not to speak up.
So, I feel all aspects would continue to stay, trade flow and originalty mixing, some faking/counterfitting as well as the sensitivity about the original stuff. Pen is a simple technology after all. And there are more need based users than collectors.

Since you collect Indian brands also I would like to know the names of these brands and the manufacturer address ( I have bought Ratnam and Guider pens from these makers in Rajahmundry. And Ranga and Vishal pens from sellers in USA (not sold by any Indian dealer!)

June 1, 2014

@bbbiswas

Pens made in imitation of famous brands, but labelled differently, do no real harm to the original. On the contrary, a lot of the time they raise awareness of the original brand and make it even more desirable. You have to separate the two parts to this debate. We have people talking about copying designs, and people who are talking about counterfeiting. These are two separate issues. One has a legal standpoint, the other does not.

You may feel that it is unethical to copy a design. However, if you were to force that view in such a way that copying was outlawed, you would be destroying what little hope there existed among people who can only dream of owning an original.

I actually think that a lot of people who are against the imitations have a different agenda: that they feel their own prestige and sense of elitism has been diminished. It is easy to hide one's own motives.

June 1, 2014

From the counterfeiting point of view, the worst offender I have seen was a studio in Korea that produced "NOS" copies of early Parker 51 vac pens that sold for close to $800. I also know of an art school in Sichuan province that produced "antiques" which they sold to finance the school. These were sold as original pieces to the unwary and unwitting. China has and does produce imitations and pens inspired by others, but they also produce uniquely Chinese design pens that cannot be mistaken for a copy of any other. A case in point is a set of 10 pens that I bought some years ago, which I will get round to photographing sometime for this forum. These pens work really well, with smooth firm points, but I have come to view them as art, and am loath to use them often, because they are so pretty that I do not want to risk spoiling them.

June 1, 2014

This is my first post to FPN, so please excuse me if I write something inappropriate or stray into areas that are not normally written about, but I find this topic and its responses to be fascinating.

Please accept my apology if I have misread this thread or interpreted the thread incorrectly given my relatively limited experience in this arena. Thank you.

You've written a very interesting post, but the thread is talking about a fundamentally different issue, we're not talking about the actual counterfeits (no one thinks those are good) but about pens that maybe share a similar look or a design element from older pens that have gone out of patent protection (due to age). Some people *cough*Moshe*cough* are obviously ignorant about the intention of the patent system, which is to provide limited (I think 20 years in most places) protection for new things to encourage innovation, after which anyone can use it ethically and legally without problems. This is so that helpful and important inventions can be had by people at all socioeconomic levels (like antibiotics, cars, toilets, most of the things you use regularly).

This is how the patent system is supposed to work, it's point is to encourage innovation and encourage interest in new things not protect things in perpetuity, if the same old inventions were always protected then companies would have much less incentive to support inventors and take risks with research and would instead spend all their R&D money on lawyers to track down and sue violators. I don't think Moshe and his fellows have thought through what their problem with Chinese pens would really mean for the economy and their lives personally, it would be a huge problem and cause significant damage (in lost innovation and also in higher prices for what innovation there is, antibiotics or efficient toilet designs for example would be priced much higher).

Edited June 1, 2014 by WirsPlm

June 1, 2014

Even if not so much in terms of money, it is identity theft. We recognize a Parker by Arrow clip. Every other good company avoided any similarity in their clips. The clip of Montblanc Meisterstuk is unique. It is their idea to make a clip with broader end. It is not a "Commonsense design" and hence a patentable shape. None should copy (or should I say emulate) this shape. When a pen is in someone's pocket we recognize it from the clip that only is visible.

I can read brand names. I assume others can, too.

I disagree with your personal definition of 'good.' But that is your right, and mine.

I own real original Parkers and Safaris. I bought Hero 616s and Hero Summer Colors because I wanted cheap yet functioning knockaround pens and I am delighted with them. I bought the Jinhao 599 for color and curiosity and I am delighted by them, too.

I don't 'wear' my pens in the hope that someone will think I own a Parker. My pens don't even leave the house.

June 2, 2014

If an American wants a pen that looks like Parker but does not want to pay for Parker the Chinese are there to oblige him.

So do not blame only the Chinese; the buyers are also to blame.

Of course , the Chinese are hurting the original brands by this cheating ( half cheating if they still call it a Hero or Wingsung etc; but full cheating when they emboss Montblanc etc on the cap ring)

I know I said I was done, but bbiswas I had to follow up to say I totally agree with you. This is why I started this thread.