What was the genesis of Narwhal?

[Buford]

I've noticed that some of the clips on my PenBBS pens look suspiciously like those found on many of the Narwhal pens. Did Narwhal hive off of PenBBS or does it have an independent genealogy.

 

I've always thought that PenBBS made some fantastic pens. And, when Narwhal came along I liked them so much that I mentally classified them as a top tier brand. I still do.

 

At the same time, I feel like there are only a few factories in the PRC that produce all of the (many) Chinese brands. And, some of the factories even churn out rip-offs of the others. It seems like it's the Wild West over there. In my mind's eye, I sort of see one of the Chinese factories producing Narwhal, PenBBS, Moonman and perhaps Ikkaku. Does anyone have any solid information about what the relationships are between the Chinese brands, and the manufacturers who produce them?

[Shanghai Knife Dude]

Eagle eyes of yours. 

 

And some very musical YouTuber has found that the threads of those brands are also interchangable. 

 

It will save time just to list independent (100% in-house, including gold nib) fountain pen brands with own facilities: JH, HD, and Hero. Meanwhile, they also OEM for other global foreign brands who shall remain nameless here. There are also many other facilities doing own brands+OEM at the same time, but rarely known to the West on Ali or Etsy, which I wouldn't list here. Still very good pen though. 

 

The rest, all design houses. Two PC in garage, one drawing running on bootleg CAD, OEM the production to a group PEN FACTORIES (who is also the makers of fake MB) and leave the rest to Instagram marketing guru and cyber influencer. 

[Buford]

That's pretty fascinating! I think most pen enthusiasts sort of suspect that this is how things are produced in the PRC. I noted that among those who have their own facilities, you didn't include Narwhal, PenBBS or Moonman. 

 

From what I understand, PenBBS is a collaborative effort based on a Chinese fountain pen web forum that's similar to FPN. I think there's also a bit of overlap between PenBBS and Moonman models (without looking at my collection I can't cite specific examples). So, all three brands seem to have some sort of connection. Narwhal seems to have taken their business a step further by having a visible CEO (Frank Zhang), being distributed by all the major online retailers, and creating its own high-end brand (Ikkaku). Zhang is also apparently the president of Omas, I believe. 

 

I do find it odd that Narwhal decided to change the spelling of their name to Nahvalur; but still insists on having it pronounced "Narwhal." 

[Shanghai Knife Dude]

On 11/26/2024 at 10:49 AM, Buford said:

That's pretty fascinating! I think most pen enthusiasts sort of suspect that this is how things are produced in the PRC. I noted that among those who have their own facilities, you didn't include Narwhal, PenBBS or Moonman. 

 

From what I understand, PenBBS is a collaborative effort based on a Chinese fountain pen web forum that's similar to FPN. I think there's also a bit of overlap between PenBBS and Moonman models (without looking at my collection I can't cite specific examples). So, all three brands seem to have some sort of connection. Narwhal seems to have taken their business a step further by having a visible CEO (Frank Zhang), being distributed by all the major online retailers, and creating its own high-end brand (Ikkaku). Zhang is also apparently the president of Omas, I believe. 

 

I do find it odd that Narwhal decided to change the spelling of their name to Nahvalur; but still insists on having it pronounced "Narwhal." 

It's easier and quick money to tell  stories and posting fancy pictures on social media, rather than running a dusty smoggy pen factory with 200+ people on payrolls. 

 

I respect and buy mostly from the later. 

 

P.S. if you believed in free speech and open friendly discussion about product quality, FPN and Reddit are the only two places.

 

In some forum, quality discussion of either pens or ink under forum name, were strictly forbidden and end up immediate banning account. Totally authoritarian. That forum should rename itself to: Fountain Pen North Korea. 

[niuben]

10 hours ago, Shanghai Knife Dude said:

It's easier and quick money to tell  stories and posting fancy pictures on social media, rather than running a dusty smoggy pen factory with 200+ people on payrolls. 

 

I respect and buy mostly from the later. 

 

P.S. if you believed in free speech and open friendly discussion about product quality, FPN and Reddit are the only two places.

 

In some forum, quality discussion of either pens or ink under forum name, were strictly forbidden and end up immediate banning account. Totally authoritarian. That forum should rename itself to: Fountain Pen North Korea. 

Sounds interesting. I never experienced the PenBBS era, but I’ve heard that their boss has a bit of a bad temper. By the way, do you know if the [Hero Pen official website](hero.com.cn) has shut down?

[Shanghai Knife Dude]

3 hours ago, niuben said:

Sounds interesting. I never experienced the PenBBS era, but I’ve heard that their boss has a bit of a bad temper. By the way, do you know if the [Hero Pen official website](hero.com.cn) has shut down?

What you have heard is not baseless accusations. The dictatorship has been going on for quite a while until the forum was jag to death. I believe that forum has been shut for good by now. Main attention now shifts to social media propaganda to towards our Western comrades. 

 

Hero, long story. The ultimate share holder is still Shanghai government. Being commercial competitive has always not being the prime target of the management KPI since 1994. But current management is proactively protecting the IP of Hero and fighting the fakes. Fake Hero, and fake vintage Hero floods the domestic market, nevertheless to say overseas. Your eBay sellers probably having no clue of its legitimacy. Hero management has been busy with attending courts, so I forgive them for neglecting the web maintenance. PS if you familiar with previous Hero sites, you may find considerable amount of stationary business had been split from Hero since 2006, but still were listed. What a mess. I could carry further on, but I have to shut up not off topic too much. OMG, Hero.... 

[Dillo]

I think it's often kind of interesting how the pen world in China is almost like an entirely different world. I have very specific sellers I buy from when I want to get Hero because of the severe problem with fakes.

 

Also with nibs, the writing habits of writers who write Chinese is very different from those who write English. I say this is part of the reason why a lot of western pen makers can get away with pens that to me simply, in my experience, don't write acceptably out of the box. If you have a pen that skips a lot, it's extremely hard to write Chinese with it because you get strokes or parts of strokes missing. It's very bad. Also, in Chinese writing, you change directions a lot, so you can't get away with poorly tuned nibs quite the same way. I generally have good luck with Chinese made nibs, and my genuine Hero pens have been very consistent out of the box. I can't say I get the same enjoyment or consistency from Visconti or even Montblanc. When I get a brand new pen, I test the nib with both Chinese and English to see what it will do. Also, in my view, Parker's nibs improved significantly after they moved production to China.

 

I have a pretty dim view of how some people can say they will not spend big money on Chinese-made pens because in my view, there are quite a few western makers who cannot deliver in the same way with quality but still charge astronomical prices. Take Visconti for example. Nahvalur sells some pretty expensive pens.

 

I feel that Nahvalur is one of the makers with a big western-facing presence and a sort of western-facing mythology around it. You can get it in most well-stocked stores in the US. I really haven't dug very far in trying to figure out what their story is, but they seem to deliver more pen than Visconti has, especially for the money. The Chinese made nibs they have seem to be quite decent. The funny part is that the western-facing website is crafted in such a way that it seems to hide where the pens are from. I don't think there should be any shame in that as I've mentioned above.

 

Of course, there is the question about originality because there are some Chinese pens that are built off the backs of other designs, but that said, I think the growth in innovative designs that have decent execution has been a great thing. I see some products with enough originality that I will get them for my collection.

[Number99]

13 hours ago, Shanghai Knife Dude said:

17 hours ago, niuben said:

By the way, do you know if the [Hero Pen official website](hero.com.cn) has shut down?

What you have heard is not baseless accusations. The dictatorship has been going on for quite a while until the forum was jag to death. I believe that forum has been shut for good by now. Main attention now shifts to social media propaganda to towards our Western comrades. 

 

Hero, long story. The ultimate share holder is still Shanghai government. Being commercial competitive has always not being the prime target of the management KPI since 1994. But current management is proactively protecting the IP of Hero and fighting the fakes. Fake Hero, and fake vintage Hero floods the domestic market, nevertheless to say overseas. Your eBay sellers probably having no clue of its legitimacy. Hero management has been busy with attending courts, so I forgive them for neglecting the web maintenance. PS if you familiar with previous Hero sites, you may find considerable amount of stationary business had been split from Hero since 2006, but still were listed. What a mess. I could carry further on, but I have to shut up not off topic too much. OMG, Hero.... 

I have **上海英雄(集团)有限公司 the Shanghai Hero (Group) Co., Ltd. website bookmarked *but not connected.

You can use the Wayback Machine to browse archived materials. (Throw the URL into the search window and access it from the calendar.)

https://web.archive.org/

 

上海英雄金笔厂有限公司 The Hero Gold Pen Factory website is live, and clicking on the store icon takes you to the official Taobao store.

I always thought that the official store was the mechanism to find out the latest news.

http://www.hero1931.com/src/html/introduce/about.html

 

上海英雄金笔厂丽水有限公司 Shanghai Hero Fountain Pen Factory Lishui Co.

https://lsheropen.cn/

 

Please correct me if my description is incorrect.

 

P.S.

I have supplemented some of the background of what is being discussed for the benefit of the viewer.

Apologies if this corresponds to rudeness.

 

*P.P.S.

This may be a Google Chrome specific phenomenon with my android device.

 

**Although the websites are integrated, I have heard that the relationship between the companies is complicated, with groups being separated, becoming separate companies, or being reintegrated and rejoined into the same group.

Reference article. (Chinese language.) 

@HFTS blog post, “五等分的英雄”

 

Edited 18 hours ago by Number99
P.S. and deletion.

[Dillo]

It does appear that the main Hero website is only accessible at certain times of day or certain days. I was able to get to it recently, and I've had luck getting to it at certain times of day but not others. It's all very strange

[Dan Carmell]

1 hour ago, Dillo said:

I think it's often kind of interesting how the pen world in China is almost like an entirely different world. I have very specific sellers I buy from when I want to get Hero because of the severe problem with fakes.

 

Also with nibs, the writing habits of writers who write Chinese is very different from those who write English. I say this is part of the reason why a lot of western pen makers can get away with pens that to me simply, in my experience, don't write acceptably out of the box. If you have a pen that skips a lot, it's extremely hard to write Chinese with it because you get strokes or parts of strokes missing. It's very bad. Also, in Chinese writing, you change directions a lot, so you can't get away with poorly tuned nibs quite the same way. I generally have good luck with Chinese made nibs, and my genuine Hero pens have been very consistent out of the box. I can't say I get the same enjoyment or consistency from Visconti or even Montblanc. When I get a brand new pen, I test the nib with both Chinese and English to see what it will do. Also, in my view, Parker's nibs improved significantly after they moved production to China.

 

I have a pretty dim view of how some people can say they will not spend big money on Chinese-made pens because in my view, there are quite a few western makers who cannot deliver in the same way with quality but still charge astronomical prices. Take Visconti for example. Nahvalur sells some pretty expensive pens.

 

I feel that Nahvalur is one of the makers with a big western-facing presence and a sort of western-facing mythology around it. You can get it in most well-stocked stores in the US. I really haven't dug very far in trying to figure out what their story is, but they seem to deliver more pen than Visconti has, especially for the money. The Chinese made nibs they have seem to be quite decent. The funny part is that the western-facing website is crafted in such a way that it seems to hide where the pens are from. I don't think there should be any shame in that as I've mentioned above.

 

Of course, there is the question about originality because there are some Chinese pens that are built off the backs of other designs, but that said, I think the growth in innovative designs that have decent execution has been a great thing. I see some products with enough originality that I will get them for my collection.

Dillo, what an interesting post, thank you! I have bought Hero gold-nibbed pens pretty promiscuously across eBay and AliExpress in buying the 200 and 800 series pens and a few others. Can you say more about fake Hero pens, whether they are low-end pens or include the gold-nibbed pens? Mine all appear to be genuine, or at least all look like Hero pens!

 

I have similar feelings about those who disdain better Chinese pens, especially since they are quite good in my experience and so much more reasonably priced. 
 

My original interest in Chinese pens were the better copies or, if you will, homages to western pens, but now very much enjoy the interesting designs and improvements Chinese pens bring to market. 

[Dillo]

Most of the fakes can be recognized by nibs that are magnetic when they should be gold, and general very very poor fit and finish. Some of the most common fakes I've found are the Hero 616 and 100

[niuben]

19 hours ago, Number99 said:

I have **上海英雄(集团)有限公司 the Shanghai Hero (Group) Co., Ltd. website bookmarked *but not connected.

You can use the Wayback Machine to browse archived materials. (Throw the URL into the search window and access it from the calendar.)

https://web.archive.org/

 

上海英雄金笔厂有限公司 The Hero Gold Pen Factory website is live, and clicking on the store icon takes you to the official Taobao store.

I always thought that the official store was the mechanism to find out the latest news.

http://www.hero1931.com/src/html/introduce/about.html

 

上海英雄金笔厂丽水有限公司 Shanghai Hero Fountain Pen Factory Lishui Co.

https://lsheropen.cn/

 

Please correct me if my description is incorrect.

 

P.S.

I have supplemented some of the background of what is being discussed for the benefit of the viewer.

Apologies if this corresponds to rudeness.

 

*P.P.S.

This may be a Google Chrome specific phenomenon with my android device.

 

**Although the websites are integrated, I have heard that the relationship between the companies is complicated, with groups being separated, becoming separate companies, or being reintegrated and rejoined into the same group.

Reference article. (Chinese language.) 

@HFTS blog post, “五等分的英雄”

 

Thanks thanks thanks ! 

[niuben]

On 11/28/2024 at 5:14 PM, Shanghai Knife Dude said:

What you have heard is not baseless accusations. The dictatorship has been going on for quite a while until the forum was jag to death. I believe that forum has been shut for good by now. Main attention now shifts to social media propaganda to towards our Western comrades. 

 

Hero, long story. The ultimate share holder is still Shanghai government. Being commercial competitive has always not being the prime target of the management KPI since 1994. But current management is proactively protecting the IP of Hero and fighting the fakes. Fake Hero, and fake vintage Hero floods the domestic market, nevertheless to say overseas. Your eBay sellers probably having no clue of its legitimacy. Hero management has been busy with attending courts, so I forgive them for neglecting the web maintenance. PS if you familiar with previous Hero sites, you may find considerable amount of stationary business had been split from Hero since 2006, but still were listed. What a mess. I could carry further on, but I have to shut up not off topic too much. OMG, Hero.... 

Well ,I find that hero.com.cn is back. And in a very low and old website there are detailed products, like some fake goods...