Pilot Custom Urushi

[mke]

 

December 2022: 96800 Yen (w/o tax: 88000)

September 2024: 121000 Yen (w/o tax: 110000)

November 2024: 165000 Yen (w/o tax: 150000)

 

Isn't that fun? A 70% increase in 2* years.

*Archive.org didn't capture the URL in 2023, so it is possible that this increase actually happened over one year.

 

[Brian3]

Wow. That’s very unfortunate. I wonder what Pilot’s reasoning is for this.

[mke]

55 minutes ago, Brian3 said:

I wonder what Pilot’s reasoning is for this.

Making better profits while pointing at the "unfortunate situation that everything is getting more expensive".

 

 

[KingsCountyWriter]

Do stores that have them in stock charge the new price or does the price reflect when the store acquired it? I purchased some pens last summer in Japan and the stationery stores were charging the sticker price, which in some cases was over 30 years old (Sailor pocket pens).

 

[Linger]

Smart brands ultimately price their products on the perceived value seen by the target audience. All arguments mentioned otherwise are to be taken with a grain of salt. They do because they can. It is the power of marketing. Nothing wrong with it, bytheway, you pay for what you get: a warm happy feeling of belonging (to the target audience).

[K Singh]

On 11/28/2024 at 12:18 PM, mke said:

Making better profits while pointing at the "unfortunate situation that everything is getting more expensive".

 

 

Well said 👍 Same case with some of the Indian penmakers as well.

[Christopher Godfrey]

And don't forget the mighty earthquake a while back: perhaps that had something to do with this...?

[mulrich]

The price increases seem excessive but I don't know the supply chain for the materials Pilot uses for this pen, or the labor market for the set of craftsman who create these pens. Maybe prices in those things have gone up faster than more general inflation. But to the prior comment's point, companies will price products to make the most money. Until they see sales decrease Pilot has little reason to drop prices. 

[womble21]

The Custom Urushi's retail price in the West has been $1000+ since before Covid. Meanwhile, I was able to buy a brand-new Custom Urushi on February 2022 for 62,727 yen from an online Rakuten store. Some people even took (and are no doubt still taking) advantage of the disparity in price to conduct arbitrage on the second-hand market. I would venture that one of several contributing factors to the recent Japanese price rises would be Western distributors complaining about lost sales.

[mulrich]

I haven't used Rakuten so maybe I'm doing something wrong but I don't see a Custom Urushi when searching the site. 

[womble21]

You need to be on the Japanese site and search in Japanese: https://search.rakuten.co.jp/search/mall/パイロット+カスタム+漆+万年筆/

[Paul-in-SF]

Ooh, they have them in blue, as well as red and black. I haven't seen that before. 

[mulrich]

5 hours ago, womble21 said:

You need to be on the Japanese site and search in Japanese:

Thanks for sharing. That explains why I couldn’t find them. Do these ship directly to the us or would I have to use an intermediary? I suppose with rakuten in will depend on policies of individual sellers. Time for me to learn Japanese. 

[mke]

1 hour ago, mulrich said:

Do these ship directly to the us or would I have to use an intermediary?

• I think most of the sellers will not sell abroad.
• Some sellers do not accept foreign credit cards. https://globalexpress.rakuten.co.jp/faq/detail?id=146&lang=en
• And I am not sure if all the prices contain local tax but I am sure that not every seller will sell you tax-free.
• And beware of "予約販売" which means the sellers orders a pen after you ordered and paid for it. It is possible that they show the old price but when ordering, they have to pay the new price and suddenly, your pen becomes more expensive.

[mke]

1 hour ago, mulrich said:

Time for me to learn Japanese. 

 

Use https://www.deepl.com/ for both directions: EN <-> JA. Don't use complicated sentences, make them short and the output is 100% correct.

 

[Christopher Godfrey]

Over on FPG whichwatch, a member here too, has the blue urushi pen for sale right now.

[Paul-in-SF]

That person is also on this site, so if you send them a message that you are interested in that pen, I'm sure they will respond. 

[mke]

1 hour ago, Paul-in-SF said:

That person is also on this site,

@whichwatch

[nm4]

Owned one years ago at the old price…it was the only Pilot pen I’ve ever owned that I felt was overpriced.  The new price makes me wince.  I’d spend a little less and get a Nakaya (as long as you are ok with the nib feedback).   Twice the pen.  TBH my Justus writes better than my Custom Urushi did.  The blue color is awesome.  
 

N