My association with The Lecce Pen Company and their range of pens is now in its twentieth year – a very significant anniversary for me. In that time I have seen unimaginable changes, not only in our companies and the way they operate but also in how personalised pens are marketed.

I can remember the first day I ever set foot on Italian Soil and it was for the sole purpose of securing a Lecce Pen distributorship for the UK and Ireland for their entire range of promotional pens. These were the days when European pen manufacturers reigned supreme globally and Lecce Pen Company was the Daddy of them all. In all honesty I had no idea at the time how preposterous my approach would seem to them – I was relatively new to the pen business and only employed a handful of printers in a building that was formerly used as a cowshed.

It is little wonder that I failed in my attempts to gain this distributorship because they were already represented in the UK by Raimart – a leading supplier of printed pens at the time and of course there was that little issue of credibility because I had no pedigree in the pen business. It was a probably case of pity combined with the fact that my audacity (naivety?) shocked them to the point that I eventually persuaded them to let me sell one of their pens they planned to discontinue. It was a horrible square thing that looked like the pen Noah used to document the animals as the entered the ark. I came back and had all their remaining stock shipped to me with not a clue how I was going to sell square pens in a market dominated by modern round ones. After a bit of research I found that the only possible outlet was with foil blockers, usually guys in their garage selling small orders of pens, bookmarks and coasters in publications like Exchange & Mart. It took a while before I sold them all and then went back to Lecce for more and they said…..sorry we have discontinued it!… WHAT!!!!

I could feel my Celtic temperament was going to let me down …again but outwardly kept my composure and asked them for another no-hoper and they gladly obliged. This scenario repeated itself for a year or two and eventually I replaced their existing distributor. In our twenty-year relationship we have sold countless millions of their pens and although a little part of me would like to take some credit I know our success is down to the quality and style of their pens. Indeed a level of quality and style that eventually led to their designs being the most-copied by other pen manufacturers across the world.

In the past ten years we have witnessed unparalleled changes in the promotional pen industry, particularly with the emergence of Far-Eastern suppliers but that will be the subject matter of a forthcoming news article.

Keep tuned into our website’s ‘News’ section here at pens.co.uk – The home of Promotional Printed Pens.

Personalised pens serve a number of purposes for businesses. Cheap plastic promotional pens are a great way to get your corporate message in the hands of potential new customers at exhibitions or trade shows. Using printed pens in your business is a simple way to ensure your employees are living and breathing your corporate identity. Offering your customers high quality promotional metal pens, engraved with their name or your business name will certainly endear them to you and your business. In a time of recession when giving cash bonus’s is frowned upon, personalised pens are one way you can reward your employees for:

• Exceeding targets
•  Loyal service
• Innovative ideas
• Winning New Business

Of course the majority of people would place a higher value on a cash bonus as a reward for achieving sales targets. However, during recessionary periods when pay and bonus’s are frozen even for successful multinational businesses, personalised pens are a nice alternative and let employees know that even though additional financial remuneration is not available to reward success, their efforts and achievements are still recognised by the business.

Rewarding the achievements of your employees with personalised pens is a great way to drive the subliminal messaging of your business. Consider the employee who exceeds their challenging sales targets and is rewarded with an elegant engraved metal pen, not only does the employee appreciate that their efforts and results are being recognised by the business and therefore continues with their efforts to exceed expectations, but its also a great advertisement for your business. Just think of the impression your customers will have when your sales reps arrive armed with a top of the range engraved pens. Not only does it show you take pride in the appearance of your sales force it also drives more subtle agendas about the success of your business.

When it comes to Personalised Pens,  Quad Ball Pens cannot be equalled in terms of value for money. This range of promotional pens represents great value because you get four different coloured refills in one pen.

Just think of it in terms of exposure to your target audience. You would have to have 4 different pens – each printed with your message to carry the same advertising weight. Think of the associated costs of doing that. Four times as many screens, set up charges and pens to achieve the same exposure – after all you can only use one pen at a time so it makes more sense to have all four refills in the one body with the only message you wish to display.

Quad Ball Pens operate on a push-button mechanism; they come in four different refill colours, blue, black, red and green and all contain German documental ink for your peace of mind. The barrel can be imprinted with your corporate message or logo in up the six accurately matched colours and they are also available on an express printing service as an optional extra – so you don’t have to worry about those last-minute panic requirements.

The barrel features a large print area and can be peripherally personalised for even the most detailed line images. It can also be supplied with unique optional display packaging and f you are intending to use them as giveaways at your next exhibition we have a range of very inexpensive disposable pen pots to keep them organised.

Why not get in touch with us today and ask for free samples and supporting literature – we have everything you could possibly need to assist you in selling these to your clients. As a leading trade exclusive supplier of printed pens, The Pen Warehouse will ensure all end-user enquiries are channelled through our promotional gifts distributor network to ensure the end-user client is supported at every stage of order procurement.

The Quad Ballpen from The Pen Warehouse – the home of personalised pens and pencils.

Personalised pens are still one of the Trade Show essentials that no exhibitor should be without. Regardless of your industry, if you regularly attend trade shows then promotional pens are one of the most cost effective mediums to get your corporate message into the hands of your customers.

Of course it is essential your trade show stand clearly identifies your business, your product / service offer and your credentials. A visitor walking passed your stand will only have a glimpse of your business; you need to communicate the key messages coherently in order to attract their attention and hopefully their business. This of course relies on the visitor being fully aware of your stand and concentrating on the messages you are trying to communicate.

Using printed pens at trade shows is effective in ensuring visitors to your stand remember your business, your product / service offer and most importantly your contact details. Investing in personalised pens that customers are more likely to keep hold of is a sensible choice, consider the number of promotional pens a visitor will pick up at various trade shows, the majority are likely to be cheap plastic promotional pens that will hold little to no value in the visitors eyes, they serve a purpose of communicating a corporate message, but this message inevitably becomes diluted by the more pens the visitor accumulates.

Savvy exhibitors will recognise this and look for personalised pens that will help their message stand out from the crowd. For your next exhibition why not consider using The Spectrum Ball Pen, a Push-button Ball pen that has the capabilities to be printed in Full Colour, this enables you to relay complex and detailed logos accurately on the large print area. In fact we can even relay photographic quality images onto the barrel of the pen. Why not give us a call and we will happily talk you through the benefits of full colour printing.

Just over 4 years ago we developed a range of double-ended personalised pens with removable caps. These pens were designed to be very inexpensive and they were aimed at a very small, niche market but we were surprised at the uptake and we quickly sold out our entire stock – mainly to one particular distributor.

We were delighted at the response but we soon started getting feedback that we could improve the design if we could find a way of preventing the caps from getting lost. We held fire on placing a repeat order and I got back behind my trusty old drawing board (Actually a Mac with Autocad) and set about redesigning a new version like no other range o promotional pens currently available at the time. It took a few weeks to finalise the designs but I was very pleased with the results so we went for modelling, primary tooling and then final tooling. I was thrilled with the results and we now stock these and we called them The DuoTwist Ball Pens and the StyloTwist Ball Pens.

DuoTwist Ball Pens : This range of personalised pens has a red refill one end and a black refill on the opposite end. We dispensed with the caps from our earlier models and created a twist-action mechanism to retract the refill at either end. While we were redesigning this innovative promotional pen we decided to introduce an in-line moulded rubber grip for a comfortable writing experience and we are very pleased with the results. This pen is ideal as an exhibition giveaway and for office use where two coloured refills are required.

StyloTwist Bll Pens: These look very similar to the DuoTwist as they share the same outer casing. However, the significant difference lies with the introduction of a nylon tip (stylus) to replace the red refill. This pen has been designed to appeal to delivery companies that require either a written signature and/or a digital signature using the stylus tipped end. The black refill at the opposite end is just a normal twist action pen. However, the combination of the two make for very unusual printed pens.

Samples and supporting literature is available freely on request. There we have it, two more innovative writing instruments from The Pen Warehouse – The Home of Personalised Pens.

Promotional pens continue to be one of the most cost effective mediums to communicate your corporate message to a wide audience for a relatively small investment. Not only can you achieve reach for your message, printed pens are also a great way to drive home other credentials of your business.

For example, if you are looking to convey an image of a business that is not only aware of eco issues but also take a proactive approach towards them you might consider using the Envirostick Ball pen in your next awareness campaign. The number of recycled promotional pens available is phenomenal, but how many of them are actually contributing to the sustainability of the planet and how many are just using a recycled logo to benefit commercially?

The Envirostick is uniquely positioned in this respect as we can quantify the precise impact your decision to buy green has on the sustainability of our planet, how many other recycled printed pens can offer this? The Envirostick Ball Pen is made from an innovative material called Ecoallene®, derived from the recycling of post consumer Tetra Pak cartons. Cartons contain three waste layers; paper, aluminium and polyethylene. Under a complex process the three layers are separated, the paper is sent for recycling and the aluminium and polyethylene layers are combined under heat to form a plastic granule called Ecoallene®. Ecoallene® has very similar properties to traditional plastics and most importantly it’s cost effective too.

Now for the numbers, from just one tonne of used Tetra Pak cartons processed to form Ecoallene®, a massive 900KG of greenhouse gas emissions are avoided and 3 cubic metres of landfill site space is saved. This really is a green product you and your customers can be proud to use, not only are you enjoying fantastic promotional pens, you are also saving the planet at the same time.

The next time you throw out an Orange Juice carton, just take a minute to consider the possibility that you could be using a pen made from the very same carton you just discarded.

Personalised Pens in plastic are normally screen printed or pad printed. However, we have one more option with promotional metal pens, – engraving but in particular, laser engraving. I have listed the features and benefits of this type of personalisation as follows

Features & Benefits of Laser engraved Personalised Pens

• Permanence: As laser engraved printed pens have their surface removed by the burning action of the laser beam, the image becomes a permanent feature of the pen. This has significant benefits for the longevity of the personalised message compared to conventionally printed pens. Metal promotional pens when printed with an epoxy type of ink, although fairly permanent, will eventually succumb to the abrasive action of constant contact with daily items such as coins, keys and hard items in general.
• Small Orders: Conventionally personalised pens require a minimum quantity of at least 50 pieces to make them economically viable. On the other hand laser engraved promotional pens can be printed in quantities as low as one with relatively little cost. The benefit of this for distributors is that it will allow you to get orders from clients that will be a great door-opener for hopefully larger and more profitable orders later on. Just imagine being able to provide the chief-executive of a large corporation with his own personalised pen – it will leave a lasting impression.
• Fine Detail: There is a finite limit to the level of detail that can be produced through conventional printing. Laser engraving can produce images one pixel wide so that even the finest logo or crest can be reproduced in staggering detail. Again, as distributors, you can impress your client with your ability to steer them in the right direction if you feel that a certain logo requires laser engraving instead of conventional printing.
• Metallic Coloured Print: No other process on metal pens can produce a true metallic appearance and this is probably one of laser engraving’s main advantages. As the engraving process removes the surface of the pen it exposes the base metal. The benefit of this is that it adds that extra touch of luxury even to a modestly-priced promotional pen.

So there we have it, Laser engraved pens offer so many benefits if our distributors can get the message out there to their target audience. Remember samples and supporting literature is freely available from your trade-exclusive supplier, The Pen Warehouse – Home of Promotional Pens.

Personalised pens at their most effective is surely when they are printed in full colour and here at The Pen Warehouse we regard ourselves as innovators in    this field.

The promotion’s industry has been used to high-quality peripheral transfer printed pens for many years now and in all fairness we were late arrivals when we introduced our own transfer system two years ago. However, since we introduced full colour printing on our Fotofinish Ballpen, Abacus Ballpen and Futura Digital Ballpen we have taken a sizeable proportion of the UK market due to our keen prices, fast service and high quality. However, I am really writing this article to tell you about a product where we are true innovators in full-colour print – our specialist transfer printing  service on The Spectrum Ballpen. One of the limitations of traditional transfer printing is the relatively high minimum quantities required to make it economically viable. The whole idea of this product is that it is a much lower price option and it can be produced in smaller volume than the traditional peripherally printed range of promotional pens. The Spectrum ballpen can be printed on either side of the barrel in quantities as low as 250 pieces. This range of personalised pens comes with black ink refill as standard and a siliconised rubber grip for a comfortable writing experience.

We are very proud of the fact that we are the first company anywhere in the world to develop this type of printing system and we have seen one or two imitators appear in the last few months, but believe it or not all of these companies still end up placing their orders through The Pen Warehouse – we didn’t spend over two years developing a system that could be easily replicated by simply buying an off the shelf machine.

We are here to help our distributors to sell these amazing full colour pens so call us for samples and supporting literature – we are here to help.

Personalised pens are destined to remain the most popular of all promotional items, mainly because of their low price point and universal appeal.

However, recycled pens in general are not doing so well in this recessionary period because they tend to be a little more expensive than pens made from normal plastic and this of course is giving marketing executives a moral dilemma. hearts are saying ‘recycled’ whilst heads are saying ‘price’. Those determined enough to hold on to the moral high ground will continue to buy personalised pens made from recycled materials but unfortunately many will not. So what do we do to sway those faint hearts? Well I believe we can take a two-pronged attack on the problem.

1. Offer recycled personalised pens that cost the same or less than their conventional equivelants made from normal plastic. We have many recycled promotional pens that fit this bill. Just search the eco-friendly section of our website and you will be amazed at the savings you can make because we believe that ‘recycled’ should not be synonoymous with ‘expensive’. You can choose from recycled paper pens, recycled plastic pens and numerous printed pens that are both recycled and biodegradable. There is simply no excuse for marketing executives to be reneging on their moral obligations to remain ‘green’ when there is no downside from a price point of view.
2. It is true that in these tough times you need a more compelling argument in favour of recycled personalised pens and we believe we have the answer….in a word ‘ENVIROSTICK‘! Here we have a pen that is not only recycled; it is post-consumer recycled from a material called EcoAllene. This fantastic material is the product of recycling Tetra-Pak drinks containers and is fully certified as truly recycled with nothing else added. On top of this it boasts the world’s first and only recycled refill made from the same material. If that is not a compelling reason to buy recycled personalised pens then I will get my Marketing Manager to eat your hat – if you have one that is.

So… you brilliant distributors of ours get out there and get selling our huge range of eco-friendly pens – we have loads of samples to give you free of charge and anything else (within reason of course) that will make it an easy  task to spread the word. Just remember, the consumer just needs to hear the message, ‘recycled does not mean more cost’!

Personalised pens are one of the most cost-effective ways of promoting you business or organisation but to our distributors the process of personalising them is a bit of a black art. Here is a brief explantion of the various processes used to personalise pens.

• Screen printed personalised ball pens: This is the most popular method for producing stunning images on pens. The images produced are mainly line or vector format images but ocassionally people attempt to produces images in full colour. We prefer not to adopt this method for personalising pens in full photographic colour as we have developed much better systems for achieving this type of image. The screen printing process relies entirely on ink passing through a woven mesh and the areas not being printed use a photographic stencil to selectively block the ink.
• Tampo printed personalised ballpens: This is without doubt the most universal form of printing. It can be used to print straight barrel pens, curvy pens,  and pens with compound angles. It relies entirely on a silicone rubber pad picking the ink up out of an etched plate containing the image and transferring that image to the pen by contact with the rubber pad .
• Foil Blocked personalised ball pens. One of the oldest and craft based forms of printing. This process is ideal for producing images on objects with flat surfaces in glossy metallic colours or where you require a bright colour on a dark surface. It has limited appeal for promotional pens because pen barrels are rarely flat. The process relies on a heated die with the image embossed on the surface transferring the colour required from a foil under heat and pressure.
• Transfer printed personalised ballpens. This process is ideal for printing cylinderical barrels of pens in full photographic colour. It is a similar to foil blocking in that it relies on heat and pressure to transfer the image from a foil. There are two distinct differences however, the foil is printed and the pressure pad is heated silicone rubber.
• Engraved Personalised ball Pens: This method of personalisation relies on the surface of the pen being selectively removed to expose the base metal in a contrasting effect. It can be achieved through machine emgraving or alternatively by laser engraving.

So there we have it, personalised ball pens can be produced in a whole variety of ways and keep an eye on this news feed for more technical information from The Pen Warehouse – the home of promotional ball pens and printed ball pens.