pencil talk

Back to school season is here, and students are stocking up on school supplies for the year ahead. For most, it is probably the last year they will have a chance to buy an American made pencil. Sanford, a division of Newell Rubbermaid, and the last major US based pencil manufacturer, will be closing their [...]

While I once thought that the IBM Electrographic represented a legacy pencil category, I keep finding new exam pencils entering the market. The Papermate Exam pencil is probably unfamiliar to North American and European readers. The box says the pencil is “distributed by Sanford Brands, a Newell Rubbermaid company,” and lists the Australia, Malaysia, New [...]

And Then There Were Three??, a new post at Timberlines, a blog by pencil industry leader WoodChuck, reveals that the last large American based pencil manufacturer – Sanford – will be closing their US manufacturing facilities in 2009, moving production to Mexico. The closures were announced in early November. Two newspaper reports: Sanford closing; 355 [...]

Pencil aficionados are aware that many of the pencil brands of yesteryear are now owned by Sanford, a division of the huge conglomerate Newell-Rubbermaid. Sanford has acquired a lot of brands over the years, including hundreds of pencil names once owned by Eberhard Faber. As a global firm, the offerings vary from market to market. [...]