My pen!
I’m really not particular about a lot of things, you know? I’m not generally brand-driven or anything, but I do occasionally settle on some things I like. Apple computers, Levi’s jeans, Hershey’s chocolate syrup… these I’m partial to.
And pens. I love my Zebra Jimnie Gel Antique ink pens. I love that instead of blue, black and green, the Jimnie Gel Antiques come in colors like cobalt, earth, and forest. I like writing with these pens because my scrawls looks different than the scrawls of 99% of the rest of the world.
Unfortunately, the Jimnie Gel Antique line has been discontinued, and I’ve been nursing the last of my stock and ordering replacements from the one place online that has any left: Board Room Products. As I placed my order last week, I wondered what I’d do when Board Room’s stock ran out.
So, imagine how pleased I was Friday when my pens arrived and the following message appeared on my invoice:
Because these pens have been discontinued for some time, in some of the pens the ink has evaporated. On the pens which this has happened, we charged you $1.00 for those pens. You might want to try the Sarasa pen in those colors.
How awesome is that? I probably wouldn’t have noticed that some of the ink was missing in these pens, but Board Room Products did me a solid anyway. AND they noticed that I liked these particular colors, and offered me an alternative that I didn’t even know existed.
So, these guys get my business from now on because, as Seth Godin says, they did something remarkable: they personalized an otherwise impersonal experience. It took someone probably three extra minutes out of their day to enter the order and write that note, and it made a loyal customer out of me. Good job, Board Room… and thanks!
Stuart-
It’s amazing to me how many people don’t care one way or another what they write with. After all, we’re talking about the physical representation of a person via the written word. I mean Bic? Are you kidding me? Flick that!
I’ve been a loyal Pilot G-2 man for some time now—nearly a decade. Both the .07 in black for general writing, and the .05 for tighter, smaller, more precise stuff are pretty much the bees knees.
True story: I used a G-2 07 the entire time Shan and I worked on the crazy Sharpie tour. During a schmooze cruise around Manhattan for some Sanford reps, while standing on the upper deck of the boat, I took out my pen and little notebook to make some notes. Suddenly, from the lower deck—a good twelve feet below—some Sanford exec yelled, “WHAT! WHAT IS THAT!?!”
“I can’t write with anything else,” I said, and finished up my notes.