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| P2P Magazine | Autumn 2016
01732 759725
around the world.
In 1971 the company changed its
name to Pentel Co. Ltd, a name that
reflects the close connection between
painting, pastels and pens (pen) and
communication and expression (tell).
Everyday writing
The launch of another iconic
product was about to familiarise a
new generation of consumers with
the Pentel brand and inspire the
future development of everyday
writing instruments. In 1972, the
company introduced the green-
barrelled Ball Pentel rollerball,
featuring a cushioned ball tip
and water-based ink that gave
users the fluid writing sensation
of a fountain pen, without
the inconvenience of messy
refilling.
When Pentel’s sales people
first saw it, they were sceptical
about the green barrel, as the
colour was so unconventional.
But after a short time they
began to see that the pen’s
distinctive looks were a
positive thing that helped
Ball Pentel stand out from
the crowd. Over the next
few years, the Ball Pentel
rollerball became the cool
pen to have in every pencil
case, studio and office.
Numerous celebrities have
been photographed with a
Ball Pentel in their hand; there is even an
archive photo showing Her Majesty the
Queen marking her race card with one.
Quality control
In 1976 Pentel received the prestigious
Deming Prize, awarded in recognition
of company-wide efforts to introduce
best practice quality control and
implementation. The prize was named
after the American engineer, statistician,
professor and author Dr W. Edwards
Deming, whose work with Japanese
industry leaders is often cited as a key
inspiration for the Japanese post-war
economic miracle of 1950 to 1960. In
1978, Edwards Deming visited Pentel in
Pentel celebrates
70 years of success
The company has come a long way
since it was founded in 1946 as Japan
Stationery Company Limited in Tokyo
by the late former chairman Yukio
Horie. Mr Horie was a visionary and
entrepreneur with a passion for art
materials and writing instruments. He
established his company to purchase
and sell stationery products in the
days when Japan was in desperate
need of inspiration and a new sense of
direction and purpose, following the
end of the SecondWorldWar.
Yukio Horie was one of the first of
a new generation of Japanese business
people to predict the widespread
popularity of art and culture among
consumers of all ages in peace time. He
made it his mission to develop crayons
and pastels that would help people
express their ideas and creativity. By
the end of his first year in business he
had established his first factory in Soka,
Tokyo and started work on the challenge
of developing art materials.
In 1951, Mr Horie successfully
combined the benefits of crayons and
pastels in the first of his products to go
on sale. This was followed in 1955 by the
launch of the Pentel Oil Pastel, a product
with a more stable quality. Exporting
to overseas countries had commenced
two years previously, and the Japan
Stationery Co. Ltd. was now starting to
gain momentum.
Not content with developing just
art materials, Yukio Horie turned
his attention to everyday writing
instruments and in 1960 launched the
Pentel Pencil, the world’s first mechanical
pencil with a push button for advancing
the lead. At the same time, he introduced
the world to Hi-Polymer Refill Lead for
his mechanical pencil and an oil-based
Pentel Pen, a forerunner of N50, one
of the company’s most successful
permanent markers.
During the Sixties, two more
factories were opened in Tokyo and
branches were set up in Hong Kong, the
USA, France and the UK.
Sales take off
In 1963 the company came to the
attention of the world, when it
launched the Sign Pen, an acrylic-fibre-
tipped pen that revolutionised the
way we write. This made the headlines
when it was spotted at a trade fair in
the United States and subsequently
fell into the hands of President
Lyndon B. Johnson. The President
liked the pen immensely and when
this was reported in newspapers and
magazines sales really took off.
The Sign Pen was even adopted
as the official writing instrument
of NASA and went into space with
a Gemini mission in 1966. This
publicity cemented the future
of the Sign Pen as the must-
have writing instrument for the
workplace, studio, college and
home. To date, more than two
billion Sign Pens have been sold
October 2016 marked a very special anniversary for Pentel, as the
company celebrates 70 years of designing, manufacturing and
selling some of the world’s favourite writing instruments.
Clockwise from
top left:
1960s
advertising for Sign
Pen; Early Sign
Pen packaging;
Founder Yukio
Horie: Pentel
head office
1960
Sign Pen: over
2 billion sold
to date
PENS
