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Transcript
Format. And so I'm, like, steeped in Erasable right now.
So sorry, like, past several days.
Hello, and welcome to episode 134 of the erasable Podcast. I'm Johnny Gamber, and I'm joined tonight by Tim Wasem and Andrew Wellfley, as usual, and I regret to tell you that this will be our last show until two weeks from now, when you'll hear us podcasting live.
Yay.
And in person.
First time.
We'll be on February 28th at the Baltimore Washington International PEN show at 7pm so if you haven't RSVP'd on our website, erasable us go and do that so you can be on the guest list. Because we're debating who we're going to have as a bouncer, but we're going to have a bouncer, and they're going to have, like, you know, pencil sharpener blades and their rings. It's messed up.
I mean, clearly it's Brad, right? Brad's very tall. I think he would make an excellent bouncer.
We need to find someone there really hates pencils.
Okay.
Yeah.
And then get them to be the bouncer and they never talk to them again.
Mike Hurley.
So we've been wanting to make this episode for a long time. It was what, episode 106 in fall of 2018, when Henry Hulan from Musgrave Pencil Company was on. And tonight we have Nicole and Tim Delger, who worked with Musgrave for its reinvention and, I don't know, like, Renaissance. It's awesome. Musgrave is, like, totally different on the user end than it used to be. So welcome, Tim and Nicole. Yay.
Yay. Hey, real quick, Tim and Nicole, is it Delger? Is it Delgar with a hard G?
It's a soft G. Soft ginger.
I come from Northern Indiana, where there's a lot of, like, Amish and, like, people of German descent. And like, any name like that would have would be a hard G. Like Dilger.
Yeah, totally.
Yeah.
And it is German. That's the weird thing. This is a question I've had to answer my. My whole life, so I'm really used to it.
Like when we have Caitlyn Elgin on. Elgin on. I always want to put a heart to you on that.
Well, thank you guys for joining us. This is awesome.
Yeah, this is awesome.
You guys have small children, so that's always a challenge at night, as we know. But before we get into grilling you guys about Musgrave, we're going to do our tools of the trade. And fresh points and do it on the faster side. So Nicole, do you want to go first for tools of trade? Talk about what you're consuming and what you're writing on and with.
Yeah. So writing. I've been using the Tennessee Red and I only write on one notebook and that's the dot grid. What's it called? Oh, shoot. I get at the Ghostly International Store. The Behance notebook. It's a dot grid. It's spiral bound and I love it. And I can't use anything else.
That is an Adobe branded notebook.
Yes, I love it. It's great. And then consuming. I'm listening to the Body Keeps the Score right now. So we're getting deep quick. But that is what I'm listening to on audible.
What is the Body Keeps the Score? I don't know that.
Oh, it's a book about trauma and how trauma stays in your body manifest.
Oh, this is on my reading list.
Yay. I'm actually, I'm leading a little group of students at Vanderbilt. I went there and we're reading it and so it's kind of part of that study. But it's neat.
It's.
It's really deep. It's good.
That sounds really good. I'm glad you mentioned that because our. I'm a teacher and our school has been starting this thing where they're doing trauma informed training for us to like better understand like where our students are coming from and like our area. And like. That sounds really good. I'm gonna check that out.
Yes. And I actually, I tried to read it years ago just on my own because someone had recommended it and it's much easier to listen to. I think it's cause like the content's so deep and heavy that if you're reading it, you kind of have to put the book down and like take a deep breath. But if you're listening, you can get through it a little bit faster.
Well, it's on scribd, so I am downloading it right now.
Nice.
Or whatever you call it now.
Awesome. How about you, Tim? Tim Delger. Thank you.
Yeah, I've been consuming a lot of this podcast all about pencils called the Erasable Podcast because I wanted to be super familiar with you guys format and so I'm like steeped in erasable right now.
So sorry.
Title several days.
And as far as like writing with and on, it's like usually whatever is in reach at work. It's a lot of sharpie on like a free. Free notepads that float around. I Work at an ad agency. So it's mostly just scribbling thoughts here and there.
Cool.
How about you, Andy?
Well, I have also been steeped in erasable, but only for logistics of various things happening. But lately I've been watching Star Trek Picard, which is the Star Trek the Next Generation spin off that just started airing a couple months ago and last month. It's really good. So I'm a. I'm sure if you listen to the show, you know this, I'm a huge Star Trek fan and especially the Next Generation. And it's really interesting to see them sort of like modernize the characters and the dialogue because Picard will say something like, I am totally not doing that. Which is not something that like, that's not how the dialogue would have worked.
At least you didn't say totes.
Totes not doing that. And the weird thing is I think I was complaining about not complaining, but just noticing this. They dropped the F bomb a lot on Picard and it's fine. That's kind of like how you do it now. But it's just like jarring every time I hear it because it's a very PG rated show before. So having a character. Yeah, just like drop the F word. Just like. Wait, what you think 300 years in the future we would have some different swears happening?
These ones are timeless.
Yeah, that's a good point, Tim. I think you would, I think you would like it because there are some parts of it that really feel like Michael Chabon.
Yeah.
And he, he also is. There's this after show that they show with Will Wheaton hosts host the after show. And they've had Michael Chabon, a couple of them. And that man needs to shave or something. He is. He looks like a. Yeah, he looks like.
He looks like Yeti.
A yeti.
Yeah. I was gonna ask about that like with him being on there because, you know, I've talked about this before, but I have almost a non existent Star Trek context. Like in my life I've never watched. I mean I've watched like random bits here and there. Like to watch this, would it be. Would I need to go back and watch Next Generation first? Or can I just dive into this? Or. I mean I'm. I plan to watch. Watch both, but I don't, I don't
think you need to. But I think it helps because they do sort of like call back to some of the stuff on the show. But of course, like the show was, you know, more than 20 years ago. So like it feels almost 30 years. Geez. A long time ago. It just seems. Yeah. It seems like somebody who didn't sort of have a love and appreciation for the original one, like, wouldn't really get a whole lot out of this, I think. I think a love and appreciation for, like, Patrick Stewart could do it, but there's just like.
Or Michael Chabon.
Or Michael Chabon. Yeah. Yeah. But I think it would be. I think it'd be good. So I was writing with my. My squire number two. Sorry, Tim. My little handmade notebook. But I switched to my Tennessee red because it seemed appropriate for this show.
I just muted. Punched a wall. Yeah.
Oh, deep.
Tim's 10. Tim's squires are hovering around Atlanta somewhere.
So for like four days. Yeah.
So I will tell you that there's an open mind in solidarity. But I opened them. Sorry, I only opened one. That was. That's our solidarity. Yeah. And I hid the other ones for my children.
Tim's. Tim, what is your tools of the trade?
Well, I have been consuming a lot of the name, Nathan. I've realized, as I didn't realize this when I wrote these down, but both of mine involve that name. But the first thing is a novel called Nathan Coulter by Wendell Berry, which is the subject matter of our next recording of the Membership podcast. And so this is really exciting because it's our first novel that we've talked about. Up to this point. We've only dealt with short stories, essay collections, and his poetry. So we're all really excited about that. So we record later this week. And so I'm rereading Nathan Coulter, which was Wendell Berry's first novel that he wrote shortly after, I guess, kind of like right out of grad school or something. But it's kind of a novella length book and it's about the protagonist, Nathan Coulter, who comes up a lot throughout, throughout the Port Williams story. And it just follows him from basically birth until adulthood. So I'm rereading that and I am listening to Nathaniel Rateliff's new solo album, which is called and It's still all right, Nathaniel Rateliff of the Night Sweats, which is kind of his last, I guess his, like, most famous iteration that he's. He's been involved with for the last five years or so. He had a solo career before where he was kind of this folk singer, I guess you'd call it, that, like, modern version of a folk singer playing a lot of solo shows. And then he started this neo soul band, the Night Sweats, which took off, which is awesome. And I love them. But he's gone back to writing some of those other songs for this or some of the. The other style of songs for his solo album. And the solo album is inspired by both the. The death of his best friend and his divorce. So it's a really heavy. It started like. I read a lot about the album. It starts out the. The writing of the album started out being very heavy, as you might expect, because so much was going on that felt negative to him. But the album, when you listen to it, doesn't have that same kind of negative weight to it, as you can tell from the title. And it's still all right. It has a kind of a upswing to it in the message. So I. I really love it. It's really good. Been listening to it for a few days and it has helped me realize once and for all that I don't trust Pitchfork reviews at all. I should have. I should have accepted that long ago. But that snobby, snobby BS has nothing like the review for this album. I almost linked the review for it when I was putting in the show notes. I was like, this review is so wrong. I'm just not even gonna. Not even gonna. Please tell me I just did.
Please tell me. The Pitchfork review was like. And it's just all right.
Yeah. Gosh. It was like, oh, these folk singers writing about their feelings. How cliche. I'm like, oh, my God, get a life. Anyways, but those two. So two Nathan's or Nathan and Nathaniel. And I am writing with our pencil of the month, the 9852ew for Mitsubishi. And I am using a Moleskine Pocket hardback notebook.
Cool.
Awesome. I just finished a book this morning by Joan Didion called the Year of Magical Thinking, which is about. Is it really? So my dad's best friend from when he was growing up passed away two weeks ago. And I was thinking of sending that to his wife and I was like, maybe I should read it first. So I'm not sending it to her because it's just sad.
Katie has gone through this a few different times. She's like, oh, yeah, somebody's trying to deal with, like, some death and loss and maybe I should send it to them. Like, well, no, they're just going to be, like, a mess.
Yeah, it's very sad, but really, really good. I mean, I haven't read a lot of Joan Didion, so yeah, this is good inspiration to pick up some more. And before that I read the Miniaturist, which was. I don't know what genre it is, just. Just take regular fiction, but it's kind of spooky and weird and set in Amsterdam. And PBS picked it up, what, a year or two ago on Masterpiece, so I already knew the ending, but it was still a really, really good story. Lots of anti religious sentiment, which is always amusing to see how people handle. And weird details about how they bury you in a church and they have to, like pick up the floor at night and burn incense because of the stench before they put you under there. Like, oh, my God. Okay, so, yeah, and I'm writing with Tennessee Red also in the field notes. What are they calling it? Element 11? Yeah, whatever they are. There you go. The silver one, which is cool, but it's leaving silver dust, like everywhere. And I keep thinking it's dirt. So why don't we jump into fresh points? We're going so fast. Everyone besides me had coffee. Yay. So, Nicole, do you want to go first again?
Yeah. I'll speak for Tim and I because Tim just wrapped up some product photography for Musgrave and in the next few days, some of the unigraph pencils will be on there and the Choo Choo, as well as some of the other kind of like iconic grave branded pencils that are in the variety pack that aren't available just to purchase.
That's fantastic. I just acquired two dozen of the Unigraphs from Pencil Things who were going out of business. They came today. Like, that's such a pretty pencil. What Core hb, which is a little hard, but there's always used for a little harder pencil.
Yeah. Should be a handful of options. I have to double check what's and in stock.
But that is fantastic.
And I think even might even get it harder than that.
Unigraph is the green one, right?
They have that cool castle on there.
Oh, yeah.
So according to Amazon, they have three dozen left from Pencil Things on their Amazon store. But they told me they had three and I bought two of them, so who knows? But they did come pretty quickly.
So, yeah, that's. That's Tim and I's Fresh Points.
Okay, Johnny, that gasp was so pure and I just want to acknowledge that.
Well, I forgot that I bought them and then it was President's Day, so I didn't think the mail would come. But you know, Amazon can make the mail come on President's Day and I opened them up. Like, I forgot I got these. I forgot how pretty these are. This is so exciting. I'm like, oh, but these are the only ones I can get.
Yeah.
Like this afternoon.
Stuff like employment laws and workers rights or anything they have to deal with.
This was like the USPS in Baltimore. They come for Amazon even on Christmas Day.
Every day in the Bay Area they have like Amazon. Basically they deliver their own packages because of course.
Yeah.
I was surprised that they didn't use their own blue bands.
Yeah.
So, Mr. The other to Mr. Tim, would you let you go next?
Yeah, yeah, sure.
Tim 2.
I.
Last time we. We talked, we were talking about that new. The new Black Wing sharpener, and I got mine in hand. I was like, the. The next day, maybe I got the. The new Black Wing sharpener and I finally got my hands on a couple of those 42 Jackie Robinson pencil. Pencil caps that Blackwing made.
Oh, nice.
I've been mean to get because I didn't get them through the subscription because I just. I haven't been a subscriber. But which. Those are. Those are great. But the sharpener, I have been just like, in one sense in love with and using constantly, but also like immediately terrified that I won't be able to get a new blade for it, which I know you guys said they were gonna. They were gonna have this, but I just absolutely love that point that it puts on. I actually like it better than the Pollux.
Mm, me too.
So question for you guys then. Do you find emptying it and reassembling it just infernally frustrating or is it just me?
Well, you're screw. You're screwing it for, like, forever.
Oh, gosh, no. I've got some. Well, compared to. I mean, aren't the. The squires. It takes like 45 minutes to unscrew those things right. To put in new.
Yeah.
So that's not as bad. I. I also. I have like, vivid memories of being in like, high school and middle school and just disassembling and reassembling my pens constantly just because it was fun. Fun to me as I do that all the time. So I love. I love how I love taking it apart and putting it back together. Does bug me at all.
But it's a really, really good sharpener. Like, I. Gosh, I really love my masterpiece, but I honestly, I think I like this more.
Yeah.
Wow. Yeah.
Drinking game while you guys are in town.
You can tell that, like how, like how we know that they've been working on it for a really long time and that definitely comes across because they. I'm not going to say have a tendency to, but like several times they've released stuff and we've been like, well, they didn't maybe didn't think this out or think this all the way.
And what's interesting is it just seems like all signs point to them like custom engineering it and designing it because like they're not just. It doesn't seem like they're just like sticking their, you know, their logo on like a comb sharpener or something. Like this feels very bespoke to blackwing and we should probably figure out how to confirm that. But like that's, that's what it seems like to me.
Yeah.
So I think, yeah, they definitely were in it for the long run with designing it yourself. You know, that it's. You don't have to have that fear of it disappearing one day because I think this is, this is going to be around for a long time. Maybe that's just my insecurity, but I was just like, this thing is great. I need to make sure I can get another one right. Yeah, I love it, using it every day, so. And I found myself even like protecting it by like pre sharpening stuff and then like finishing, which is so ridiculous. But I love that, I love that it's got a, A short. Like the collar, the wood collar of it is so short. But the point is so long. Like I don't know, it's. It's perfect. And I was. And I. And I like it equally with different hardnesses, which isn't always the case with me, for sharpeners. So.
Nicole, have you tried the sharpener?
I don't have it yet. No.
Yeah, well, they're terrible.
They are awful. Yeah, it's a great thing. So I'm just really enjoying that. I'm thankful for that thing. The only other fresh point I have is that I. This is something we've talked about before, but I've never actually had one. But I finally bought. Got some composition notebooks from the decomposition or the. I got some decomposition notebooks from. What's the designer's name? Michael Rogers. Rogers. Michael Rogers. Yeah. So I'd had a pocket one that I bought with Johnny when we were in DC together last and I, I got. Who, who was that that originally sent me the baseball? Was that you, Johnny?
Yes, because I was drooling over another one.
Okay. They had, they came out with this, this one called the Curveball, which is. It's like. It looks like a green picnic tablecloth sort of, but then it has all kinds of baseball imagery over it. And I was just like, oh my gosh, that looks great. It's almost baseball season. And I was. Itching for something. And so I looked it up and then I decided to buy one and get some decomposition notebooks finally. And man, did I do that because I ended up with six. So I ended up buying a bunch, just stocking up, which they showed up today. And I'm totally glad I did that because I, um. I've been kind of burning through notebooks lately, doing some. Some writing. And these are just really fun. And so I got. They got. I got the Curveball, which. That baseball one. I got one that's called Birdsong, which is. It's like a bunch of tape cassettes with.
Oh, I'm using that one right now.
Nice. The ribbons pulled out and like birds flying through the ribbons from this cassette tapes. I got several of the. One which. I know, Johnny, you like the Redwood Creek, which. Having that one in hand is like. I mean, it's. It's kind of stunning. I mean, that they. I didn't realize that they printed this cabin in the trees, like straight onto the cardboard. I did not realize that because some of the other ones, I mean, most, or actually all the other ones that I got were, you know, printed onto. They like, put down a white primer or whatever, or like they put down a white base and then painted over it. So it is absolutely gorgeous. So that's definitely my favorite one of the bunch. But I got a few of those, which I'm thankful for. So. Yeah, by the time we get to Baltimore in a couple of weeks, I'll probably already be. Be using one of them. When I finish the notebook I'm in
now, I might have like 10 of them sitting here if you forget them. Okay,
yeah, I'll steal a few.
All right.
Andy, how about you?
I feel like all my updates are just sort of like, you know, show news. First, a quick update on the Squires, which is that Tim doesn't have his yet. Tim does not have a squire yet. I just wanted all of you to know that all of them have been sent out and there are a few that like a diminishing amount of them have just new label printed not in system, which I don't exactly know why that is, but I think it's just like maybe they forgot to scan it or maybe the barcode wasn't readable for some reason. And everything's out and on their way. And I've not gotten anything returned to me yet. So hopefully the international folks should be getting theirs in within this week and people in the US should be. Should be almost. Almost done with them.
And yeah, big Kudos to Andy for doing all the shipping.
Oh and honestly it was not that big a deal at all. I have shipping down to a systems
like so that's only because you've done it so many times.
Yeah, but they, I think they turn out absolutely gorgeous. Oh yeah, yeah, they look really good. It's about the same color of yellow as the bolt if anybody remembers the bolt. And something I like to play with is I like to take the pink twisty off and put on a green one for my experiment. It looks like a Ticonderoga.
Yeah, that was cool.
Yeah.
So yeah, these are gorgeous and I'm really, really happy with how they turned out.
The blue refill is nice. It's a really good color.
Yeah, it's, it's such a. Like a dark, dark blue. Like a. Not quite a navy but like a dark royal blue. Already thinking about putting a green refill in just because I like green ink. But yeah, I Baron Fig did just a. Just a bang up job on that looks so good and thank you all for ordering and for supporting us so we, we can you know, not have to starve all in Baltimore.
I, I had a little bit of a, like a little bit of a teary eyed moment when you sent us that picture of all those squires in a like in the boxes like when they, they arrived at your house. And I was just thinking about how amazing it was like all the support from people who listen who bought those. Cause it was just you know, we knew how many we sold but it's one thing to know a number and then to see them in a box. And I was like man, people are amazing and I am so thankful for these cool people who are listening to our podcast. I mean it was. Cause that's. That made. It just made the. To have not just a difference of. It's not like giving us an income, it's. It's giving us money so that we can be together for the first time in five, six years or whatever it's been since we. I can't, can't stress enough how amazing it was to see that picture and just for. To see people support like this.
So the day that they came, I was down in Mountain View having dinner with John Morris who was in, in the Bay Area. That was really fun. And, and John and I traded stickers and just talked about, talked about erasable stuff with pencil stuff and he kind of like solidified his plan to offer another erasable community Blackwing Run which if anybody took part last time. When was that? Johnny was that like two years ago,
less than that summer 18, I think.
Yeah. So it was right after Blackwing started offering custom imprint black wings and he did one for the erasable pencil community. And it's basically just a big group order to get this done. And since then we've grown a little bit and people might be using up some of those. So he's going to be doing a new run of Erasable Black Wings. So if you are not in the Facebook group, join the Facebook group or else get in touch with John Morris. I'll put a link to his shop in show notes to kind of otherwise order. It is not an erasable podcast. Blackwing proceeds do not go to support us in this podcast, which is totally fine. It is, it is going to sort of like, you know, show that you're part of the community and taking part in that. So yeah, just a quick announcement there. So last update, and this one is not as, not as great as the Squire update. Because of the Squires and because of some day job things and because we're going to Baltimore. I am super delayed on getting Plumago 7 ready to go out the door. So I'm going to send out an email to pre orderers pretty soon. But I apologize for the delay and it's probably going to be looking more like early March by the time we get that done. So we're kind of changing up the erasable release schedule anyway. We're going to try to do kind of like a spring fall release instead of a summer winter release. So it'll probably be October by the time we Send out issue 8. So apologies on the delay. It's just been. There's been a lot going on, which is great. Yeah. Cool.
All good.
Yeah, that is. That is it for my fresh points. Johnny, how about you?
So I only have one fresh point and that is on Saturday, February 29 from 4 to 10pm at the right Notepads Bindery, which is in Pigtown in Baltimore. We are co sponsoring an open house with Mohawk Paper at Bindery. So there will be wine, beer, maybe some food and periodic tours of the press room where they have the Heidelbergs and some people from Mohawk will be there with paper samples. So it's going to be really awesome. You get a hug from each of us if you come, or at least from one of us.
I'll do it.
I'll do it. I love hugs.
Stay away from my arm though, because it's gonna be a little tender.
Yeah, yeah. So we'll have new tattoos. So you pull you aside and be like, hey, go smack Tim in his arm.
Definitely. Definitely won't get infected in a dirty dusty.
Do that early in the night.
Yeah, we'll probably still have our meat wrappers on at that point, which is really gross. You'll see.
I can't wait.
Yeah.
Nicole, are you coming to Baltimore?
Are.
We don't mean to put you on the.
Yeah, we gotta get a babysitter that night.
No worries.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Y' all are gonna have a blast, though, man. That's gonna be so much fun. You're finally together. The band is getting together
so ironically. Like, we could just play music.
Well, you could.
You could play drums. Everyone. There's gonna be. People will be drunk anyway.
Yeah, I'll play the triangle.
You could play a tambourine. I can bring my acoustic bass. Tim can bring an acoustic guitar.
We'll get you a cowbell, Andy. That's all you need.
And we'll get someone there to tell you to play it more and more.
That'll be Chris. Chris. Chris Roth.
Yeah, but. Yeah, Right. Notepads was doing a. Like, an RSVP thing off their email list. So if you want to come and you want to RSVP and you can't find another way to rsvp, I guess you can drop us an email, or you could drop me1@editorenslerevolution.com and I'll get in touch with them.
Nice. I can't wait. That'll be really, really fun.
Yeah, I'm really looking forward to it. Four to six is a long time. So. Yeah, if you're in Baltimore, you can find some time to swing over there
if you want to see Johnny Gisch just, like, hammered, you know, I'd probably
just be sitting there drinking coffee.
Yeah.
Holding a. Holding a can of something like. That's warm.
Like, I know maybe there will be some black wing lager there.
Yeah. We're drinking beer. So ever since, you know, we spoke with Mr. Hewland and have watched Musgrave, like, every month become more and more awesome and. And have really cool new designs and interactions with people who use pencils and even new pencils, we've been wanting to sort of get the scoop from people who work with Musgrave, but who aren't Musgrave. So we have some questions for Nicole and Tim Delger about working with Musgrave. And, like, I don't know. I mean, I'm overstating it, but, like, completely remaking Musgrave from a pencil user's perspective. So first, we know that You've both helped Musgrave to transform itself from an interesting manufacturer of pencils, which they always were, to a company that makes, like, really cool new stuff. And speaking only for myself, we're learning to love them in a whole new way. But we know nothing about you too. So as much as you're comfortable sharing, can you tell us a little bit about yourselves and your work in general?
Yeah. Well, first, thank you for those kind words about our work with Musgrave. So we really want to acknowledge and appreciate that.
Yeah, it feels good to hear that we're doing, you know, we're doing the right thing. So thank you, guys. As far as us, man, it's always been really hard for us to describe, like, what we do or what we sort of are. I mean, we're a married couple, and we like each other, so that helps a lot. We both come from an advertising background, so we met in an advertising agency in Texas, and after living there for a while and getting married, we've sort of bounced around the country for me, taking different jobs in different advertising agency. I'm an art director and creative director now. And so throughout all those moves, Nicole moved away from being just in the advertising agency world and started her own thing doing branding and marketing and communications type of work. And then also sort of mixed into that is we've always been doing just weird creative projects together on the side. So we did, like, a line of furniture made from old street signs and sold those online. Or I did this thing called the hipster logo design guide years ago that, like, sort of weirdly blew up online. So we kind of worked together.
I remember that. Was that the thing where you could
projects for, you know.
Oh, hang on. You don't. They're interrupting you.
Sorry, go ahead.
Was that the thing where you could, like, generate, like, two logos and it was like, bourbon and branch or whatever it was?
Yeah.
It was not an interactive generator. It was more like a.
Of
sort of a cynical infographic about the state of logo design at the time.
Yeah, I totally remember that too.
You know, we always do all these projects. We call it, like, kind of throwing spaghetti against the wall, the refrigerator, and you see what sticks. And so some things, you know, we thought were huge and didn't go so well. And we were like, huh? And then with the hipster logo, I think we were at a wedding that weekend. You were like, this is really funny. Right? I'm gonna put this online. He had worked hard on it, and then I'd say within eight hours, it was like a Million tweets. And we were on the point of Wired and Fast Company, and we were like, what? Why didn't we put an ad on this site? You know? So, yeah, so we always do weird things. So I did that. We produced some films for Dremel the Tool, some short web films, and then did some work for Solo cup, too.
Cool.
So we're sort of like. Well, I like to think of us as like a SWAT team for branding and marketing because we're not, you know, we're not necessarily like an ad agency or a branding firm, but we are like a pretty powerful duo when we get to work together on these kind of interesting projects.
So I can't not ask if you two were at all involved with getting Solo connected to the movie Solo from the Star wars franchise.
We were not. Our client Brie, I think, had a big, big part of that, and that's who he answered to. It was a smaller thing for Solo cup, but really fun. She's a great guy.
The joy that just. The joy that brought me, like, walking through the grocery store and seeing.
Of course. Thank you.
Thank you. Makes me so happy.
It's deeply satisfying, finally making that pop culture connection. How did you take this?
It's so obvious. But also it was like, thank you for just doing it and getting it over with. I definitely bought some just for that. Yeah, sorry. This is where we're going to have one of those awkward pauses. Did you have something else you wanted to tell us about? Like, anything else you want to tell us about before we go on to the next question?
No, that's just it. It's like we probably sound like the two most disorganized people because we can't even describe what we do, but it's always been a struggle. So if you. If that's not clear, I'm happy to keep trying.
No, no, no, you're good. You're good. I just. I want to make sure that I wasn't cutting you off.
I know.
With my stupid Star Wars Solo.
Yeah. So. So, yeah. Tell us more about you then, Tim.
Yeah, so first time I saw Star Wars, I would. I still have my Millennium Falcon. Okay. So we're endlessly excited talking to you guys, because what you are doing with Musgrave, to us just. I mean, it just seems like a dream gig. Like, just a really cool opportunity. I mean, before you guys came along and worked with Musgrave, Musgrave was one of the companies that we would just, like, bring up from time to time, be like, man, there's just so much potential. There's so much you could do. And there's like, it's, it's great to have a pencil maker here in the States, but we really just wish they would, would catch up. And so I think they would get
a damn new website is what we wish.
Pencil.net ordering pencils by like product number where you're like two dozen of product number 35754 or whatever it was. But so how did you come to work with Musgrave? How did that, how did that connection happen between you and this American pencil company?
First of all, it is 100% a dream gig. So you're, you're right on the money there in terms of the potential. And it's also like they are just dream people. So it's like, I can't even overstate how much of a dream gig this is. So that is accurate.
Yeah, there's, there's definitely, there's buy in and, and trust and, and it just feels like, yeah, we're able to present ideas and not feel, you know, in advertising you might put some ideas up and somebody with a big ego is nitpicking things or, you know, questioning you or things like that. And it feels like we're really on a team and that is really wonderful. And it makes us want to work harder and it makes the work better. And so everybody kind of wins. So we have. I feel like every time I tell a friend about this client that I work on, I'm always like, and it's the best. So I just, I love it so much. I have so much gratitude. I think we express that every day in different ways. So how do we kind of work with them? You know, they just reached out over email. I think they were looking for somebody in Nashville. And I mean, I literally got a random email in my inbox and from a member of the board and clicked it. And then of course, I went to the old website and just like you guys, I was like, oh my gosh, this is gonna be amazing. So much potential. And I feel like it was so. It really, I remember where I was standing in the house. Really, like, it was, it was this awesome email to get. And so I went to write back and Tim was outside with our girls. And I said, you know, hey, come look at this email. How cool this is. It's pencil factory. Reach out. And Tim looked at the email. It had so many exclamation points and like smile emojis. He was like, I think you should act like you've been, you know, asked to pitch a business before Nicole, I was like, all right, right, right. I'm so excited. So. So. So then we were like, hey, you know, we really got to bring it and. And really put a lot of thought into when we did present work to them, you know, as we really wanted to. To work with them and to secure that piece of business.
The rest is history.
The rest is history. Yeah.
So it's really interesting to know how to think about how people think or feel about pencils and how that's something you can influence or something that you can change. How has your thinking about pencils changed since you started working with Musgrave?
I mean, I came at it, like, totally cold or with the same relationship, I guess, anyone would have with pencils. But I had heard a story about them on our local NPR station, like, maybe a few months before Nicole got the email. And so it was sort of this, like, standard American manufacturing little bit of curiosity thing. But the sort of the factory aspect was really fascinating to me. And then when we did start working with them, you know, more than one person would say something like, people still use pencils, you know, that kind of thing. And then you sort of can start to have the conversation with them of like, oh, yeah, you know, think about a hotel or a golf course or an oyster bar or something, like, they're all over the place. And then that sort of tends to sort of pique someone's memory of like, oh, yeah, you know, they have some memory about school or something they picked up along the way somewhere in life. So there's always this little bit of an affinity there to it when you just start to remind people, you know, about. About those little details. And I think they're just. The pencils are so ubiquitous, they're all over the place that they're easy to take for granted. But then when you take a moment to sort of appreciate, you know, all that goes into can be a fascinating sort of simple little object. I know that I like to go to estate sales, and so now I'm, like, rummaging through, you know, the drawers, the office, or the, you know, the garage to see if I can find some. Some weird old pencils that somebody else has just passed up. So I've definitely got an appreciation for it. The more I've learned.
Yeah. And I think when I talk to friends about it, I think people that collect pencils are really interesting. Now, of course, you know, me especially managing the social media. So it's like, this is. I tell friends, like, this is something people really care about, you know, it's like wine or coffee. People get a taste for pencils and the nuances between them, and they really. They come to love them. And I have too. You know, it starts to. You pick up on it. And now I. I notice just like Tim was saying all this things. And so I think the thing that changed for me about pencils is like, oh, this. There's people out there are so passionate about it. You know, your listeners, you guys, like, it's really cool on our.
Some idiots even made a podcast about it.
Yeah, you know, nerds. But that's cool. That's cool. You know,
so I'm maybe speaking only for myself, but probably not. We are all in love with Tennessee Red. So aside from that, because I assume that might be your favorite pencil. What are some of your favorite pencils?
Musgrave or not.
Yeah.
We are really proud of the Tennessee Red. We can't take credit for the idea, but we're super proud of how that turned out in our small role in that. For me, it's hard to beat the harvest for Musgrave, especially just after hearing those guys talk about it and sort of just the simple look of it and the gold on yellow. I'm a big fan of that one.
Yeah. Well, before I started working on Musgrave, I was a pen user. Guys, I hope that's okay to say on air.
Get off my shit.
See you guys later.
Edit that out.
Always written with pens. And so the 600 news is like a bridge, a gateway drug because that 600 news is super soft. And so it's almost like writing with ink to me. I kind of got the feel like, oh, this is my favorite. That was like my go to. To almost like break an old habit because now I only write with pencils. Of course, it kind of like live and breathe it in that way, but so I have this fondness for the 600 news. And then outside of Musgrave, I love a good novelty pencil. So the Camel rainbow pencil with like the, you know, the six color in the core.
Oh, those are awesome.
I love it. I love it. I have a bunch that I bought from CW&I. I keep for little kids birthday parties.
I have to say, the. The pencil shaped exactly like a cigarette
just blew my mind. Yeah, it's amazing.
So, follow up question. What are your other favorite pencil things like sharpeners, erasers, etc.
Well, I had posted on my personal Facebook page. Oh, maybe I had. Okay. I had read it on the Erasable podcast Facebook group because I was like, I really need a good electric sharpener, because my kids put a pencil in there backward multiple times, put eraser first, and like, my cheap sharpener. Anyway, and so I had posted, I had. I had researched, and it was like, oh, vintage electronic sharpeners are where it's at because they're, you know, heavier. And the weight, it makes it sharper. So I was like, cool, I'm gonna find that. So I posted on my Facebook, does anybody have a vintage pencil sharpener they're gonna sell? And then, you know, then actually I got a bunch of comments like, yeah, I love mine. I'm never going to sell it to you. Okay, I got to find sharpener. And not like the next day, I got a text message from a friend, and she was like, I'm at a garage at a state sale. There's two sharpeners. Do you want me to get them for you? But I didn't have her number saved, so I was like, yeah, who Dissolute. I have this old Panasonic sharpener my friend Corey got for me, and it was. It's awesome. It's so great. It's probably from the 70s or something. So that's my. My favorite pencil thing. And I have it hidden in my office, which is room for our kids so they don't damage it. But, yeah, so that's. That's my favorite. So I am slow. I'm slowly kind of collecting, and I feel like you guys are probably a couple years ahead of me on collecting pencil things, but. But I'm working on it.
It's not a rabbit hole you want to just like, fall down into, like, too quickly. So I think.
I think you're.
I think you have a healthy. A healthy pace on that.
It's also one of those rabbit holes where you're like, you, like, one night, like, go crazy and order a bunch the next year, like, wow, I bought a lot of pencils last night. And then you look at the bill and it's like, $17. All right. Could have done worse.
Yeah.
Could have been decomposition notebooks.
Yeah, that's right. So moving back to Musgrave, I mean, you guys, as. While you've been there, there have been new pencils, a new website, a new web store. When you started out with them, what was. What were some of the initial actions you took when starting to work with such a old and well established company like Musgrave?
I mean, the biggest thing was to just get in there and learn as much as we possibly could. So we, you know, there was a little bit of Information online as far as the history and sort of what we were looking at. But going down there to the factory and meeting those guys and, you know, taking a tour was the most valuable kind of first step. I mean, we just went and soaked it all in with no, you know, agenda other than like, we just want to see what this is all about and really learn as much as we can. And then in our initial sort of pitch document to them, which was based off of almost no knowledge other than what we could find online, we just had suggested, like, it looks like we could build a new website. It looks like we could do some photography, and it looks like we could tell the history of this company in a little bit more, in a little bit better way. So it was just like these foundational elements, like doing a photo shoot. So we did hire a photographer and went and spent a whole day in the factory really thoughtfully documenting every piece of the process and every beautiful tool.
Yeah, we worked with a woman named Emily Dorio, who's based here in Nashville, who's super duper talented. She shot. Emily's shot a lot of hotels, and she also does food photography and restaurants. So we knew that she would have an eye for getting really close up, you know, getting close up being able to capture the machines, being able to capture the vibe. And she really flew it out of the water. And that gave us a big trove of photography to be able to do a lot of different things that we needed to do. Sorry.
Yeah, no. So we sort of built that library of photography, knowing that we were going to use it on the website, and then like heavily, of course, in social media. And then the other sort of most kind of poignant moment, I guess for me, starting out was when they just handed us a FedEx box full of old photos from their hundred year history. Like, some of these were old prints from like the 30s, some of which had been digitized and some of which hadn't.
And so
the drive back home with that box of photos in the car was like, okay, you know, we got precious cargo here, you know, and it was like the first thing was like, we got to get these digitized. And, you know, on some safer storage idea than a FedEx, they had been scanned.
But it was like we needed. We wanted it scanned our way, you know, so get it just right.
Nice. Well, so, I mean, we've mentioned it before on this episode and before, but like, the transformation of Musgrave is just really, really remarkable and something that we are so glad to see. And if you can talk about it, and maybe if you can't, that's totally all right, too. I would love to hear some of the most difficult challenges and some of the best victories that you've had, especially considering that, you know, Musgrave is kind of a little company and that might be resistant to some change.
Yeah, I mean, I've. We found that they haven't been too resistant at all. They've been really welcoming and super trusting of. Of stuff that we want to do. And I also think that we're. We're not going in there, like, with all these crazy, weird ideas. We know we're pretty responsible with the thinking that we're bringing to them. So let's get Henry Hewlett an issue at all.
Yeah. No, no. Definitely not doing no TikTok.
Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you.
No, there were just a handful of things, like the. Just telling the history of the company, for one, was a big one for me because it was. There's so much just richness there. And so to get that in a place online that is a little bit more that full story with some of the images felt like just a really big piece of it for me. And then, I don't know, the customizer thing that we put on the website was a real beast to get all the little assets for that together. And I think we'd like to keep expanding on that thing, but that was. That was one that we felt, like, really needed to be there and also took just lots of work to get. To get that into a good place.
Yeah.
To go back. Yeah, to go back to challenges that you guys have seen. When we got the Tennessee Reds out for Christmas and the Harvest Professionals, we ended up having that delay.
Yeah.
Shipping. Where I had to, like, personally email every person that had ordered. And that was some. It would have been fine if it wasn't like, oh, you know, the holiday season. You know, it's like timing actually really, really matters, and you can't get down to the wire where, if I think that had happened at any other time of the year, I've been like, meh, yeah, I got lost in the mail, Whatever. I don't know, you know, but it was important for us to be really transparent, like, oh, hey, there's delay. Are you. Are you traveling for the holidays? Do you need to ship somewhere else? Do you want to cancel? You know, that kind of thing. And that was, you know, that. That learning curve was. Was really just kind of going into the holiday season. That was our first year, I think, to have some retail products during the holiday season. We all learned a lot and we'll definitely approach holiday a lot different this year. But it's those kind of learning curves that. That we work through and, you know, everybody but the factory kind of understood where. Where we had can improve and do better. And, you know, it's on me to start planning way, way, way earlier for a holiday.
Yeah, well, I think still, I mean, the. The product for me was well worth it. I. Oh, yeah. Loved what you put out. So.
And the cedar boxes were out in time. I had mine on Christmas morning. I knew it was coming. I saw a big, heavy box come from Tennessee before Christmas. I was like, sweet. The one thing I wanted.
Yeah, the cedar boxes were ready. Go. And then we thought the 12 packs were going to come sooner. And I thought, oh, our customer is going to be mad if we, like, release a new product and they can only have this more expensive version and then a week or two later we come out with a more affordable version. That was actually my thinking. So I was like, let's put them all up. And then it was like, oh, the 12 packs, there's a delay. So it was like, it's interesting that actually put them all online. Thinking we wanted to be able to have people at any price point be able to buy, because I think I would have been like, oh, you know, if buying a nice fancy box was a real splurge for me financially, I would have been really sad if I had seen a lower price point come through. And I was excited about being a pencil, you know, getting this new type of pencil. So anyways, it's like, what is it? No good deed goes unpunished. So that was what happened there.
Yeah. So speaking of gorgeous pencil boxes, you guys have T shirts, Like, a lot of T shirts. Yeah. There's a new website. Like, everything about Musgrave, except for the classic pencil imprints, looks completely different now. So I guess this question is for Tim. Can you talk about the work you did on the design and I guess just the design work for Musgrave?
Yeah, totally. I mean, for me, starting out with them, it was easy to make the distinction between the company, Musgrave and the brand. And so the company was doing awesome. They had no problem. They, in some ways didn't really need to upset the apple cart because they were doing just fine and they'd survived for 100 years and they're thriving and they've got great accounts and so it's well managed. And so the company was doing awesome. It was just that the brand was not really telling the story, that rich heritage story, as well as it could. So I felt like the most responsible thing to do from a design standpoint was to just not necessarily touch all of that old stuff, but just bring it out and show it in its best light that we could. So all the imprints on the pencils, I mean, you'd be an idiot to try to change the way that the harvest pencil looks or any of those classic old designs. And so it was more like, let's just keep all this, but then just showcase it and allow that to be sort of an entry point to tell this American Heritage story that these guys have in a really genuine way. I mean, there's other brands out there who would just die to be able to have photos like this of an old factory and to tell, to truly, you know, honestly tell this American heritage story. So that's really what we wanted to like, protect and to put out there. And so, you know, as far as, like, the design stuff for the logo is the only really new, new thing that we created for them to start out with. So, you know, I mean, I was just like, so obsessed with looking at these old photos of this factory floor. And if you go on the website in the history section, you can see a lot of this stuff. And for the logo, I was just like, I was also trying to find, you know, dig through and just find like, oh, there's got to be just an old logo that we can sort of bring back to life here instead of having to reinvent something new. And so if you look at some of those photos on the site, you can start to see the word musgrave in the way that they wrote it on the side of the building or on the side of these trucks, these delivery trucks and stuff. And it wasn't necessarily like a logo, I guess, in the sense that we use it now, but there was a specific way that they were using that and that sort of old thoughts of type and official looking seals and stuff. And so the idea was just to echo that stuff and build a logo around those ideas. So that's the way that the logo came to be, with sort of a script typeface as a secondary thing to reference handwriting. And then built around that is a couple of other elements like a seal that you'll see every now and then that has more things about Shelbyville and the date that they were founded and all those, those, those ideas. And then the M in the diamond comes off of the series pencil. And I think they probably used that idea and a couple of other pencils throughout the past. So he sort of just dug those elements back up and put them all together to make, you know, to make the brand what it is now. So, you know, it was never about, we're going to. We're going to totally rebrand this company. It was more like, how can we revive the brand for, you know, for the current needs? Mostly just what's going to work on the Internet, you know, and how's it going to work in the market today?
Yeah, you know, if you didn't already know about pencils, for us, it was like, oh, we have this sound a secret, you know, that we get to tell. And that was exciting to be able to talk about Musgrave and say, can you believe this company? You know, it's been here for 100
years and it's been right here.
Yeah, we're so. We're genuinely excited about it, and I think that comes through in the work.
So, I mean, it's really cool to hear you talk about, you know, pulling from the remnants of their history. Did you also look to kind of the history of pencil branding as you were going into this, or were there certain things you. You pulled inspiration from in that world? Because it's been around for so long in our country? I just didn't. Just curious to hear if there was something else that you were getting inspiration from.
I mean, I debt. We definitely both read a couple of books about the history of pencils and became pretty familiar with, you know, the sort of the European side of the history and then the way that Musgrave came to be here and, you know, where pencils kind of originated in America and all those details. So that probably informs everything on more of a subconscious level. But for Musgrave Branding, it was more of, like, what is very true about that company and what can we pull from. I do know that the something in a diamond logo exists elsewhere in pencil world, so that was sort of like something we had to pay attention to. But it wasn't about telling the story of the history of pencils as much as telling the story of the history of this company.
I like this logo because it's like a diamond meets, like, the Gmail logo. And so I think. I'm just kidding. I think it works really well.
I pull up the Gmail logo, I'm like, wait, wait. Oh, my gosh, that's so funny.
That would make a cool tattoo. Just saying. So if I can interrupt with one really, really specific question. On the Tennessee Red, the closest sort of Piece of imagery to the feral is a little red circle with three stars in it.
Yeah.
What's the story about that?
Yeah, I know that is called the Tristar from the Tennessee flag.
Yes, that's the.
Oh, wow, Tim, how do you know that?
Yeah, I've heard of that.
It's our state flag.
Yeah. So that was one of my favorite features when that pencil came out. That just. I love, I love that. That sounds like a little detail there.
You know, there, there are three pencil podcasters thinking about what tattoo to get next or in two weeks. And that's three stars. And there are three people that hosted.
You can ask me what connection I have to Tennessee and like there's some pencil companies there. Like, this is going to take some explanation.
You guys complicated on your tattoo, yet you just know.
Oh God, this is a whole thing.
Okay, should we pause and take.
No, no, no, that's fine.
So doesn't it seem like if you were to meet two of your best friends from the past six years and you get together and commemorate that you're there by getting a tattoo, doesn't it seem like you would want to get the same tattoo? Like matching tattoos?
Well, are you all tattooed?
I haven't. I do not have one.
Andy and I are certain from, from scratch. So he's.
Yeah, I have many tattoos.
Yeah.
This is too complicated for me to get into.
Yeah, it's like, do you, do you revolve around a theme or do you try to get something that matches to me?
You're getting a pencil tattoo, right? Like, that's the obvious.
I mean, that's what I thought, but who knows what Johnny's doing?
Oh, I mean, we're like, I usually
don't know, the friendship bracelet that has the heart that kind of like you have to be together for it.
Oh, yeah, we could just do that.
Why don't you do the thing where you each pick someone else's.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, no.
Tattoo roulette.
I'm not letting Johnny pick mine. That's all I'm saying.
You're both getting skulls that are heart
shaped eyes, the pencil stabbed through the top.
Johnny doesn't pick up tattoos until he gets there. And I'm, I mean, I'm kind of an obsessive planner before that, let alone like getting permanent ink into my body. So I, I can't, I can't operate like that.
Yeah, I'm usually like that. But after my first tattoo, I was like, you know what? Like, there it is. So let's do it.
Tim and I are behind you a little bit there, so.
Well, you know, it helps if you have a tattoo artist who you really trust. Like, I can show up with an idea and I know Hunter's gonna do something awesome.
Yeah.
So without that, I might not have those. Good to have the guts to do that.
We'll see. We'll see what happens.
It'll be awesome whenever it happens.
Yeah.
Yeah. Painful.
So let's get back to the tendency Red. Yeah. If. Inasmuch as you are able and willing to say, what role did the two of you play in the release of the Tennessee Red? Can you talk about any of the decisions that went into making that pencil a reality? But. Or was it in production before? Like, before you started revamping it? Revamping the brand?
Yeah. I wish we could take claim of, like, hey, guys, you know, it would be a great idea. But I think I had. I went, you know, I try to get down the factory as much as I can. It's just an hour drive. And Henry had been talking about it and it was something the board had been wanting to make. So, you know, the buy in was at the highest levels of like, oh, this would be a really cool pencil to produce. And we were just calling it the Tennessee Red Cedar pencil. Sounds like such a mouthful to like, casually call it that in a meeting. You know, we got these Tennessee Red Cedar pencils. And so that's where I think we. The name just. I think that pencil named itself because I'm like, I didn't. I don't know if I called it that or Henry did. I remember we definitely were like, well, let's not put a number on it. I don't think it needs a number. It's so different. It's going to be so cool. So we'll call it the Tennessee Red. And so from. Yeah, from that perspective, Henry was really as far as like, the. All the decisions of the component parts, really, for Henry. And that probably is why pencil's so great. You know, he. He knows what he's doing. He's been there for a long, long time. Time. So our work was, you know, to create the imprint design and have a couple different iterations that we showed him and get his feedback. And Tim, you can talk a little bit more about that process.
Yeah, I mean, I think the name was pretty much settled on when you guys had talked about it, and it was immediately clear to me that that was cool sounding. So. So my initial challenge was just make the imprint. And coming from a graphic design background, designing in that tiniest of Spaces is a huge challenge. And so we went through several iterations of what that could be like, and were there three stars or where were they? And where was the Musgrave? And it was like, I mean, we might have done 30 different iterations of what the design could look like. And then is it going to be shiny foil? Is it going to be matte? What are all the details? So it was really fun to kind of play with getting into all those details and then ultimately settling on something that everybody was excited about. And then designing the box was also like. I mean, I just love that part of it too, because packaging is like the dream for any graphic designer. And so just echoing the Tennessee Red, the design on the pencil, but then with using the red paper to create the box with white printing on it, it was just like. It was all just super fun for me to dig into.
So I bet.
Yeah, it was. And it was like one. One detail I think is kind of fun is we did. So we did the smaller version, which some of you guys have seen the first prototype with the shiny red foil I sent you guys. And when we ran it through, Henry was like, this is hard to read. It is really small. You know, the tea is big and the rest is small. And so we came home, and then I just remember saying to Tim, like, well, let's look at how they do on the harvest. And sure enough, on the harvest pencil, the H is capital, but the rest of the harvest is lowercase, but almost the same size. So we looked to the harvest when we made that final tweak on the Tennessee read, to pull up the nse and it looks really good, though. It looks so good. And so it was fun to me to kind of have that last tweak come from one of our other great pencils.
Yeah.
Oh, that's awesome.
Yeah. And I think I showed Caroline Weaver, I think early on, maybe a few of the versions got her feedback from a retail perspective. It was kind of one of our first retail ready pencils. And obviously she's so smart and knowledgeable and wonderful and such a kind person to be able to reach out to. And so I know she, you know, gave me some feedback as well, and that was really helpful.
So this is maybe a personal question. You guys have two really, really, really cute kids. And like, I have cute kids, so I know from cute kids. What kind of kids pencils do your kids like? Are they, like, swamped in Musgrave pencils or do they have, you know, their own stashes of Black Wings?
I recently Dug up a big box of old colored pencils from when I was in college. So they've been using those a lot.
Nice Prismacolors. Like, it's nice set.
Oh, wow.
So they're tearing through those. And they will write. They don't discriminate. They will write with anything on everything.
Yeah. Tiny frescoes are all over our house. But they're. Yeah. So they're little. They're three and four. So they. Yeah, they write. They write on everything, with everything. And it's funny because they don't call them Musgrave pencils. They call them Henry pencils.
Henry.
They love Henry kind of association. Yeah, that's kind of funny because I had gotten. Picked up June from school and they had given him a box of pencils. And they were. They were made in China. They were not American made pencils. And I was like, I don't know if we're gonna be able to have these. She's like, why can we? Because she was so proud of this box. I should have been more sensitive. I mean, she's four and she got a three box of pencils at school. And I was like, yeah, these can't be in our house, honey. And. And she was like, why do we only have to have Henry pencils?
Yeah, you should. Shouldn't have just flung them out the window on the drive home like you did.
I did garbage. Yeah. I have like, a little giveaway for some other things for another school, and I put them in there. Like I said, I'm a purist at the house. But I will say I have noticed, like, now that our kids are doing a lot more art. And I don't know if this is this way for you guys, but the tops of markers are like my nemesis in the house. It's like, put the top back on the marker. So I am noticing, like, oh, wow. With colored pencils, it's a lot less waste, you know, I mean, they last forever and it feels way more green to me. So I am trying to make sure that they mostly use colored pencils when they're. When they're playing and drawing.
Oh, that's great. Rosie just got some sentiment markers. So she has a 10 color marker mustache from smelling them and touching her face. We took her to the dentist. I'm like, please, please don't get upset about the ink all over her face. But I'm trying to get her to use colored pencils.
Lila actually just markered a beard onto her vase yesterday. So that was a first.
What color?
It was like, like maroon. She's like a maroon beard and she got like halfway up the sides of her face, but she got a lot done.
So efficient.
So if you can say, are you guys willing to share anything that is coming up at Musgrave? Like, what's next in the. In the process of.
Don't worry. Nobody listens to the show revamp.
Well, we. We might have an apparel item which we. We're gonna getting a prototype and maybe
the T shirt that's red.
No, no.
Oh, my God.
That red T shirt is on you. We can do that tonight.
We can knock that out.
Yeah, you gotta do it right now. He's making a. To do. That's what I got to do. Get that red T shirt. It's a different. A different apparel thing. And I'm going to try to pre sell it to make sure there's enough interest for it. But I think it's going to be really awesome. So I feel like I can talk about that because that's not a pencil thing. That's more of just an exciting kind of promo item. But I've been asking for it. Like, I feel like a little kid that's like, dad, can I have a pony? I'm like, can we. Can we please do this, please? Every time I have a meeting, I end with like, and by the way, can we get da da, da da. So I'm the one inching closer to making those happen, so.
Well, what I hope it is is a silver sweatband that's. That's test scoring. Test scoring 100 themed. I'd wear that all the time.
I would totally wear that too.
And so, which leads me to my next question. It depends on whether or not I continue to be friends with you. What is your opinion of the test scoring 100?
You can have a bad opinion of that pencil, apparently.
I don't think you can. But I.
So great. I mean, the first time I saw it, I will say I was like, I got like, short of breath.
You're like, the hell is this?
Yeah. Going back to the body keeps the score. I was like, I must have had some kind of like, test experience, like looking at this pencil. And I have test anxiety. Anyway. But anyway, so it was like, oh, this is kind of visceral, you know, this remembering, whatever school memory. But I love it.
Yeah, it's such a.
I don't know,
it's just like, I really, really want to know sort of like the design process behind that barrel because it's like, it's so weird, but it's so cool. They were like, okay, we're going to coat it in silver, but we're not going to put an undercoat on it. It's just going to be like this silver wash over this super sharp hex pencil.
And then.
Yeah, I don't get it, but I love it.
So what's a nice way to say this? General pencil company, the other big, you know, the big. The other big old American pencil company who's still around, never outsourced. They were, you know, they were a little more active on social media before you two joined Musgrave, but now they're way behind for everything. They haven't come up with anything new in a long time. They did do the number one of the Cedar Point, which we appreciate. But if you had any messages for them about how they could get their act together, What would that be?
No, I mean, I mean, I really, I view them as an awesome heritage brand. And, you know, when I think about what we make or our vision, we're excited about American made pencils. So for me, I think, I don't want to say anything negative about General because I think if anything, it's like we're, you know, we're working together, like, hey, buy American pencils. You know, buy something made here in the United States. So I, I wouldn't, you know, that's, that's not my place to say anything. You know, I think the overall message is buy American made pencils. It, to me, it's such a small price point difference, you know, than an import pencil. And it really makes a difference. Makes a difference in our community in Shelbyville. And, you know, people that work there, that come every day and it provides their health insurance and, you know, it's, it's really important. So for me, I think it's more message about really being cognizant of American made pencils.
Yay.
Okay.
I really love. I really love generals. I'm just kidding. I prefer their test scoring pencil. Sorry.
Oh, it's okay.
It's okay. The 580. But it would be pretty amazing if you guys collaborated on something.
Oh, I can't even imagine. It'd be like Coke and Pepsi collaborating.
But just think if Coke and Pepsi collaborated, they could put Starbucks out of business. They can make something that tastes really good, has no chemicals, no calories, and all the caffeine you need.
Okay.
That's the direction it would take it.
But yeah, all the caffeine a normal person needs.
Well, before we, before we let you two go, it's, it's really been A joy talking to you and hearing about this. This project. But is it. Is there anything else you guys want to talk about or bring up or mention or plug or anything like that?
Oh, no. I mean, I. I definitely want to express gratitude for you guys. I mean, you know, early on, that was part of our. Part of my research is listening to a lot of old episodes and really coming. We had a lot to learn about pencils, and we've learned a lot from you guys. So we want to say thank you and your community online, you guys should feel really proud of. It's so positive. It's so, so caring. You know, I definitely keep my eye on posts because it. It teaches me a lot about new product releases and, you know, just like, easy to. Yeah, it's great market research and, you know, I have so much gratitude for everybody and I know they have a lot of opinions and strong opinions and sometimes we can. Sometimes we can act on things and sometimes we, you know, we know, I see it and we pass that, the feedback along. And so I think just if anything, I would want to add that to have a lot of gratitude.
Yeah. Thank you guys so much, man. It's. It's a blast to be on here and the community that you've built has been so super helpful for us. So we're listening and it's important to us. And I do have to say, Andy, congratulations on that book cover. I've been following those heads of state guys for a long time, and that thing looks awesome.
So congratulations.
Thank you. Yeah, they do an amazing job. So they're kind of like the in house. Not in house, but like agency of record for Rosenfeld Media and some of their newer stuff. That one and a couple of the other new covers are just like, really phenomenal. So I wish I had anything to do with them with that, but I'm super glad to. Yeah, I love. I need to make that a print.
I know. I really want a frame framed print. Some pencil, kind of cool art pencil, you know, stuff in the office. I'm like, oh, I want that.
Yeah,
you know what? That would look good as a tattoo with that sort of like watercolor wash background thing.
Yeah, I don't think I can sit through. Sit still through that shading.
I'll use a wider nib for that.
Oh, great.
No, that hurt. That hurts less.
Oh, really? Okay. Yeah.
I mean, Frankie needs to hold my hand when we get tattoos, and my mom did once. So if you need to hold my hand, I won't judge you. Okay. Like, you're probably stronger than Frankie, So that might hurt. So, yeah. So thank you for being on tonight. This is one we've been wanting to make for a long time. I don't know what took us so long.
Yeah. Thank you so much. This is a big part of your evening. Thanks for joining it with us.
Yeah. And can you tell our listeners where to find you both online and on social media?
Yeah. On Instagram, I'm icole Delger. You might be bored by lots of kid pics. And then nicoledelger.com and of course follow musgrave@musgrave pencil and musgravepencil.com and I am
at T. Delger on Instagram and I post rarely, but I try to keep it quality. And then you can see more of my work@timdelger.com is that a commentary on my end?
I try these damn kids.
I try to curate it.
And Andy and the other Tim, can you tell folks where to find you?
Sure. I'm at Andy. WTF is my website and admat a at a Wealthley on Twitter and Instagram. How about you, Tim?
You can find me on Twitter at Tim wasom and I'm on Instagram at timothywassom.
And I'm Johnny. I'm@pencilrevolution.com and on social media ensolution. And you can follow my weird series of posts about limited edition fatigue that I think are going to get me a lot of hate mail soon. So you can send me some nice mail. That'd be good. And we are the erasable podcast. We are at erasable us. You can find us on Spotify, itunes and your favorite podcast catcher. You can check out our Facebook group@facebook.com groups erasable. Our Facebook page is Facebook. And on Twitter and Instagram we are at erasable podcast. And thank you also to our Patreon patrons. In alphabetical order. No other particular order? Oh, no, this is an alphabetical order. I don't know what the order is. Sorry. Oh, it's alphabetical order by first name. So thank you to Alex, Jonathan Brown and Sipe. Bobby Letzinger, Chris Jones, Chris Metzkus, Kritz Ulrich, Dave McDonald, Dave Tubman. Fourth letter gangster hotline. Hans Noodleman, Jocelyn R. Myers, Jason Dill, Jay Newton, Joe Crace, John Binion, Johnny Baker, Kathleen Rogers, Caitlin Wiens, Lara. I'm sorry, Laurie. Larry Grimaldi. Sorry, Larry. Leslie Touzet, Mary Collis, Measure Twice, Michael Diolosa, Michael Hagan, Random thinks. Sarah Hunter, Stuart Lennon, Tana Feliz, Think Travel, eat. And Thomas Ekberg Anderson.
Thank you so much.
Jeez, that's a lot of people. Thank you, guys. You are the best. And if you're in Baltimore or on the east coast or on the planet Earth and willing to travel, come see us in Baltimore on the 28th, and you'll get to hear that show the following week after all of the awesome people have already seen it.
Yeah.
Sorry.
Do you like our podcast? Most people like our podcast, but if you like our podcast, David will turn it off.