Notes on the Technico brand

J. S. Staedtler’s “Technico” brand of pushbutton spring clutch leadholders were Introduced in 1950.

Just an aside here about branding—I think the Staedtler leadholders illustrate a pitfall you kids out there watching are going to want to be aware of if you plan to pursue a life in the purgatory that is the branding and advertising industrial complex.

Check it out: J. S. Staedtler is a pencil manufacturer. They naturally want their brand on the products they make and sell. Also, each product has a name, of course, and a number—a model number. So in 1900 when Staedtler introduced a new product for the relatively new professional pencil market they gave us the J. S. Staedtler Mars 1002 with a distinctive blue finish. Great. Fine. Then in about 1932 they introduce a new lead formulation for drafting that produces nice, dark lines which are good for reproducing with blueprint machines. This is a big development so they create a special brand for this, Lumograph, and sensibly add it to the distinctive blue Mars professional line. So now we have the J. S. Staedtler Mars Lumograph 1018.

You can see where this is going, eh? Unless you hang out around office supplies shops all day or work in the marketing department of J. S. Staedtler, (or write crap about pencils on a website), the hierarchy and significance of all these brands is becoming confusing. But not confusing enough apparently, because in 1950 Staedtler introduces their new pushbutton spring clutch line of leadholders which at the time are a big new direction for drafting leadholders. They need a good name to distinguish this new type of holder from the old type. The call them Technico. And they add it to the distinctive blue Mars professional line. So they give us the pencil immediately below, the J. S. Staedtler Mars Lumograph Technico 1001 and the imprint takes up the entire length of the goddam barrel and nobody cares.

Everyone except those in the marketing department of J. S. Staedtler still just calls the blue stuff Mars.