Announcing Our New Retail Store!

This past Tuesday we made an announcement during our podcast that we are opening a retail store here in Appleton, WI.  After over a year of searching for the right spot and several recent very busy months of organizing, we have located and procured a perfect spot in downtown Appleton to open a pen store!

If you’ve been listening to our podcasts for a while, you’ve probably noted a recent interest in large, bulky display cases. I picked up three of them at an auction a couple of months ago (one 1920’s Parker Lucky Curve, one 1916 Aikin Lambert, and one 1918 Wahl Eversharp glass display case), and two weekends ago we traveled over two thousand miles round trip to go and pick up a vintage 1950’s Parker lighted display case and several greeting card displays.

Normally, people would pass this type of activity from us as just our own special breed of crazy, and while that is partly true, the Aikin and Lucky Curve displays don’t fit down the stairwell to the pen room, and the six foot long Parker case absolutely doesn’t! These four vintage displays will be the highlight of the pen portion of the new store, and there will be a number of other cases for ink, leather, books, paper, and more.

Since the space was handed over in less then optimal condition to start, we are replacing the poor bamboo flooring with carpet, adding bookcases for ink (thanks carpenter Joe!), and doing some general cleanup. The ceiling is a laid with nice copper tin tiles, and it is a very bright space. Here’s a before of one section of the store:

View towards the front of the store

View towards the front of the store, note damaged flooring

the lime/mint green paint just didn’t do it for us, so we painted a delightful blue which really accents the tin ceiling well. The floor was partly missing in the front, so the only reasonable option was to pull it up completely and start fresh. Here’s how it sits today:

Walls Painted!

Walls Painted!

We will have a separate section of the store devoted to paper products, a wall of ink, as well as repar supplies and more. Basically everything we carry online, and a bunch of stuff we don’t! If you are anywhere near the area, we welcome you as a guest to our new location, slated for opening Saturday, November 16th! More pictures as the store progresses!  Store location is:

Anderson Pens
10 E. College ave., Suite 112A
Appleton, WI  54911

Cheers!
Brian & Lisa