Now, we all know that Tiffany is a fancy-goods company, not a pen maker. And we might also know that Tiffany buys its Tiffany-branded pens from quality pen makers. I own this vintage Tiffany pen made by W. S. Hicks:
More recently, in the 1990s, Tiffany marketed a version of the Pelikan M800 that it called the Atlas, with a slightly modified clip and cap crown design and, of course, a TIFFANY imprint on the nib. Which brings us to the briarwood pen. It has a TIFFANY imprint on the cap band, but when you turn the cap around to see the back, you’ll find a DIPLOMAT GERMANY imprint on that side of the band. And there’s also a DIPLOMAT imprint on the nib.
So, Tiffany has decided to stick with the precision of German engineering and the quality craftsmanship that can only come from skilled German hands; after Pelikan, they went to Diplomat, another well known German pen manufacturer.
But I wonder if they knew what they were getting. Y’see, I noticed something a little odd about the pen when I first laid eyes on it. The clip, umm, where have I seen that clip — and that cap crown, come to think of it — before? Could it have been here, maybe?
By gum, that do look familiar, don’t it. And now that I think about it, the section profile is the same, too. But perhaps most telling of all is the nib. Here are the nibs from the briarwood pen and the ribbed pen above:
Notice that W-shaped motif in the imprint? It’s a Platinum trademark. But Platinum is a Japanese company! Hey, what about the DIPLOMAT GERMANY imprint on the cap band? Well, fans, it doesn’t say MADE IN GERMANY, now, does it? Clever Diplomat-cy, eh?
So, the exquisite German quality that Tiffany bought really came from Japan. Via Germany, with a markup. I wonder how much they could have saved by going directly to Platinum…