On Sunday, 1 March 2026 the London Spring Pen Show was held, once again at the Novotel London West, Hammersmith. It was a great day as always but this year, my experience was very different: I attended as a vendor for the first time. So rather than posting about my haul, (which was nil), this post will be to share a few reflections from a first time vendor.

The suggestion of booking a table was floated at our pen club, sometime last year. It seemed a good idea and an opportunity for me to sell some pens instead of constantly buying more. In the event, four of us chose to book a table to share. Doing this together immediately made it seem a lot less daunting.

In an initial burst of efficiency, I purchased a card reader device, to take payments at the show. But for the following few months, I thought only intermittently, about which of my pens I might try to sell. Being a hoarder and fountain pens being a prime hobby, I found it difficult to contemplate parting with my pens. Each had been acquired with no intention of selling. But I must have anticipated that they would be passed on to someone eventually as I had also hoarded most of their boxes.

It made sense to prune my accumulation of pens, even by a little. I was leaving it until nearer the time, to decide which to sell.

Putting a sale price on a pen, was harder than I had thought. I expected to sell most at a loss. I had a very loose formula, thinking how much I had paid for the pen; factoring in what its current replacement cost might be; and allowing a discount for it being a used (or pre-loved) pen. I could then adjust the resulting figure up or down to reflect how I felt. As well as my wish to hold on to my pens, I was also a bit despondent about losing money on them. But, as my wife cleverly pointed out, if you are not using the pens, you have already lost money on them.

As the show drew closer, I looked over my entire pen accumulation, and made a draft list of those that I might sell. I focused on the modern pens, as opposed to vintage. The majority of my vintage pens are Parkers from recent pen shows or eBay and I was not intending to sell those.

Seeing the pens listed was a good start. Conveniently the number was around 48. These could all be carried in two zip pen cases, each holding 24 pens. Over a few days, I wrote down my provisional sale prices.

How to decide which pens to sell? One way is to ask yourself whether you have used it in the past year, or even two years, and whether you are likely to use it again. I had quite a few in this category, but that did not always mean I wanted to sell them. A few of these pens caused me to feel quite sad whenever I remembered that they were on the sale list. Of course I could simply withdraw them from the sale, or adjust the price upwards a little, or keep them in the sale and hope that no-one bought them!

With pens listed and prices set, I put the pens in the zip cases. I then needed to write the prices on tags. I envisaged writing the prices and a few words of description such as nib size on the tags and to thread the strings through the pocket clip. The pens could be transported and displayed in the zip cases, but I feared that on opening them, I would find the price tags all tangled together. Alternatively I could bring the tags separately and attach them on arrival. No, I did not want to do that either. Then it dawned on me that I could type up a price list instead of labels. This seemed a much better option.

The next task was to gather all the available pen boxes. I had them for about 30 of the pens I was selling. In some of them, I found the purchase receipts and some of these dated back to the 90’s, 80’s or even 70’s. The boxes would conveniently fit into a small wheeled suitcase. With my suitcase of boxes and a ruck sack for the pens and other bits and pieces I could use public transport to get to the show and back.

I had made a checklist of items to bring. This included a bottle of ink and paper for people to try the pens; a jar for water and some kitchen roll to clean nibs after dipping; a large magnifying glass and a small loupe; the card reader, USB charging pack, calculator – and sandwiches for lunch.

On the big day, I arrived at the hotel soon after 07.30am. I was welcomed by Michael, one of the organisers who showed me into the hall where vendors were setting up. Our table was in a great location on a main thoroughfare but it soon became apparent that one table, shared between four of us, would leave each of us very limited room to display our stuff. Michael had anticipated this and offered to move us to a different spot where we could have more space. As luck would have it, he was able to move us up to an excellent nearby neighbouring position.

My three friends arrived and we set out our wares. Kee had brought a number of inking stations that she had created from Lego, in various attractive colours, as well as some pen trays and various pens. Elizabeth had a good selection of her modern pens, plus some leather journal covers. João had brought a selection of pens, both modern and vintage.

My good friend Jon of Pensharing was setting up his table nearby and came to say hello. He spotted two Leonardo pens that I was selling and promptly bought them both. My first pen show sales! This was also the first payment I had taken with my card reader device, which performed well all day. Jon also offered me some useful advice about pricing. In my eagerness not to overcharge, I had priced a few pens on the low side, a rookie error, and Jon suggested checking prices with eBay Sold listings.

Soon after this, my Cross Peerless also sold. It was lovely to see familiar friendly faces and always nice when people stopped by our table to say hi. Before the show I had been a little apprehensive, being a novice, at the prospect of possibly up to 900 or so people passing by our table. However, in the event, although there were plenty of people about, at no time were we overwhelmed by the numbers.

Early bird entrants started to circulate at 9am. I was told that there had been a long queue of them, waiting to be admitted. Then at 10am, the standard entry visitors came in and the numbers started to build up.

Having the company of three friends on our two tables, was such a plus. Between the four of us, we had quite a varied selection of goods to sell without displaying too much to take in. Also it meant that if one of us was away for a moment, the others could watch his or her table.

With a regular stream of visitors to our tables, including numerous people whom we knew, the time passed quickly. I had been fortunate to have a flurry of good sales in the morning. Before I knew it, mid-day was upon us. I had not budged from the table. Some of our pen club friends were meeting for a pub lunch nearby but we all had to forego this as it would have meant too much time away from our tables. I did take a short break around mid-afternoon to talk to Kirit Dal on his Aurora tables. He had helped me to chose an Aurora for a friend in Australia at the last show in October, and asked me how he had liked it. Kirit showed me some special new pens that he had created himself, from wood or Ultem in which he had installed Aurora nibs, having obtained Aurora’s blessing to do so, which must be a rare honour.

As time went on, I sold my Aurora Optima rossa with an oblique broad nib. This had been one of the hardest pens to decide to sell. A red Waterman Carene and a Sailor Pro-Gear also went, along with some lower value Lamys. It was particularly enjoyable to be able to sell a pen to someone new to fountain pens, to help them pick out something suitable and give them a few tips to help them get started.

By the time the show drew to a close around 4.00pm, I had sold a total of 14 pens (five to people I knew), ranging from a Lamy Safari to a Montblanc Heritage 1912. I was very satisfied with that. I had a new respect for the regular pro’s who carry such large numbers of pens to sell and those sellers who create such enticing table displays of pens, inks, notebooks and other ephemera. My own set up had not required much more effort than unzipping and opening my two pen cases.

After the show, the four of us adjourned to the hotel bar to relax over a drink before journeying to our respective homes. We had all had fun and agreed that it would be worth doing this again some time!

My only regret was that I had missed out on browsing all the other tables at the pen show and talking to the vendors. I had been too intent with tunnel vision, on minding my own table and not wanting to miss a sale. However I think that if I did this again, I would relax enough to do at least one lap of the tables at some point in the day and it was a shame not to have done so.

At the end of the day, I reflected on all the people who had come to see us and tried to list the names of all those I knew. It was a lot of conversations for one day and no wonder my brain was exhausted.

So that is over for now. It was a great and memorable experience and I can see why some people do this regularly. Both of my grandfathers were shopkeepers and so perhaps it is in my blood. I was happy to have made some sales. And for those pens that did not sell, I was happy to bring them home again to make another go of our relationship. It is a win-win situation. My thanks go to the organisers UK Pen Shows, to Michael for the extra table, to my co-sellers on our shared tables and to all those who came to see us and buy from our tables.