Ah, the good old Bic pen. Where would we be without you?
As a cheap and disposable tool capable of at least a fair enough amount of line weights, the Bic pen is one of the most indispensable tools that can be found in a designer or engineer’s toolkit. Sure—there are plenty of other great pens out there, but there’s no denying that for mere pennies apiece, Bic pens have earned their place on the Most Useful Basic Tools list…along with Post-It Notes, Sharpies, and standard copy paper.
But have you ever stopped to consider how a humble company—born out of the ashes of World War II in 1944—came to earn a place in the Museum of Modern Art with a mass produced product that costs pennies to produce? Or how, in less 50 years, the company managed to sell 100 billion pens?
In this great 10-minute documentary from the dudes over at Business Casual, we get a behind-the-scenes look at how Bic became the ink-spreadin’ powerhouse that it is today:
