To many of us, we associate the word Reynolds with ballpoint pen. Many of us are of the impression that Reynolds is the inventor of the ballpoint pen. This is not the case, though. There were persons other than Reynolds who invented the ballpoint pen. Way back in 1888, somebody already thought of the idea although the idea never went into the production stage. Later, the 1930’s, a Czech invented a different kind of ballpoint pen and in fact manufactured the product. Again, in the early 1940’s, a Hungarian journalist invented another version of the ballpoint pen.

One may ask: “What role then did Reynolds play in the ballpoint pen bonanza years ago?”

Let me start by giving a profile of Milton Reynolds. Born in Minnesota in 1892, Reynolds was a high school drop-out who became a millionaire at age 26. Reynolds then was an independent tire dealer at age 20. Four years after he became a millionaire, Reynolds lost all his money. This is a preview of Reynolds subsequent business ventures which ended in three bankruptcies. At one time he became a stock market speculator but ended in financial disaster in the 1929 stock market crash. Reynolds’ dominant business trait was his boldness to enter into risky ventures. He bounced back fast after one business fell after another and entered into other business ventures as if he was just changing his clothes. In short, his threshold for stress and disappointment is incredibly high.

Reynolds is a type of businessman who pursued relentlessly any business idea that he thinks will make money. An example is his aggressiveness in pushing the promotion of the ballpoint pen.

The story goes that before 1945 when Reynolds started producing commercial ballpoint pen, Ladisla Biro, a Hungarian journalist had given the patent for American production to a US company by the name of Eversharp, Inc. and to Eberhard Faber sometime in May 1945. However, the American patentees did not go into commercial production.

In the meantime, Reynolds who earlier was already attracted to the commercial potentials of ballpoint pen found a way to develop another kind of ballpoint pen which he eventually succeeded to register for patent. While the Biro-invented pen provided the ink to the ball through capillary action – Reynolds modified the procedure by having the ink supplied through gravity flow.

After he got a patent for his ballpoint pen, Reynolds formed a company known as Reynolds International Pen at US$26,000.00. He immediately started production. His first-day production was 70 pens. Reynolds immediately tapped Gimbels Department Store in Manhattan to sell his ballpoint pen. On October 29, Reynolds ballpoint pen was displayed for sale for US$12.50 at the Gimbels Department Store. The pen created an unexpected great interest from the public. Gimbels created business history when it sold US$100,000.00 worth of Reynolds ballpoint pen in one day. Unbelievably, during the first three months the Reynolds ballpoint pen sold in 60,000 retail outlets all around the United States and 37 foreign countries two million ballpoint pens with a total revenue of US$5.7 million, and a net income of US$1.6 million.

Upon seeing the Reynolds’ success in the sale of ballpoint pen, Eversharp and Eberhard Faber also went into production in December, 1945. Even the South American subsidiary of Eversharp and Eberhard Faber shipped ballpoint pens to the United States sometime in March, 1945 to compete with the Reynolds ballpoint pen. Too late! Other companies also entered the ballpoint pen market until it showed signs of saturation in 1946. True to his business nature, Reynolds shifted to another business venture.

This story illustrates the importance of business timing. Despite business blunders that Reynolds committed in his other business ventures, his extraordinary business sense in the ballpoint pen bonanza is astounding. His performance in the ballpoint pen industry is indeed historic.

Similarly, in the Philippines setting, our exporters may have committed many business blunders but certainly there is at least one instance when a business decision made at the right time benefitted the exporting company. Also, the case of Reynolds is presented here to encourage, inspire, and challenge our starting exporters that they may stumble along the way but they should not quit their businesses but rise again and look for other business opportunities.

Have a joyful day!