In my blog post about Simbalion’s Supreme Quality Pencil 88 I mentioned Keyroad, a Chinese stationery chain that I have also mentioned in several previous blog posts. Today I want to show you some photos I took in and around Keyroad stores, most from Keyroad’s store on Fuzhou road.
The stationery on offer in Keyroad is not as exciting and high-end as what you could get in Meriful, but unfortunately Meriful on Fuzhou road closed down, or moved, in any case: I couldn’t find it on Fuzhou road. There are Meriful stores in other parts of Shanghai, but I haven’t visited them.
Keyroad’s focus isn’t directly stationery. Their target group seems to be teenage girls, but because of this they have “designed” stationery, while common stationery stores tend to sell functional stationery.
There is of course some overlap: you’d find plain pencils as well as erasers with cartoon pictures on in either type of store, but in Keyroad you’d find lots of colourful as well as imported stationery.You’ll find the likes of Lamy Safari or Parker Pens, but imported stationery tends to be prohibitively expensive.
I found more Keyroads than on previous visits – in new locations and also in locations where, previously, there have been similar shops.
Price: May 2013
Exchange rates: June 2013
Wow, Hero ink is just 3.5 yuans there. That’s like a 50 cents increase in the past 12 years. I like this kind of posts, I never had any stationery chain near where lived when I was in China…
3.5 kuai isn’t much more than 50 cents, so it must have been really cheap in the past …on the other hand: it ‘s still very cheap compared to other items.
I just had a look at your blog. The photos are amazing!
Thanks for the compliment (I have a case of photo OCD that I somehow…have to take picture outdoor).
I meant to say 0.5 kuai increase. It was 3 kuai back in mid-late 90s (I was in the far south so the price is generally a little higher than how it is in the central/northern parts) and since it’s so cheap, I also used it with brushes.
…outdoor and with the lens wide open. Very nice.
In my opinion the situation in Shanghai is quite extreme: there are articles that have western prices and articles that have prices from the past. I’m not sure whether the ink prices will go up, but I think they’d go up very soon if fountain pens were more popular.