Mechanical Pencil Day is here!

149 Comments / Mechanical pencils / By

It’s time to celebrate! The first ever Mechanical Pencil Day is here.

Why Today?

With the two most popular lead diameters being 0.5mm and 0.7mm the day was set to 05/07 (in the format used in UK, France, Italy, Spain, ..) that’s 07/05 (in the format used in USA, China, maybe Canada) or 5.7. (in the format used in Germany and other Central and Northern European countries). [1]I guess my personal mechanical pencil day should be 02/03 then 😛

To celebrate this special day there are, of course, prizes to be won.

Everyone’s Celebrating

CultPens was kind enough to supply more than £50 worth of prizes. They also agreed that I can split these between Bleistift.blog and Stationery.wiki. As part of their Mechanical Pencil Day celebrations they published a blog post from me on their blog yesterday (The picture are not form me, though). Other blogs give out prizes, too. I can’t list all the blogs that offer prizes, as I am not sure who exactly is taking part (this blog post was written before 5 July) but I know that Dave from Dave’s Mechanical Pencils has some fine pencils he’ll hand out. He’s the one who made me aware of Mechanical Pencil Day in the first place. Have a look at his blog for even more chances of winning fine writing gear than if you only take part in my giveaway.

How to Win

OK, here’s what’s on offer and how to win Bleistift’s giveaway prizes. By the way, I won’t force you to follow my YouTube, Facebook or Twitter account to take part in the draw for this giveaway. We’re all adults here and you should decide yourself who you want to follow. Instead of following my social media channels, all you have to do for a chance to win is to leave a comment at the bottom of this blog post.

Mechanical Pencil Day Prizes

..and here are the prizes. From left to right we have:

How will the winner be decided?

  1. I will use a random number generator to get a random number n. I will then check who wrote the nth comment.
  2. I will then check whether the nth comment is the first comment by a blog reader on this giveaway post. If it is the first comment by a blog reader on this post this reader will get the pencil of their choice. If the comment was written by myself or it was not the first comment I will go back to step one.
    This ensures that I won’t win a prize myself. It also means that you can comment as often as you want, but only one of your comments (the first one) will count for the prize draw.
  3. I will then repeat the first two steps until we have a winner for the second pencil. The second winner can choose from the remaining three pencils.
  4. Deadline is 11 July 2018 at 12:00 (noon) Zulu time (UTC), that’s 5:00 PDT [2]Tango, 8:00 EDT [3]Quebec, 13:00 BST [4]Alfa, 14:00 CEST [5]Bravo, 20:00 CST [6]Hotel, 21:00 KST/JST [7]India. [8]All these time zones remind me of the 1980s and early 1990s when MTV Europe was still free to watch. In Europe, you’re not really used to different time zones, but with MTV Europe being a … Continue reading
  5. I will contact you if you’ve won, but if I don’t hear back from you within a week the pencils might be given to someone else or used in another giveaway or contest.
  6. The two remaining pencils will be the prizes for the Stationery.wiki contest. You can, of course, take part in both, the Bleistift giveaway and the Stationery.wiki contest. In fact, I encourage you to.

Who can take part?

CultPens sent the pencils to me. I will send them to the winners using Royal Mail. They will usually send items to more or less all countries, but if you live on the ISS or in a research station in Antarctica and are not sure whether they deliver to you you can check on their Country Guide page.

I will send the pen using the cheapest method (this is a free blog after all, with no income from advertising). I think within the UK this is covered up to £20. Internationally the cover might be even higher. If you need the pen sent in a specific way let me know and I will see whether I can accomodate.

Good Luck.

References

References
↑1 I guess my personal mechanical pencil day should be 02/03 then 😛
↑2 Tango
↑3 Quebec
↑4 Alfa
↑5 Bravo
↑6 Hotel
↑7 India
↑8 All these time zones remind me of the 1980s and early 1990s when MTV Europe was still free to watch. In Europe, you’re not really used to different time zones, but with MTV Europe being a pan-European TV station programmes were announced in different time zones.

149 thoughts on “Mechanical Pencil Day is here!”

  3. Rob Holland

    Thank you for giving these away. I hope that you’re enjoying using your mechanical pencils today

  5. suvobrata ganguly

    hi! I am heavily into fountain pens, not really either a connoisseur or an aficionado of mechanical pencils. but am intrigued enough to be following you. not writing this in the hope of being the nth entry, just to let you know that you are doing a good job and that these pencils deserve more of (y)our love, attention.

  10. Anna B.

    Awesome giveaway! Would love to win any of these fine mechanical pencils (especially thay orange Monami)!

  12. Scribble Monboddo

    What a great idea! I quite like 1.18mm lead, but I’m not sure this event would have worked so well on the 18th of January – maybe Yard-o-Led can deal with that one themselves…

  14. Dave R.

    Regarding date formats and Mechanical Pencil Day, in Germany it would actually be 05.07. In Europe, only in Hungary would it be 07.05, and they even say “Hállo” for “goodbye”.

  20. James Harrigan

    i hope on am the nth commenter, but even if not, this is pretty cool. come for the contest, stay for the mechanical pencils.

  22. Gunther

    Happy Mechanical Pencil Day, Matthias! Please exclude me from the draw – I already have too many mechanical pencils 🙂

  24. Alana G.

    Hey, I saw your blog post on reddit! Thanks for running this giveaway! I’ve invested in a few GraphGear 500s and a Staedtler Mars Technico, but I’ve been wanting to try out other pencils and struggling with the funds to do so. I would LOVE to try out a rOtring some day!

  27. Evan M. Rosenberg

    That Messograf looks gorgeous. Thank you for this giveaway.

  29. gianni

    Thank you for your hard dedication to this hobby. Please bring us more and more tests!

  35. Brian Chu

    Cool contest, I hope it carries on!

    I have a pentel mechanical pencil that I have been using since drafting class in highschool (25 years ago) and it’s still working great. I use it in the garage to mark materials because sawdust and fountain pens don’t get along, but pencils are just fine.

  45. stuart elman

    Good morning from the US! What a great way to start a day to learn about the mechanical pencil day! I have three good pencils and several disposable ones. I have one Rotring 500, Shaeffer and Pilot MR pencil.

  48. Arne Robberechts

    Thank you for the giveaway, those are some very nice pencils!

  53. Ivan Corea

    Oh man, I love hexagonal pencils.
    Good luck to me and good luck everyone!

  56. Greg Williamson

    There’s less than an hour left of 05/07 here in Eastern Australia.

    What beautiful mechs! And a great idea. Love that MonAmi. Good luck everyone!

  57. Jorge

    Thank you for this awesome giveaway! I’m glad to be part kf the firs MPD 🙂

  61. Derrick

    I’m a high schooler and I’ve been standing by my Pentel GG1000 for several years but my school mates laugh at me for using such “fancy and expensive” stationary but I always rebuttal with “I’ve been using pencil and paper to write everyday my whole life so far so I might as well make it a good experience”. I’m glad to see that I’m not the only one who thinks this way and I’m excited for the possibility to grow my collection of mechanical pencils!

  63. Jack T

    Happy mechanical pencil day! Thank you for sharing your love of mechanical pencils with everyone.

  64. Joel

    That Cleo Mesograf is one impressive looking pencil. Thank you for organizing the giveaway!

  65. Huy

    Yay Go Mechanical Pencil day! 😀 Goood luck to everyone, these look like very nice pencils!

  67. tani P.

    Amazing and generous giveaway! I’d love any of those! Solid bloggin’, friend.

  68. Mary

    Thanks for doing the giveaway. My dad has on old Pilot mechanical pencil. His father brought it back from Japan when he was working for DWP and doing big time negotiations in Japan. The entire nose of the pencil retracts. It’s pretty cool, and my favorite mechanical pencil.

  71. Jason

    Awesome! I’ll have to mark mechanical pencil day in my calendar from now on, it’ll be like another pi day!

  74. Jason F

    Thanks for doing this giveaway, and thanks for making it possible to win without allowing an app to read and post tweets to my timeline etc. etc. Mechanical pencils don’t get the love they deserve!

  81. Donovan Peterson

    Happy Mechanical Pencil day! Thanks for the opportunity to win a pencil.

  86. Oscar

    Man that cult pencil looks good. Thanks for sharing your love of mechanical pencils with the world!

  90. Olwyn

    I deeply love my Rotring 600 and feel it can do no wrong! But I’m unfamiliar with all the other models you’ve shown. I’m wondering now if my Rotring would enjoy some company?

    I also particularly enjoy the Rotring Tikky leads. Wish they came in other grades besides HB, though.

    Thank you for your very enjoyable blog. I read every posting and thank you for the giveaway.

  93. Evan

    A pencil as interesting as the messograph, and in .7? Absolutely wonderful.

    Thank you for the giveaway!

  94. Evan

    A pencil as interesting as the messograf, and in .7? Absolutely wonderful.

    Thank you for the giveaway!

  95. Michael Corry

    I’m more of wooden pencil fan but I like the look of the rotring

  96. EH

    My sister insists that now that I use fountain pens, I need to up my game when it comes to mechanical pencils. Have to admit, these look super sweet. Thanks for sharing.

  103. Montalbanix

    I follow your blog a long time ago, thank you for teaching us the world of pencils

  104. Francis O'Reilly

    First time I’ve found this blog, via Cult Pens. Looking forward to reading more!

  105. Sandra Carrigan Holeman

    Hi, all of these mechanical pencils are gorgeous! Thanks for the chance to be a winner!

  108. Mark Bruskin

    This is fun… I have several mech pencils that I still use regularly… a Pelikan 800 and a Rotring 700. Time to add a new one to the party

  110. Peter Short

    Is this just another made up day to sell stationary? Oh well, I certainly like it better than those ‘other’ stationary days…….

  111. Christine Kearns

    I love both mechanical pencils and wood pencils ✏️
    I am excited for this new day.

  114. Alek N.

    Beautiful pencils 😀 Thanks for the chance to win one of these 🙂

  118. Manuel FS

    I just found out that today’s Mechanical Pencil’s day. Amazing.
    I would like to participate as well.
    Cheers!

  119. Paul

    The orange one looks really nice. Does anyone know if the grip is slippery? Thanks for giving these away!

  125. Jontan

    Mechanicals have always been the best in my mind, and not those ones you buy in a pack of 30 haha. This giveaway is super cool thank you for sharing! I personally only have a kurutoga roulette silver and a kurutoga advanced red.

  128. Keith McCleary

    My personal preference is for the larger diameters, but that’d make Mechanical Pencil day on 11/9 or 9/11. 0.7 works for sure though. I just placed a CultPens order after reading the email and blog post.

    Thanks for the giveaway.

  132. K

    I have just found your blog through Cult Pens. I really like your content and thank you for the giveaway!

  133. Dave McB

    The Cult pencil is just gorgeous! Can’t believe I hadn’t seen it before.

  139. Walt Patterson

    Bought a Kuru Toga for my granddaughter. Liked it so much I kept it for myself! Shameless but happy!

  141. Anna P.

    Thank you for the chance to win one of your mechanical pencils. Each one looks very interesting.

  146. Penelope M Marshall-Kalina

    I guess we all get the point one way or another but the best point is the one on the mechanical pencil in my hand as i write my best wishes to all my friends worldwide who appreciate the beauty of these tiny but excellent, precision made examples of engineering at its finest. Get the point?

  147. Carol Jones

    Love my mechanical pencils and would love to expand my collection. I use them as an engineer everyday.

  149. Pingback: Mechanical Pencil Day – Lexikaliker

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