Project book

EXPLORING THE HIDDEN VALUES IN EVERYDAY OBJECTS An exploration into improving the value of the Bic Cristal pen

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FOREWORD This project book aims to guide you through my major project and explain and demonstrate the research and decisions that shaped my final outcomes.

The aim of this project is to explore the hidden values in everyday objects. To illustrate an example of how this may be undertaken, I have chosen to use the Bic Cristal pen to demonstrate how this may be undertaken.

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CONTENTS 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26

Project aims My approach The problem Sales figures The solution 70 Years of the Bic Cristal History of the Bic Cristal Changes to the Bic Capability Life of a Bic

30 32-35 36-39 40-43 44-47 48 50-55 56-61 62-67

Key elements Quality Ownership Functionality Feel Elements to develop Development of feel Development of quality Development of ownership

70-81 82-85 86 88 90 92

Case studies Existing marketing schemes Press release Bic awards Packaging Wooden Bic

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Strategy Implementation Conclusions

PROJECT AIM To explore the hidden values in everyday objects Everyday objects are often overlooked and ubiquitous. The Bic Cristal is an iconic product that is incredibly developed and well considered. With an estimated 15million sales a day, it has a huge global market, yet is globally unnoticed, frequently lost, broken or stolen.

With increasing amounts of disposable objects coming to the global market, sustainability and global resources may both be further damaged if we don’t utilise these products to their full potential.

Stopping disposable objects may be hard, however by increasing the perceived value of everyday objects, users are more likely to utilise these products to their full potential. Even small changes that improve the perceived value of such a global product such as the Bic Cristal can make large improvements to reduce unnecessary waste.

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APPROACH Bic has been used as an example of how adding perceived value to an everyday object may be undertaken My approach has been as a consultant who specialises in adding value to existing products through design changes.

My brief: what if Bic wanted to improve the perceived value to the Bic Cristal to increase product and brand awareness and maintain future sales.

As an exercise to highlight the product, I am not suggesting all of my pens are manufactured. Many of my pens have been used as an illustration to highlight elements of the Bic Cristal that could be further developed.

My designs have varying levels of viability, some are intended purely as show pieces to start conversations and highlight elements of the pen. These may be produced in very limited numbers. Others can be mass produced in large numbers as a limited edition into the mass market.

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PROBLEM - IT’S TOO UBIQUITOUS The biggest problem for the Bic Cristal is also its greatest success. Selling millions of products per day, the simple Bic has become too ubiquitous.

Due to the large number of these products in everyday life, they have become unnoticed and uncared for.

The sociologist Umberto Eco was quoted to say “The Bic Cristal is the sole example of socialism in practice... it cancels out all the rules of ownership and social distinction”.

The pen’s ubiquitousness and standardisation make it liable to be copied and imitated. Combined with little to no conscious acknowledgement for the product, this slowly degrades Bic’s brand image and sales.

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SALES FIGURES Bic still remains the number one seller of stationary products in the European, African and Latin American markets, as can be seen by their 2013 annual reports.

The Bic stationary division lost 14.6million Euros of income between 2012-2013 This solely is not down to the Bic Cristal, however as one of their best selling products, this may be a large contribution.

Improving these sectors will help Bic recover from these loses and improve this division of Bic.

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SOLUTION Phase 1 - Highlight Bic first need to highlight the Cristal and its design by using the high end material pens and making them visible through press releases.

Phase 2 - Engage Bic then need to release a campaign as a ‘Bic award’. This should allow members of the public to nominate people who epitomise the Bic brand and its approach and attitudes.

The winners of these awards should be awarded a brass Bic. These everyday people could be anyone (teachers, artists, valued members of the community etc).

By engaging users and allowing high quality Bics into the public, they will improve the perceived value of everyday Bics Phase 3 - Implement While the campaign is underway the Personal and the Scale pens should be released to be mass market as a limited edition. These will create an interaction between the user and the pen, with the aim to raise awareness of both the Bic Cristal and the Bic brand and encourage people to use their pen for its full potential life.

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70 YEARS OF THE BIC CRISTAL 2020 marks the 70th birthday of the Bic Cristal. It is intended that this project be used as an awareness campaign at this time to highlight the quality and reliability of the world’s best selling ballpoint pen and ensure a positive future.

While the Bic Cristal still has fantastic sales, with cheap imitations and poor quality look a likes, it is important for Bic to highlight that theirs is the original and best product. This will help maintain and highlight Bic’s brand image and increase positive perceptions of their products and improve perceived value.

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HISTORY OF THE BIC CRISTAL The Bic Cristal was released in France in 1950 by Marcel Bich and his company Bic. In 1959 Bich brought the pen to the American market: the Bic pen was selling with the slogan “writes first time, every time.�

The design was inspired by the simple wooden pencil. They both share the hexagonal profile which gives the pen three grip points and makes it easy to use.

In 1961 the stainless steel ball was replaced with much harder tungsten carbide which is vitrified by heat, Each tungsten ball is ground down to an accuracy 0.1 micro metre It is estimated that 15 million Bic Cristals are sold everyday.

The Bic Cristal is the best selling pen in the world; the 100 billionth was sold in September 2006.

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CHANGES TO THE BIC The Bic Cristal has undergone constant updates to reduce cost and provide upgrades in its performance. The scale of these details often go unseen and unnoticed by many.

One of the biggest changes for the Bic Cristal was the addition of a hole in the cap which was added in 1991 to reduce the risk of suffocation.

The Nib of the pen has undergone four changes from its original design. The first caps were brass and sat flush with the barrel of the pen. This was changed to plastic and Bics now use an indented cap. However with the ability to purchase new cartridges the nibs have changed again to allow for easy removal.

A small hole has been drilled in the barrel to allow the air pressure to equalise inside the pen and improve ink flow.

Also the plug at the back of the pen has changed from a solid plug which can easily be removed and reinserted into the pen to a smaller plug with ribs that makes use of being formed to the plastic barrel to make it harder to remove.

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BIC CRISTAL CAPABILITY The Bic Cristal is surprisingly capable and much of this is down to the ensured quality in every pen. To better understand these I quickly created some campaign posters that highlight these elements.

Each Bic has enough ink that it can write for up to 2 miles.

Each pen has a Tungsten Carbide roller ball, as hard as diamond and manufactured to a precision of +/- 0.001mm.

It has been calculated that every Bic Cristal could be used to write to speeds up to 429mph.

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LIFE OF A BIC The Bic has several elements that contribute to its ubiquity.

Theft/loss: Due to the uniformity of most Bics many people do not intentionally steal Bics, however either assume they are theirs or have been left behind and are needed at that moment in time. It is easy to lose a Bic as you can never identify your own and if place on a table, many people overlook them until they have realised their pen has been lost.

Lack of attachment: Each person will use hundreds of disposable pens in their life and this is part of the nature of disposable products, because of this people do not form attachments to these products and take little conscious care of them.

Unconscious ownership: Conscious ownership would help tackle both of the areas above. Most of the issues relating to the reason a Bic won’t be used to its full potential comes down to the fact that most users don’t see the product as a valuable product, therefore little care and awareness is applied to its life.

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Development

KEY ELEMENTS To help me understand how to add perceived value to products I selected elements that increased perceived value of objects.

This came down to four elements Quality: This can involve the materials used for the object or the details given to the manufacture and construction of the object Ownership: This is likely to be people’s connection to an object through its acquisition or use.

Functionality: This is what the object enables the user to do and additional functions that the object has.

Feel: This can be the weight of an object, the material feel for or the feel of parts or movements.

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QUALITY Quality is a very broad term, however what is meant by this, is the certainty that the parts will perform reliably and have been accurately produced. Quality does not necessarily have to be expensive. It can also relate to workmanship, quality of the materials and manufacturing or finishing of an object.

A quality product will have a high perceived value because the user can see that with the care that has gone into its creation, it will perform reliably as it has been well considered and designed.

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HOW QUALITY IS APPLICABLE FOR PENS Quality can help pens be perceived as much more valuable as it ensures that the product will perform well.

By showing quality in a product, this can transfer to how the user perceives the object, if it looks like care has been given to its manufacture and production, they will believe that the pen is going to fulfil its function well and be reliable, therefore more valuable.

If pens can show the quality that has gone into its creation, by how well and reliably it performs, due to using quality parts, materials and appearances users will take much more care of the pen as it has a higher perceived value to them.

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OWNERSHIP Ownership of objects can give them a large perceived value. Ownership is based on an a specific object for the memories that have been created with it. This gives it a high perceived value because of the connection the user and that specific object have due to the experiences they have been through or the importance of memories that the object signifies.

This is particularly difficult for objects that are sold in high volumes and are standardised and uniform. It is very hard to ownership to objects that are exactly the same as everyone elses especially if it is impossible to identify your own object.

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HOW OWNERSHIP IS APPLICABLE FOR PENS By encouraging users to form memories and personal attachments, pens can be much more important to the user. If users can form ownership of the pen they will perceive it to be a much higher value as it has an emotional value to them. This will increase the likelihood of the user taking care of the pen.

The addition of the changes I have made to the Personal pen allows the user to identify their own pen to promote ownership of that specific object and the Scale pen to highlight the use each pen has provided and how far it has written.

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FUNCTIONALITY Functionality of a product can give it a large perceived value, due to the ease of use and performance the object gives the user. For an object to have good functionality, it does not necessarily need many functions, just to perform its functions incredibly well and be reliable in doing so.

If the functionality is high users will see this object as useful and valuable to help them achieve a task. This perceived value will be even higher if the object does a function which seemingly only it can achieve. This object will then become invaluable at helping users achieve their task.

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HOW FUNCTIONALITY IS APPLICABLE FOR PENS The functionality of a pen is obvious, it must perform its task of writing well . The pen must reliably perform, not leak and the ink must be of a good quality to provide good application as well as being comfortable to write with.

Functionality for a pen mostly comes down to the manufacturing and the quality of its parts and reliability.

As a Bic pen only has one designed function it is expected that it will perform this task.

However if it repeatedly does so with no faults it is likely to have a much longer life span allowing for other elements to be added to improve perceived value.

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FEEL The feel of a product is incredibly important as this is a contact point between the user and the product.

By making a product feel deliberate and high quality through weight, resistance, balance or texture, users are naturally more likely to perceive the product as higher quality.

The feeling of a product should never inhibit its function, however if certain features are made too easy and have no resistance or are loose or light, this may negatively effect users perceptions of the object.

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HOW FEEL IS APPLICABLE FOR PENS The feel of a pen is exceptionally important as it is a handheld product that has to be held to be used.

The feel of a pen depends very much on weight, balance and textures of the materials.

By changing the weight of the pen, this can vastly increase the perceived value of it. This is generally because heavier materials tend to be higher quality, however this doesn’t always have to be the case as long as there is weight to the pen.

This weight must be used in moderation, as if it is overly heavy or is poorly balanced this will effect its functionality and usability.

Other elements can easily be explored such as material feel. Exploration of smooth and rough textures can largely affect the use of a pen.

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ELEMENTS TO DEVELOP Feel The feel of the pen is very important for its perceived value. There are a number of ways I can develop the feel, however I will mainly aim to do this through material feel and weight.

Quality The perceived value of the pen largely depend on the quality of the pen. This doesn’t necessarily have to be expensive, but quality elements need to be highlighted.

Ownership By allowing users to create memories or personal attachments to their pens this will create a much higher perceived value, but will also create conscious owners of the products.

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DEVELOPMENT OF FEEL I wanted to see if by adding weight and changing the feel of the pen, it would change peoples perceived value of the pen. By adding a variety of heavier parts to the pen I asked people whether or not they felt these pens felt more valuable based purely on weight.

Changing the weight definitely affected people’s perceptions of the pen. However where the weight was located also affected how people wanted to use the pen. A high centre of gravity was generally said to be better for playing with the pen and had a ‘wiggle factor’ and encouraged people to play with the pen, but a lower centre of gravity was better for writing and use.

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DEVELOPMENT OF FEEL To try an change the feel of the Bic I explored the textures of the pen body.

Knowing that knurling was often used to add extra grip and feel to objects, I wanted to see how this would effect the Bic. I tried four different types of texture on the pen and saw how people reacted to it.

Many said it devalued the pen as this was something similar to fake imitation pens.

However most preferred the larger knurl.

To see if these textures would have the same effect I added them to brass. This instantly made a large different and the knurl made the pen feel more instrumental and precise.

The textures did make a difference, but not on the standard materials used on the pen.

If higher value materials are used, this may be a viable option to add value, but not on a standard pen.

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CAUSED BEHAVIOUR CHANGE The reaction to developing the feeling of the pens was largely dependant on the person testing it. The majority of people said the knurling on the plastic pens devalued the Bic and made it feel more like an imitation.

However once transferred to metal, most said that the knurl made the pen feel more instrumental and gave the feeling of accuracy.

Preferences on weight and positioning of the weight varied largely due to personal taste. The varying feel of the pens was largely noticed and a large number of people mentioned that the different weights of pens would make them better at certain tasks such as writing or sketching. Generally the heavier pens were preferred for writing and the lighter variants with additional weight such as the brass tips were preferred for sketching.

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DEVELOPMENT OF QUALITY I wanted to add material quality to the Bic by changing the materials it was made from. I wanted to highlight the beauty of the design of the Bic Cristal and the quality of each pen, which is usually lost within a inexpensive object. To understand perceived quality and realise how to improve it, I wanted to see the reaction to a higher quality Bic. Brass and silver were used because they are typically materials used for decoration on high end objects and are both eye catching.

Much of the response was about how the Bic looked once it had been made out of higher quality materials. Once further questioned it was the design that typically stood out, not the aesthetic qualities of the material, which I believe to be a success in highlight the design and the quality of the pen proving that the design is suitable to be a much higher quality object.

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DEVELOPMENT OF QUALITY The Bic hexagonal design was originally inspired by the standard pencil The higher value material pens are quite obviously going to add value to the Bic as they are higher value materials. Making the Bic out of wood vastly changes the material feel and perceptions of the pen.

Pencils are typically made out of Cedar wood and this lightweight material has much the same weight feel to it as the standard Bic, however the softness and warmth of the wood completely transforms the feel of the pen and although the material is of a similar quality, does make the pen feel a more quality product.

If Bic wished to continue with releasing additional variants of the Bic Cristal and with increasing environmental pressure, Bic could release an alternative to the Bic with a wooden body. However this would be a rather large deviation from the classic design and clear body.

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CAUSED BEHAVIOUR CHANGE By changing the materials, the Bic Cristal can be made into a valuable object. By doing this, elements of the pens design and quality of its parts can be highlighted and can completely change the perception of the pen.

It is hoped that these large changes will draw attention to the Bic. While these quality pens are not intended for the mass market, as part of the campaign they can draw attention and attract peoples eye much more easily than smaller incremental changes. This awareness of the campaign is critical to attracting attention to the Bic and the Bic brand.

Lower cost material changes can also largely change the feel and perception of the pen.

Changing the pen body to wood allows it to feel more of a natural product.

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DEVELOPMENT OF OWNERSHIP To create emotional attachment to pens and highlight the capability of each pen to write 2 miles, the scale has been added to the side of these pens to allow users to relate to both the amount of use they can get out of each pen and also the amount of use they personally have had with each pen.

The most likely time for any disposable product to be destroyed or lost is at the start of its life as users have little to no attachment to it. As the use increases the user can relate to the amount of time and distance they have used that pen for, therefore creating an attachment and encouraging them to use it for the entirety of its life.

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DEVELOPMENT OF OWNERSHIP The main issues facing the Bic Cristal is that all Bic’s look the same. By giving the Bic a matte section that can be written on, this allows each user to completely personalise each pen, making it identifiable and personal. This in turn encourages a personal attachment and ownership of the pen.

Once the pen has been written on, due to the rough texture, the ink is permanent (even from another Bic Cristal). This makes it a lot less likely that Pens will be accidentally taken and if misplaced, they will be easily identifiable to the owner. This area also allows users to be creative and express themselves on their pen.

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CAUSED BEHAVIOUR CHANGE Both the Personal and Scale pens help facilitate an emotional attachment between user and product through personalisation and use.

By helping users identify their own products that they have personalised and making them relate to the level of use they have had with a product, this hopefully encourages users to notice their products more and take care of them as well as using them for the full length of time.

By giving both of these pens the ability to gain personal connections, whether it be through personalisation or use, it is hoped to elevate the pens status and a consciously owned product and ensure a longer product life.

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Marketing

CASE STUDIES The Bic Cristal is sold worldwide in over 160 countries. Sales figures are still high, but are dropping.

To maintain the success of the Bic Cristal, Bic must take action and highlight the Cristal as the archetypal ballpoint pen.

To help understand how to do this I have looked closely at Moleskine and Zippo who are both archetypes of their markets.

Both of these brands, while different in several ways, have elements that are similar to Bic and the Bic Cristal.

I wanted to understand how both of these brands have portrayed themselves and highlighted the qualities that are similar to those of Bic.

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MOLESKINE CASE STUDY The Moleskine notebook is the heir to a notebook used by artists and thinkers over the past two centuries: among them Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, and Bruce Chatwin. A simple black rectangle with rounded corners, an elastic page-holder, and an internal expandable pocket. Produced for over a century by a small French bookbinder that supplied the stationery shops of Paris.

In 1986, the manufacturer, a small family-owned company in the French city of Tours, went out of business. But in 1997, a small Milanese publisher brought the notebook back to life.

Moleskine has since become the archetypal brand in notebooks. Moleskine relies purely on the word of mouth and brand visibility while their products are being used, to promote their brand.

Due to the heritage of this type of notebook and the people who previously used it, the Moleskine has become an iconic design that is seen to be an important creative instrument.

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MOLESKINE CASE STUDY Bic can use Moleskine as a good example of making a produce and brand synonymous in a market area.

One of the key attributes that gives Moleskine a quality association is those who have historically used them.

The Bic Cristal has been used by a wide variety of artists, scientists, writers, designers, politicians and business people.

If Bic can use this for the Cristal and subtly highlight this, this will help with brand image.

Bic also need to further improve their brand visibility by continuing to engage and highlight brand ambassadors and everyday people who hold the essence of the Bic brand.

While I do not propose a rebrand of Bic, I feel the way the Bic Cristal is presented in its packaging could also be improved. The Bic will always be a disposable product, however the visuals used on packaging and presentation of the pen could be improved, refined and simplified to give a more quality appearance. If done sensitively will not impact Bics brand image, but add an undertone of quality as Moleskine has done.

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ZIPPO CASE STUDY The Zippo lighter was conceived by the Zippos founder, George G. Blaisdel in 1930. When Mr. Blaisdell watched a friend awkwardly using a cumbersome Austrian-made lighter produced by IMCO. Late in 1932, Blaisdell decided to refashion the Austrian lighter. He retained the chimney design which protected the flame under adverse conditions. The first Zippo lighter, was produced in early 1933 and sold for $1.95 each. Every Zippo comes with an unconditional lifetime guarantee with free repairs.

Beginning in 1939, Zippo ceased production of lighters for consumer markets and dedicated all manufacturing to the U.S. military. With a strong presence and the majority of the US military carrying a Zippo lighter, Zippo became an American Icon, contributing to its success and global recognition today.

The Zippo brand enjoys a huge level of global recognition. Zippo state that the brand has an unaided awareness of 98/100 people.

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ZIPPO CASE STUDY The Zippo lighter has become the iconic refillable lighter. Bic can use the Zippo brand as a good example of a product that has become iconic and archetypal lighter in a busy market space.

Zippo has succeeded by producing a reliable, trusted and quality product.

If it wasn’t for the Zippo’s reliability, it would not have been so widely adapted by the military, giving it its iconic status. The Bic Cristal has many of these attributes and they can provide much of the same benefits if harnessed. Bic can use the reliability of the Cristal to promote who and how it is widely used. If highlighted these can be a valuable asset in raising awareness around the pen.

Even though each Bic Cristal is disposable, as a product range they must have been used by a vast range of incredibly important people and due to their reliability in an incredibly varied situations and circumstances. If Bic can highlight and tell this story, they can improve the perception of the product and demonstrate the versatility of the Cristal.

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CASE STUDY CONCLUSIONS Moleskines are different from Bic as they are a high end product with a relatively high price point. Moleskines are ultimately disposable and encourage creativity like the Bic. However by taking small elements from Moleskines approach, Bic can further develop their brand image to add quality.

Moleskine make use of their heritage and those who have famously used books like theirs.

For Zippo much like the Bic Cristal, quality has given it a trusted brand image. If Bic can use the reliability of the Cristal and the instances it has been used, in the same way Zippo have, they can highlight this.

If Bic can highlight the reliability of the Cristal and the scenarios it has been used in, like Zippo, it will be become better perceived.

By using small elements from both Zippo and Moleskine and subtly applying them to the Bic Cristal for its advertising and marketing, Bic stand a much higher chance of promoting the Bic Cristal as the number one choice of ballpoint pen.

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EXISTING MARKETING SCHEMES To celebrate the 60th birthday of the Bic Cristal, Bic produced a limited edition gold and silver coloured plastic Bic Cristal.

These Bics’ were released into the mass market. Even though this is a celebration of the Bic being in the market for 60 years, it was also to highlight the pens and make them more desirable due to the fact they were different.

To a certain extent this did work as people were interested in the pens as they were unlike other Bics’.

However this is a very direct approach for Bic to take in the mass market to highlight their pens and could be done in a more subtle and clever way for the mass market.

Larger production numbers may also be needed to increase the reaction from the public.

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EXISTING MARKETING SCHEMES Bic Cristal story was used between October 25th 2014 and November 15th 2014.

The campaign was to engage people with the Bic brand by allowing them to upload their stories of how they used their Bic. In return for every story that someone uploaded, Bic would donate 100 pens to a school in need.

From the numbers provided, Bic’s attempt only got 207 people to participate.

This proves that Bic are trying to engage people in their brand and support creativity and ownership of their products. However the medium in which they did so was not successful.

People will not take time out to engage with the brand, however if done passively and by letting people make their own connections, this may be more successful.

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PRESS RELEASE To further the increase the awareness of Bic and the Bic Cristal, a small range of simple advertisement posters should be used, highlighting ‘Everyday Quality’.

These posters must highlight the quality of each Bic and its capability. These advertisements alone will not improve the perceived value of the Bic Cristal, but alongside the release of the Scale and Personal pen, this will further help raise awareness of the Bic Cristal.

The advertisements need to be placed in a wide range of everyday articles and magazines. These magazines should be business, science, art, culture, news or informative and not lifestyle magazines as Bic does not want to advertise in an area that is not consistent with their brand image.

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BIC AWARDS The Bic awards should be introduced as a marketing campaign that raises awareness of those who represent qualities of the Bic brand.

These awards should be done on a nomination process from the general public and chosen by Bic. Not only will this allow Bic to be associated with those making changes in the world, but also highlights the culture of Bic. Winners of the Bic awards should be presented with a full brass Bic Cristal The nominees may be leaders in industries, prominent figures or everyday people who are making large changes in their communities. Efforts should be made to create a varied mix of winners.

Those who are awarded the Bic award will receive a brass Bic Cristal. This will further Bics visibility of quality products.

The awards should be an ongoing campaign, awarding up to 1000 per year, this ensures a good level of engagement with the public.

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WINNERS

HOW T

BIC AWARDS BIC CULTURE BRAND ACTIVITIES LEADERSHIP HISTORY

Winners of the Bic awards who have been awarded the brass Shannon Jones

For her contribution to music and with a unique approach to creativity

Jessica Shaw

For her contribution to teaching ap and dedication to the development

Alan Moore

For his contribution to science with creating research that has improve

PACKAGING Packaging is another element of improving the perception of the Bic Cristal. The current packaging makes no attempt to highlight the pen or its attributes.

Much of the packaging is stylised and contains unnecessary elements and gradients.

I have aimed to design packaging that is honest and simple to highlight the simplicity of the Bic Cristal with no unnecessary elements or designs.

I wanted the box to present each pen within the box which gives an opening experience, while highlighting how many pens the user has used.

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WOODEN BIC Bic are making efforts to improve the sustainability of their products. They have released a refillable model and now sell Bic Cristal refills.

To further the efforts of this and also raise awareness of the brand, in the near future (5-10years) I believe that it may be beneficial to release a wooden Bic Cristal.

By using wood and changing the material of the Bic, not only does this completely change the feel of the Bic, it also highlights the pen itself.

While the wood strays away from the original materials of the Bic Cristal and removes the clear barrel, by not being able to see the ink level, this may actually cause more intrigue. If users cannot always see the ink level in the pen this may cause them to have to actively check, making more of an interaction with the pen.

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Conclusions

STRATEGY From the findings of this project, I believe that by using the high quality Bics to create awareness for the product and with the introduction of the Personal and Scale pens as a mass produced limited edition, this can engage users with the Bic Cristal.

By engaging users with a ubiquitous product such as the Bic, this will bring the Cristal back as a consciously owned product and will hopefully create a product users can relate to and form an attachment to, through use.

It is hoped that this in turn will remind consumers that the Bic is the world recognised and reliable Ballpoint pen and is the one they should purchase instead of cheaper imitations.

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IMPLEMENTATION The Scale and the Personal pen should be released as a limited edition for a substantial amount of time (a year minimum), to allow good market penetration. These pens should be sold alongside the standard Bic Cristal at the same price.

Bic’s tone of voice must promote creativity and the potential in every pen the user owns.

If Bic market these pens to engage users and highlight the creativity and potential in every pen, the Bic Cristal could move from a ubiquitous mundane product to an object of creativity and empowerment.

The length of implementation and sale of these pens and how long they stay in circulation ultimately depends very much on the extent of their reaction and sales improvements. If sales improve, they could be permanent additions to the Bic Cristal range.

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CONCLUSIONS With the introduction of small incremental changes to the Bic Cristal, such as the ones I have suggested, I feel that a significant perceived value can be added to each pen.

Bic could further develop the work I have done, and by using other areas and the pen’s qualities, further increase perceived value. The alterations suggested require little change to the pen and Bic’s business model or values. However the impact will be beneficial to Bic’s brand awareness, sales and the environment.

Small changes to their products, linked with awareness campaigns such as the suggested Bic awards will combine to help Bic as a company and maintain sales of their most iconic pen as well as brand awareness.

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