The Wall Street Journal
Battle of German Brands Lasts Centuries; Going to Court Over Bragging Rights
NUREMBERG, Germany—Forget everything you know about corporate rivalries. Apple vs. Microsoft, Ford and General Motors, Coke and Pepsi: They're Johnny-come-latelies.
Two pencil makers here were battling before any of those brands—or the U.S.—even existed.
Their latest duel is over birthdays. Staedtler Mars GmbH this year celebrates its 175th anniversary. Next year, rival Faber-Castell AG fetes its 250th.
Yet Staedtler isn't trumped, because in 2012 it will celebrate the 350th anniversary of its earliest antecedent. City records from 1662 list a pencil craftsman named Friedrich Staedtler, to whom today's company traces its lineage.
"It's a competition throughout centuries," says Staedtler managing director Axel Marx. A "pencil war" over which company could claim to be the oldest landed the two in court 15 years ago.
Each boasts historic milestones: Friedrich Staedtler was the first dedicated producer of wooden pencils on record, and his descendants pioneered colored pencils in 1834. Faber in the 1840s was the first to brand top-quality pencils, and in 1870 registered one of America's earliest trademarks.
Today, the rivals still vie to push the pencil envelope, battling over children's coloring and retirees' hobby crafts. Locals take sides in the fight. "It's like football teams—people like one or the other," says Anja Hofmann, a sales clerk at the Thalia bookstore in central Nuremberg.
Faber-Castell dominates the world's luxury-pencil market, offering fine woods and platinum holders. It developed a line of ergonomic pencils with three sides and patented grip dots.
"In our industry, there is no doubt Faber-Castell is the Mercedes," says Count Anton-Wolfgang von Faber-Castell, who drives an Audi painted in his company's signature dark green.
Staedtler is "the technology driver," retorts Mr. Marx. In 2007 the company unveiled a method for strengthening the fragile leads of colored pencils. Now Staedtler aims to revolutionize the industry with a supremely ecological pencil made from a proprietary wood byproduct, Wopex.
Two centuries ago, cross-town competition was so pointed that the rivals poached each other's craftsmen, says Duke University Prof. Henry Petroski, author of "The Pencil," a 400-page history of the writing implement.
By the 1970s, times were tougher. "I wanted to run away from the pencil business," Count von Faber-Castell recalled recently in his family's castle. "I said it's not only dull but dangerous," because pencils were commodity products, and the company's world-leading slide-rule business had just been demolished by pocket calculators.
But eight generations of tradition dragged him back. Unable to find a strong manager for the family-owned company, Count von Faber-Castell begrudgingly quit his investment-banking career in New York. He returned to the town of Stein, where cabinetmaker Kasper Faber in 1761 had escaped nearby Nuremberg's stifling guild system to register a pencil workshop.
That was almost 200 years after a storm in the northern English town of Borrowdale uprooted an oak tree, revealing a dark substance that local shepherds started using to mark their flocks. Before long, chunks of graphite were being sold around Europe as an amazing new way of writing.
Scribblers initially wrapped "black lead" in string to protect it and keep fingers clean. Soon, joiners began crafting wooden holders for ever-smaller slivers of the increasingly expensive carbon. The first man known to have registered a pencil business was the Nuremberg carpenter Friedrich Staedtler.
In 1995, the company that now bears his name decided to mark 333 years of history. Faber-Castell celebrated by suing.
The count's lawyers argued that gaps of several years between businesses owned by various Staedtler descendants around 1800 interrupted the corporate lineage prior to 1835. That's when Johann Sebastian Staedtler established the company that remains today.
"I think we clarified that regarding Staedtler in court," says Count von Faber-Castell, who won an injunction.
"We cannot say we are the oldest pencil company," concedes Mr. Marx. "But our name is the documented origin of wooden-cased pencils."
The two companies also have clashed in the U.S. In 1849, Kasper Faber's great-grandson Lothar von Faber sent his youngest brother, Eberhard, to Florida to secure supplies of cedar for the factory back in Stein. Lothar was an early globalizer, sourcing graphite from a Siberian mine near Mongolia, which he touted with Mongol pencils.
Lothar had developed the first industrial pencil production. He was also the first to market high-quality pencils, stamped with his company's name, A.W. Faber. To protect their brand, the Fabers registered it in 1870 as one of the first U.S. trademarks.
Faber pencils were favored by notables including Ulysses S. Grant and Vincent van Gogh. But family feuds and World War I split the Faber brands. By 1920, Eberhard Faber's American company had no link to the German Fabers.
When European rights to the Eberhard Faber name came up for sale in 1978, Faber-Castell was too weak from the collapse of slide rules to pay. Staedtler snapped it up and started making Eberhard Faber products near Nuremberg, in competition with Faber-Castell.
"I sorely disliked it, but there were no other options," recalls the 69-year-old Count von Faber-Castell.
Undaunted, the tall, silver-haired nobleman pushed Faber-Castell up-market by highlighting the firm's longevity, emphasizing its aristocratic tradition and posing for publicity shots before the family castle.
Last year, Staedtler and Faber-Castell drew a line under their acrimonious past when Mr. Marx contacted the count about selling back Eberhard Faber. "I came to the conclusion we were contributing to the Faber name," says Mr. Marx.
On Jan. 1, for the first time in more than a century, Faber-Castell regained European rights to the brand. The count aims to resurrect it with fresh marketing.
Mr. Marx, meanwhile, is pushing Staedtler into computer pens that can digitize handwriting.
Both companies say they're friendly rivals at the moment, but that could change as Staedtler mulls how to mark the 350th anniversary of Friedrich's registration in 1662.
"We are thinking of how to do that without starting a new war," says Mr. Marx.
Two pencil makers here were battling before any of those brands—or the U.S.—even existed.
Their latest duel is over birthdays. Staedtler Mars GmbH this year celebrates its 175th anniversary. Next year, rival Faber-Castell AG fetes its 250th.
Yet Staedtler isn't trumped, because in 2012 it will celebrate the 350th anniversary of its earliest antecedent. City records from 1662 list a pencil craftsman named Friedrich Staedtler, to whom today's company traces its lineage.
"It's a competition throughout centuries," says Staedtler managing director Axel Marx. A "pencil war" over which company could claim to be the oldest landed the two in court 15 years ago.
Each boasts historic milestones: Friedrich Staedtler was the first dedicated producer of wooden pencils on record, and his descendants pioneered colored pencils in 1834. Faber in the 1840s was the first to brand top-quality pencils, and in 1870 registered one of America's earliest trademarks.
Today, the rivals still vie to push the pencil envelope, battling over children's coloring and retirees' hobby crafts. Locals take sides in the fight. "It's like football teams—people like one or the other," says Anja Hofmann, a sales clerk at the Thalia bookstore in central Nuremberg.
Faber-Castell dominates the world's luxury-pencil market, offering fine woods and platinum holders. It developed a line of ergonomic pencils with three sides and patented grip dots.
"In our industry, there is no doubt Faber-Castell is the Mercedes," says Count Anton-Wolfgang von Faber-Castell, who drives an Audi painted in his company's signature dark green.
Staedtler is "the technology driver," retorts Mr. Marx. In 2007 the company unveiled a method for strengthening the fragile leads of colored pencils. Now Staedtler aims to revolutionize the industry with a supremely ecological pencil made from a proprietary wood byproduct, Wopex.
Two centuries ago, cross-town competition was so pointed that the rivals poached each other's craftsmen, says Duke University Prof. Henry Petroski, author of "The Pencil," a 400-page history of the writing implement.
By the 1970s, times were tougher. "I wanted to run away from the pencil business," Count von Faber-Castell recalled recently in his family's castle. "I said it's not only dull but dangerous," because pencils were commodity products, and the company's world-leading slide-rule business had just been demolished by pocket calculators.
But eight generations of tradition dragged him back. Unable to find a strong manager for the family-owned company, Count von Faber-Castell begrudgingly quit his investment-banking career in New York. He returned to the town of Stein, where cabinetmaker Kasper Faber in 1761 had escaped nearby Nuremberg's stifling guild system to register a pencil workshop.
That was almost 200 years after a storm in the northern English town of Borrowdale uprooted an oak tree, revealing a dark substance that local shepherds started using to mark their flocks. Before long, chunks of graphite were being sold around Europe as an amazing new way of writing.
Scribblers initially wrapped "black lead" in string to protect it and keep fingers clean. Soon, joiners began crafting wooden holders for ever-smaller slivers of the increasingly expensive carbon. The first man known to have registered a pencil business was the Nuremberg carpenter Friedrich Staedtler.
In 1995, the company that now bears his name decided to mark 333 years of history. Faber-Castell celebrated by suing.
The count's lawyers argued that gaps of several years between businesses owned by various Staedtler descendants around 1800 interrupted the corporate lineage prior to 1835. That's when Johann Sebastian Staedtler established the company that remains today.
"I think we clarified that regarding Staedtler in court," says Count von Faber-Castell, who won an injunction.
"We cannot say we are the oldest pencil company," concedes Mr. Marx. "But our name is the documented origin of wooden-cased pencils."
The two companies also have clashed in the U.S. In 1849, Kasper Faber's great-grandson Lothar von Faber sent his youngest brother, Eberhard, to Florida to secure supplies of cedar for the factory back in Stein. Lothar was an early globalizer, sourcing graphite from a Siberian mine near Mongolia, which he touted with Mongol pencils.
Lothar had developed the first industrial pencil production. He was also the first to market high-quality pencils, stamped with his company's name, A.W. Faber. To protect their brand, the Fabers registered it in 1870 as one of the first U.S. trademarks.
Faber pencils were favored by notables including Ulysses S. Grant and Vincent van Gogh. But family feuds and World War I split the Faber brands. By 1920, Eberhard Faber's American company had no link to the German Fabers.
When European rights to the Eberhard Faber name came up for sale in 1978, Faber-Castell was too weak from the collapse of slide rules to pay. Staedtler snapped it up and started making Eberhard Faber products near Nuremberg, in competition with Faber-Castell.
"I sorely disliked it, but there were no other options," recalls the 69-year-old Count von Faber-Castell.
Undaunted, the tall, silver-haired nobleman pushed Faber-Castell up-market by highlighting the firm's longevity, emphasizing its aristocratic tradition and posing for publicity shots before the family castle.
Last year, Staedtler and Faber-Castell drew a line under their acrimonious past when Mr. Marx contacted the count about selling back Eberhard Faber. "I came to the conclusion we were contributing to the Faber name," says Mr. Marx.
On Jan. 1, for the first time in more than a century, Faber-Castell regained European rights to the brand. The count aims to resurrect it with fresh marketing.
Mr. Marx, meanwhile, is pushing Staedtler into computer pens that can digitize handwriting.
Both companies say they're friendly rivals at the moment, but that could change as Staedtler mulls how to mark the 350th anniversary of Friedrich's registration in 1662.
"We are thinking of how to do that without starting a new war," says Mr. Marx.
