Sheaffer Lifetime and their incredible 1960's Ad Campaign

The Sheaffer Lifetime pen is one of those icons that has defied, and continues to defy, time. The first Sheaffer pens with a “lifetime guarantee” was introduced in 1920 (with a price tag of a princely $8.75). The signature trademark – the white dot, to indicate that the pens carried a lifetime guarantee, was incorporated in 1924. The year was a milestone one for Sheaffer as the same year had witnessed the introduction of a line of pens manufactured from Radite, which allowed, for the first time, pens to be made in a wide range of colours, including pens sporting a combination of swirling colours.

For serious aficionados, such facts are well known. What is astounding, almost hidden by the mists of time, is a series of print advertisements that Sheaffer ran for the Lifetime pen in the 1960’s. The campaign was an outstanding attention grabber from the moment it hit the mainline media and while its contribution to the bottom-line of the company is not immediately known, it continues to occupy a pride of place in the hallowed portals of advertising history. Indeed, it will not be an exaggeration to say that seldom has the fountain community been blessed with such a powerful communication exercise.

The concept was simple – the advertisements consisted of “futuristic” products with body copies that presented the Shaeffer Lifetime Fountain pen as one that is so nearly perfect that it is guaranteed for life. The communication was simple as it was direct – the Sheaffer Lifetime is future proof and however much the technology may advance in the future, the Lifetime would still be there in all its glory. Bingo!

One advertisement of the campaign featured a TV set that could be worn in the wrist. A second talked about instant delivery of mails. One talked about a probable shopping list for Christmas in the 21^st century that would include a portable visual phone, a ring tape recorder and a pair of camera sunglasses – reminding the reader that the Sheaffer Lifetime, one gifted in 1963 would still be the one writing away (apart from being relevant), however much the world may advance technologically.

The small print talked about a whopping 225 reasons justifying the company’s claim – two hundred and twenty-five being the number of separate operations that needed to be undertaken to create the masterpiece, with the “flexible 14K gold point” nib requiring as many as ninety operations alone. The idea was to stress on the painstaking manufacturing process that ensured the longevity, not to mention the company’s confidence in its own prowess that allowed Sheaffer to offer the kind of guarantees that it did.

Tongue firmly in cheek, the communications also pointed out that maintaining such exacting standards did call for the spending of an “unusual” amount of time, but then, Sheaffer, concerned as it was about the recipient of the customer’s gift, did not cut corners. Note how the competition was decimated in a matter of fact way, even as the obvious superiority of the Sheaffer Lifetime was firmly established.

Sheaffer did not stop only at that though, and the copy had, very clearly pointed out all the features that made the Lifetime stand out – that its perfection is ahead of its time; the way the 14K gold inlaid point skims over a piece of paper laying down a firm, decisive line; the clip that holds it securely in the pocket -  the LIFETIME sobriquet highlighted in capitals! (Is this an example of the first Keyword optimized copy in keeping with what they thought we would and are doing these days?)

However, it wasn’t the copy that made the campaign the huge hit that was. Neither was the concept, though, like the body copy, it too, was far ahead of its time (no pun intended). What really set the advertisements apart was the gadgets that it featured from the future – electronic instant mail, wrist TV, camera glasses, ring tape recorder, electronic translator, suit temperature conditioner, visual phone and an electronic checkbook. Gadgets, that were not even in the realm of public imagination in those days of yore. To put things in the right perspective, the year 1963 when the campaign broke, was still years away from the Apollo 11 landing a man on the moon in 1969. Now imagine the chutzpah of a company – a global major, one of America’s Big Four, coming out with a campaign like that!

As a matter of fact, such was the response that the campaign generated, Sheaffer was inundated with inquiries and a booklet had to be published where the company’s marketing department clarified that the gadget concepts that the campaign talked of, according to the knowledge of the company, did not “exist anywhere as working or experimental models”. With its typically unstated elegance the booklet had also gone on to seize the initiative and explain that in order to “meet the present and future writing needs”, Sheaffer was touching upon many types of new product concepts. Moving on, it had also stated that perhaps some of the product concepts that were featured in the campaign would never come into existence pointing out in the same breath that the space age too was once just something that existed in the realm of comic strips!

The Sheaffer Lifetime fountain pens that the campaign had sought to push are now naturally termed as vintage fountain pens. Most of the gadgets that had been featured in the advertisements have not only seen the light of the day, but are either integral parts of our lives or are very near commercial availability. Like the campaign had claimed, the Sheaffer Lifetime is still writing away, laying down “firm, decisive lines”.

In a world where advertising seldom gets even the present right, here was a campaign that looked deep into the future and not only connected with its target audience, but got facts so right that it is eerie to put things mildly. Guess, the fact that Sheaffer was (and in many ways it continues to be) a prime mover in the intellectual space explains the obvious mastery over the craft that had gone into the creation of the campaign. Guess, this is what a lifetime guaranteed campaign is all about.