Paradise Pen

Fountain pens sure got more expensive from when I last had one…
Ok, this is the place to go if you still value old-​fashioned handwriting with a precision implement. They have all the standard brands and knowledgable staff.
I wound up buying a pen from their house brand, and it’s a great one. I’m happy.

Went there a couple of days before Christmas 2015 to look for a pen for my daughter. Ended up meeting one of the nicest and most knowledgeable and friendliest sales person I have ever met — Linda went well beyond the call of duty, with extreme professionalism, knowledge, kindness and patience. The selection is outstanding, the prices are reasonable. Ended up buying a Mont Blanc for my daughter and it wrote SO well — no nice. In fact, it wrote so much better than my own Mont Blanc as it was a different type — so the sales rep ended up GIVING me a few refills to thank me for my business and some to try for my OWN Mont Blanc (whom I did not purchase at the store). I came back the NEXT DAY (Christmas) and ended up buying another Mont Blanc, because of how incredible Linda was and gave me also refills to last a lifetime. OK — for the price. I went home and went on
and discovered that the SAME pen was selling for $ 150 less but with only a 2 star (out of 5 review). Scrolling down a bit — I read the ON LINE REVIEWS: 6 people stated that this was a FAKE — 1 person said that they NEVER received the item and is filing a DISPUTE and only 1 was happy (probably did not know). Doing a bit more investigations online, I found out that LIKE CARTIER, Mont Blanc and many others, these products are ONLY sold through exclusive authorized retail shops OR online FROM THEM DIRECT (and prices direct were HIGHER). Fakes are EVERYWHERE and they are getting clever but often the refils do not work, they break from the first day and are made of different material. There is a reason why a pen costs $ 500 or more and fakes are half that price. Linda ended up selling me a bunch more refills for my Cartier Pen, and other Pen I had — at incredibly lower prices than anywhere (including Amazon — and EVEN REFILLS in some cases were fake online). My conclusion: This store is a GEM. Every person I talked to was absolutely fantastic. Despite being busy, Linda NEVER rushed me — and explained differences, and which refill fits in what pen in 2 seconds (as opposed to going on line and trying to find out what works with what and then making sure they are not fakes). The shopping experience was not good, not great, but EXEMPLARY. The price was fair and it was a REAL Mont Blanc — serialized — with an International Warranty. If you want to be treated well, end up with an awesome item that will last a LIFETIME or more — go see Paradise Pen. I bought 2 from them, and ALL my future purchases of items like these will be there. The selection is awesome, the prices are fair, the items are REAL not fake, and you will get exceptional service.

Had a great customer service from this store today. Linda was extremely helpful in checking on the status of an order I made on line. She was extremely curtious and helpful even though the order was an online purchase. I will shop here vs galleria in Houston where I had the opposite experience with an extremely pushy and rude older saleswoman that made me not want to buy from her, thus I made an on line purchase. Thanks Linda!

I have been frequenting Paradise Pen (Austin, Texas location at Barton Creek Mall) for several months now and heartily recommend a visit.
I have always loved fountain pens and had been looking for a replacement for my aging Parker 75 (bought in the mid 80’s), had narrowed it down by internet research to the Pelikan brand for writing smoothness and price, and went in to see if they had any. Man, was I lucky I did! There’s no substitute for handling the real deal and writing with ink. I quickly realized that had I ordered blindly off the internet, I would have been disappointed. For many, Pelikan is a great brand, but the form, weight, and writing experience was lacking for me. With great patience, knowledge, and customer service, Linda, the store manager, guided me to selection of a Pilot Vanishing Point, a very different style of pen, but one I thoroughly love!
Back to the store/​people: Linda, Inez, Alaina, and Natalie are all *very* customer-​oriented and knowledgable. They are passionate about the writing experience and enthusiastic about sharing. That makes for satisfying shopping and a desire to return. There are so many things available to try out, and certainly there is so much more than just fountain pens (ballpoints, roller-​balls, inks, pen cases, journals, desk accessories, etc., etc.). I have only briefly met Travis and Joe, but I suspect they’re «cut from the same cloth».
My wife, not really into pens, was impressed by how much time they would spend with her, not rushed, without any pressure, even though it was readily obvious that she was not there to buy. She also thinks «they have a cool catalog».
Prices range from low to the very expensive. I regularly shop online places like Amazon and others, hunting bargains, but again, the service, knowledge, and ability to «test drive» items is worth a lot to me. I’ve called with questions or needed advice and have received courteous help. I don’t know about other PP locations, but this one is top-​shelf. Check it out… I think you’ll agree.

So this store caught my eye when I was wandering around Barton Creek mall.
First impression: Cartier, Montblanc, Montegrappa, etc. If you’re a fountain pen enthusiast, you know those brands… and how expensive they usually are. With these displayed in the windows, the store looks pretty intimidating from the outside – rather reminiscent of a jeweler’s or some fancy place with a select clientele.
Well, you’re (mostly) right. They’ve got expensive pens. But you have to realize that the brands found at the store are, for the most part, sold through authorized dealers; thus, they will cost pretty much the same wherever you get them. If you want cheaper pens, I suggest you find some of the cheaper brands at Staples, an art store, ebay (buyer beware), online, etc. Regardless, fountain pens will range from $ 8 to thousands of dollars, and you should be an educated consumer and do your research.
With that said…
Ink:
Don’t be deterred by the appearance of the store. The store manager, Linda, is fantastic. Very friendly and helpful. They have a bunch of sample Iroshizuku inks, and Linda let me try them, which is really AWESOME. I spent close to an hour in there just trying out all the colors. On fountain pen-​friendly paper so you could get the full effect, too! Note that not all the ink colors are kept in stock at the store – maybe half of them are on the shelves. However, you can try the colors they DON’T have and special order whichever colors you DO want. A bottle of Iroshizuku is $ 35 here. A bit pricier than the $ 28 at Goulet Pen. As for other ink brands, they had Private Reserve, Parker, and Paradise Pen. Not a wide selection, but the popular colors are there. Definitely try the Iroshizuku, because they’re gorgeous.
Fountain pen-​friendly journals (not prone to feathering, ghosting, or bleeding):
Small collection of the popular Rhodia notebooks. I got the 6×8 dot-​grid notepad! ($ 5.50 to Amazon’s $ 6.23, if you were wondering.) You could probably find more online, but there you go if you just want a small pad or notebook without waiting for it to arrive in the mail. The prices are pretty on point as what you’ll find online anyway. The store also carried a few 5.75×8.25″ Leuchtturm journals ($ 15.99 vs. European Paper’s $ 18). Too bad they were ruled pages, instead of the dotted pages. There was another brand of small, hard cover, magnetic journals, but I forget what it was.
Pen:
Upon expressing interest, Linda brought out the Lamy Joy (calligraphy) pens to show the difference in nib (that’s the pointy, metal part that makes contact with the paper when you write) sizes. She even let me write with the 1.5mm pen as a dip pen (dipping the nib in ink and using it that way instead of actually filling the pen with ink). I love it when you can try the pen before purchasing. :) By the way, if you’re new to fountain pens, the Lamy pens (especially the Lamy Safari) are popular. And yes, they’re sold at Paradise Pen. I didn’t try the other pens (as I had already treated myself with a fountain pen this month). However, I will definitely come back in the future when I decide I need to add to my collection (I see you, Pilot Vanishing Point and Montblanc 146).
TL;DR: The place isn’t as swanky as it seems. Linda is great. Try inks. Buy journal. Test pens. Spend an exorbitant amount of time and money, because the hobby is expensive but oh-​so-​very addicting. 5 stars for service.

They have a wide variety of pens to choose from.

Extremely poor customer service!!!
My father and I are pen collectors, but we will never buy from here again. The manager was rude and made a remark I found to be very offensive. I also saw a glowing review that was posted by the manager posing as a customer. His name gave it away. I reportd it and it has been removed.

Every so often, I like to get something a little extra fancy for my Dad. Previously, I had shopped at Paradise Pen in Barton Creek a few years ago when they were under different [awful] management. My experience was terrible, and I didn’t want to go back.
But after a few years, I decided to give Paradise another try because it’s not very common to find a [physical] pen store. The new manager, Drew, is a vast improvement from their last manager, and was incredibly helpful. He is very knowledgeable on their products, and even when there was a question he didn’t know [only one!] he was more than willing to look up the answer for me.
The rest of the staff is also very knowledgeable, and were obviously trained well to know what they’re selling, unlike many retail establishments. [Especially in the mall]
I feel much better now about the store, and have been won back as a customer!

I really enjoy shopping here. The staff is incredibly friendly, helpful and knowledgable.

This store is wonderful. Last year we bought a pen for each of our groomsmen as gifts so this year I went back to get something for my dad. I didn’t have anything specific in mind but the manager helped me choose a Cross pen that I’m sure my dad will love. The staff is very knowledgable and attentive even though they were busy, with it being so close to Christmas, and I was very happy when I left. Can’t wait to go back and get something nice for myself.

I recently had the misfortune of visiting Paradise Pen Company at Barton Creek Mall because the pen my boss gave me for Christmas had broken (the first time I took it out of the box).
The woman that «helped» me was actually no help at all. She told me that the person who fixed these pens «was out at the moment.» She didn’t offer to take my name, or to tell me when he’d return, or to allow me to leave it for repairs or anything. The message was clear: it wasn’t getting fixed here today.
When I asked about the potential to exchange it with another (working) model, she cited «policy” – no exchanges or returns without a receipt. When I told her it was a gift from my boss and that it would difficult if not awkward for me to ask for that, she simply shrugged and said «Sorry, I don’t make the policies.»
Worst service experience I’ve had in YEARS.
So now I have a $ 75, broken pen. I will never, ever step foot in this place again, and advise that you don’t either.

Ah. I love to be treated like dirt.
So, the husband and I walk in and get a hello from the person working followed by a 5 minute ignore session while we were browsing.
No, «can I show you something?»
No, «is there something you are looking for?»
No, «lovely pen, isn’t it?»
For the record, I was looking to purchase a pen or pen set for my father’s upcoming birthday and was prepared to drop some change because it’s a big one.
After looking around a bit, I was going to ask her about a couple pens when this guy breezes in tweaked off because the ink refill for his pen doesn’t work right. She oozes a ton of attention on him completely ignoring us.
The irritating part is this dork spends 10 minutes drawing circles on a piece of paper complaining about the ones he already had and why they didn’t have enough replacements for what he wanted.
Then the really irritating part is the next 5 minutes when the woman is *still* totally ignoring me while the guy keeps trying to decide how many ink replacements he wanted while *still* drawing circles and I’m politely waiting at the counter to ask about a couple pens to buy.
When this continued on after hitting 20 minutes of «ignore mode on» I announced to my husband so she could hear that I «will just go buy it online» and walked out.
There is no way I’ll go in here again to be this rudely ignored. If she had just turned around and politely acknowledged me and said she would be with me in a minute, I would have really been cool with it. However, the way I was treated was absolutely unacceptable without question. I’d rather hand my father a 10 cent BIC first.

Visited recently for two reasons: (1) A friend took a job that requires her to have business cards on hand, and this is the only store in town that has Acme Studio (
) business card cases, and they’re pretty dope, and (2) I inherited roughly a million pens from my father– Pelikan mostly– and I needed some ink refills, the kind of ink refills Office Max doesn’t carry.
The store is small, but it has lots of shiny things to keep one occupied, including some really great Caran d’Ache pens (a company one doesn’t see too frequently) in addition to the usual suspects. I was in and out in five minutes, just long enough to finish my bubble tea from the sushi stand outside of the movie theater.