Luxury and the price of the commercial artisan

I was with some friends for Palm Sunday. We had some fun times, and we checked, among other things and mostly for the fun of it, Montblanc fountain pens and knives (we did have to buy some kitchen knives, but we explored some extra).

I kept some of that exploring at home, from the computer, and something has been bothering me.

We've lost the core idea of craftmanship. You see, when I was a late teen, the core Montblanc pen was about 100€. These days, it's about six times that. That's not inflation. It's the price handmade fountain pens are sold at.

There are similar differences in knives, but this will do.

We've reached a point where a demi-luxury brand (because there are way more luxurious things than the basic Montblanc), machine made, thinks it's worth the same than the artisan (maybe machine helped but still artisan) producer.

When an ebook is priced in the high teens and pundits defend the agency price and the uniqueness of Books written by Snooki while artisans, indies, price their books reasonably and, from obscure sites, sell about as much.

Being out of touch can hurt.

Take care.