Stabilo GREENlighter 6007

I was intrigued enough by this review at Pencil Talk to search out the Stabilo GREENlighter highlighting pencil at a stationer's some distance from my home. I've used Stabilo Boss highlighter pens for years, but the idea of using a pencil for hightlighting text made more sense. I've found all highlighter pens dry out unless you replace the cap, and of course the process of highlighting demands the reader to use it intermittently, which means having to take the cap off and replace it numerous times during a spell of reading and highlighting. Another reason for using a pencil is that I have found highlighter pens to smear fountain pen ink, and as I use a fountain pen I wanted to avoid that if at all possible.

Based on the Pencil Talk review, I purchased only the yellow version of this pencil; the green and pink variants aren't as good, apparently. It takes a little getting used to, because more effort is needed to leave a useable layer of highlighter than a pen. The hightlighting is more subtle than a pen's. The highlighting core has a smooth, deep waxy feel and glides over the paper, though as I say, it needs more pressure and multiple passes to leave a healthy line.

The barrel of the pencil is triangular in section and painted in dayglo yellow with thin white lines. All information is printed in black, as is the FSC logo.

I've really enjoyed using this pencil and it has found a place in my pencil case. This one is a winner, in my view.

Barcodes

Reading around the pencil blogosphere it seems that some consider a printed barcode on the pencil's barrel to be alien to the character of the pencil. Here's an example of a pencil review where the reviewer has welcomed one manufactuer's efforts to avoid printing a barcode on the side. In that case, the manufactuer, Caran d'Ache, has resorted to a removeable plastic sleeve with the barcode printed on it. This seems to me to be an elegant solution, though probably a relatively expensive one. Others have tried to use a sticker - Tombow comes to mind here - but too often that leaves a sticky residue on the pencil once the sticker has been peeled off, which is unpleasant to use.

Whilst it is nice to see a clean, clutter-free design on a pencil, I do like to see the various pieces of information the manufacturer has put on it. Whether the manufacturer's name and trademarks, country of origin, a model number, the grade of the lead, those mysterious little codes embossed in the side but not painted, and indeed the barcode, they all add to the character of the pencil.

The problem of fixing a barcode to a pencil so that it can be scanned at a shop's till really has only one foolproof solution - print it on the side of the pencil itself so it cannot be peeled or picked off. This is what Staedtler and Faber-Castell do. I don't think they detract at all from the character of the pencil, and those manufacturers make them as discreet as possible anyway. I am sure that in future, if the pencils produced now are collected or used by pencil lovers, they will appreciate these symbols of our industrial society. Here's to the barcode.