BiC Conté Felt Pens

First Impressions

​BiC Conté Felt Pens are a budget offering of similar price to Staedtler and Stabilo pens, for those who like to use pens but find a fineliner tip to be too narrow and hard to work with.

The pens do have quite a basic look and feel to them on first viewing. The plastic caps are very reminiscent of cheap children's pens and don't inspire confidence that they will perform well (luckily the opposite is true). The narrow barrels are identical in appearance to other products in the Conté range, with their uniform black coating and simple silver stamp. The caps and pen tips are coloured, which is handy for selecting one at a glance. Again there is no colour name or number to identify them with. Some of the caps don't correlate well with the ink colour, so I'd recommend doing a swatch chart before using.

​
Performance
​After an underwhelming first impression I was pleasantly surprised to find these pens are actually really, really nice to use! I'm not usually a fan of bullet tips, preferring something a little softer like a brush, but these glide very smoothly across the paper and don't pill or feather if you go over the same area a couple of times like many waterbased pens. They have a pointed bullet so can be used for small spaces as well as larger ones, making them very versatile. The colours are really vivid and although a couple of the orange/red shades are quite similar, I was happy to find some uncommon shades like the peach and teal.

from Wyspy by Anita Grabos

Value
These pens come in a 20 pack for around £11, which is a reasonable price to pay if only for spares. The pens do feel very light and quite insubstantial so I'm not sure how long they will last, only time will tell!

Overall I would certainly recommend these pens even if you're just wanting to supplement your Staedtlers with those extra colours.

I was given these pens in exchange for an honest review. You can find them on Amazon here:

BiC 927784 Conte Colouring Felt Pen - Tin of 20