Sharp move as Somers write new retail chapter

The historic T Sharp & Co store in the Hay Street Mall has sold its last pouch of tobacco following a decision by its new owners to concentrate on the sale of specialist pens and fine gifts. 

The 99-year-old store is now in the hands of the Somers family, which has 50 years’ combined experience in the pen industry and owns four pen stores on the east coast.

Part-owner Katie Somers told WA Business News the store was best known as a tobacconist, but had sold a small range of pens in the past, which had made the retail transition a little easier.

The T Sharp & Co name hails from businessman Theodore Sharp, who took over the store on the corner of Hay and Barrack streets in 1910, creating Sharp’s Tobacconists, which operated as a family business until last month.

And it seems old habits die hard for some Perth smokers, with several long-term customers of T Sharp & Co upset, and in some cases angry, that the store would no longer be selling tobacco products.

The Somers family has expanded the range of more than 20 pen brands including Montblanc, Montegrappa, Mandarina Duck, El Casco. S.T. Dupont, Faber Castell, Lamy, Parker and Waterman, in addition to stocking desk accessories, stationary, leather goods, cufflinks and, shortly, French jewellery. 

While a specialist pen business may be something of a niche player in an age of laptops, palm pilots, and mobile phones, Ms Somers said trade was buoyant.

Pens increasingly are becoming a collector’s item and a status symbol via designer connections and international celebrity marketing campaigns.

Ms Somers said designers were now targeting women in particular by incorporating diamonds, precious stones and pearls into pens, dubbing them ‘writing jewels’.

Among the store’s more unique pens are the Fisher Space pen, designed by N.A.S.A for its astronauts. The pen can be used upside down, on wet paper, over grease and on glass.

Then there are the Faber Castell Porsche Design pen made from authentic brading as used in a Porsche car, and the Montblanc Starwalker Platinum Ball Point pen with a floating snow dome cap.

Ms Somers said the rent in the Hay Street Mall was even more than what the family paid for its store in the Queen Victoria Building in Sydney, but three lucrative sales of S.T. Duponte pens during their first two months in Perth had helped them settle in.

“The big factors for choosing this store were its heritage qualities and its prominent position, plus its large windows facing both streets and the good flow of tourists,” she told WA Business News.

A full renovation of the store is scheduled to mark its 100th anniversary next year, and the family including Ms Somers, her mother Linda and brother Carl, have ensured the re-fit will be sympathetic to the building’s heritage listing and old-world charm.