Like many people, I first discovered Moleskine notebooks years ago in a bookstore. After reading the propaganda on the back, I believed that buying the notebook would turn me into the next Hemingway. It didn’t, but I won’t begrudge a company for having good marketing.
It was, however, a very nice notebook. By the end, it was still in good shape so I bought another. That next one was terrible. The binding split in a week and the cover began to de-laminate in a month. The paper would bleed and show through with a G2 1
I tried to hang on to that thing 2 but eventually gave up in disgust. What’s worse, they were the only game in town so to speak. I wanted to give up notebooking. In fact, I kind of did for a while. Some time later the same thing happened only this time with their passport-style notebooks.
After some research I discovered the problem. Inconsistent sourcing. You never know what you’re going to get. I suspect they don’t care since their marketing is good enough to get their notebooks sold anyway.
At this point every name brand notebook I’ve tried is at least as good as Moleskine at their best and often has better features to boot!
All this to say, I want to like Moleskine. I want them to be high quality. I, even, want their “history” to be factual. I want all these things but to paraphrase a rock star with scary lips, “I can’t always get what I want.”