Everyone used pencils at the beginning of the space program. NASA ordered some mechanical pencils because there were fears over the flammability of wooden pencils after the Apollo 1 fire. They paid something like $130 per pencil in 1965 money, and there was public outcry. Fisher developed the space pen with their own money and offered it to NASA, who paid approximately $2.40 per pen by buying in bulk. The Russians ordered them too and paid the same price.

Both space programs have used them ever since, and one arguably saved the Apollo 11 mission when the astronauts used one to fix a broken arming switch, without which, they could not have returned to earth.

Fisher supposedly spent 1 million developing and patenting the space pen. When you think about how many pens have sold for $50 at various aerospace museums over the decades, it was a solid investment.