Founded by the stationer Claus-Johannes Voss, the banker Alfred Nehemias and the engineer August Eberstein in 1906, the company began as the Simplo Filler Pen company producing up-market pens in the Schanzen district of Hamburg. Their first model was the Rouge et Noir in 1909 followed in 1910 by the pen that was later to give the company its new name, Mont Blanc. The Meisterstück name (English: “Masterpiece”, the name used for export) was used for the first time in 1924, for the top lines of fountain pens. Today, the Mont Blanc brand is on other goods besides pens, including watches, jewelery, fragrances, leather goods and eyewear.