In the early 1950s, Marcel Bich launched his first ball-point pen. The famous "Cristal" was designed by an in-house research department: instead of copying fountain-pens, as the first ball-point pens had done, it mimicked the simpler shape of a sharpened pencil and was transparent, so that you could see how much ink you had used. The first advertising campaign began in November 1953. The core concept was disposability, and the strategy of aiming at the mass-market was to make Baron Bich's fortune. The recipe was simple: value for money; and the name of both brand and main product was simply the founder's surname with the "h" chopped off. Bic biros were a runaway success, soon becoming a household name and selling 10,000 per day in their first year. Today, the figure is 15 million. Bic biros are now sold in over 60 countries and are used for all sorts of scripts, including Chinese and Arabic.