Excuse me, I believe you have my stapler.
—Milton
Swingline has been a top name in staplers for 50 years. I remember seeing them in offices when I had my first office job in the early ’90s. They continue to be popular today.
But they reached cult status when a red version of the Swingline stapler was featured in the 1999 movie Office Space, which was, itself, elevated to cult status.
I loved Office Space the first time I saw it, and continue to love it on repeated viewings. Anyone who has worked in an office setting for long can relate to many of the concepts in the film (despite the fashion reflecting the style of a couple of decades ago), such as paper jams, difficult bosses, and inconsiderate coworkers. I remember needing to make my pen difficult for anyone else to use so they wouldn’t steal borrow it. Milton had that issue with his beloved red stapler.
Swingline has released a special Office Space version of the stapler called Milton’s Swingline Red Stapler, enabling us all to have a piece of memorabilia from the movie that’s also functional. Put it on your desk and complain to your coworkers about the printer while you collate papers.
It’s an actual Swingline model and has a 20 sheet capacity and metal base. The top part is plastic, alas, but it’s still quite solid. It also has a reversible metal plate, so you can force your staples inward or outward (a practice I never understood, but perhaps it is not for me to understand). It can use special Swingline S.F. 4 High-Performance staples, or just standard staples. I only had Swingline S.F. 1 staples available, but they worked like a charm, through two sheets or 16.
More stylish than any stapler I’ve owned before, this one makes me smile whenever I use it. It coordinates nicely with my pieces of flair and TPS reports.
Relive the worst and most complain-worthy aspects of office life with a re-viewing of Office Space while you print TPS reports and staple them with the new Swingline red stapler, soon available to all fans of staplers and of the movie. It will retail for $17.99, and you can pre-order it on the Swingline website (along with other Office Space office supplies), or wait until spring and order it at Amazon!
If you can’t wait, you can enter a giveaway held by Swingline and FOX where you can win one of these Milton’s Swingline Red Staplers and a lifetime supply of staples! The giveaway ends February 28.
I received a red stapler for the purposes of this post, but any obsession with the cult film is all my own.
