I spent about four years trying to go fully digital with my note-taking. I had apps, I had a tablet with a stylus, I had a keyboard shortcut for every occasion. I was, by any reasonable measure, extremely well set up. And yet I consistently found that my notes were harder to find when I needed them, my thinking felt less clear during meetings, and I retained less of what I’d written than I did when I used to write things down by hand.
The research on this is fairly clear — handwriting engages the brain differently to typing, and the act of physically writing something down improves retention and comprehension. I knew this. I’d read the studies. I still spent four years ignoring it because digital felt more organised and more modern. Eventually I stopped arguing with the evidence and went back to paper.
What I Actually Needed
Once I’d made the decision to go back to paper, I needed to think about what kind of paper. I work in a busy office environment — I’m in meetings most mornings, at my desk most afternoons, and I move between the two constantly. I needed something that was easy to carry, easy to write on, and easy to tear pages from when I needed to hand something to a colleague or pin something to a board.
I also go through notepads quickly. I write a lot. Buying individual pads every couple of weeks was going to get expensive and inconvenient, so I wanted a bulk option that would keep me supplied without having to think about it.
Why I Chose the Pukka Pad A4 Ruled Memo Pad 10-Pack
The Pukka Pad A4 Ruled Memo Pad – 10 Pack ticked every box. Ten pads of 160 pages each — that’s 1,600 pages of writing space, which at my rate would last me the better part of six months. The A4 format is the right size for my desk and for the kind of structured note-taking I do in meetings. The 8mm ruling is the spacing I find most comfortable for my handwriting. And the glue top-bound format means pages tear off cleanly without leaving ragged edges or disturbing the rest of the pad.
Pukka Pad is a brand I’d used before and trusted. Their paper quality is consistently good — the 60gsm weight is substantial enough that ink doesn’t bleed through to the next page, which matters when you’re writing on both sides.
Back at the Desk — The Difference Was Immediate
The first week back on paper was a revelation. My meeting notes were more structured because I was forced to be selective — you can’t copy-paste on paper, so you have to decide what’s actually worth writing down. My retention improved noticeably. I was coming out of meetings with a clearer sense of what had been decided and what I needed to do, rather than a long document of transcribed conversation that I’d have to re-read later to extract the relevant points.
The thick card back cover on the Pukka Pad is something I didn’t think I’d care about but turned out to matter a lot. I often write standing up — at a whiteboard, in a corridor, at someone else’s desk — and having a solid backing means I don’t need a hard surface underneath. The pad is self-supporting, which sounds minor but makes a genuine practical difference.
The Paper Quality
I use a fountain pen for most of my writing, which means paper quality is something I notice more than most. The 60gsm Pukka Pad paper handles fountain pen ink well — no feathering, minimal show-through, and the ink dries quickly enough that I’m not smearing it with my hand as I write. For ballpoint and rollerball users the paper will be even more forgiving. It’s not premium paper, but it’s genuinely good paper for the price point, and at ten pads for the cost of what I used to spend on two or three individual notepads, the value is hard to argue with.
How It’s Changed My Working Day
Six months on from switching back to paper, my working day looks quite different. I start each morning by writing a short list of priorities for the day — three to five things, no more. I take handwritten notes in every meeting. I sketch diagrams and frameworks by hand before I build them in any software. My thinking is clearer, my meetings are more productive, and I end each day with a better sense of what I’ve actually accomplished.
None of that is solely down to the notepad. But having a reliable, good-quality supply of paper that I don’t have to think about — that’s always there, always the right size, always the right ruling — removed a friction point that I hadn’t realised was there. The ten-pack means I’ve never once reached for a pad and found I’d run out. That sounds trivial. It isn’t.
Where to Find It
The Pukka Pad A4 Ruled Memo Pad – 10 Pack is available in the Notepads and Notebooks & Notepads collections. You’ll also find it within the broader Paper Products and General Office Supplies ranges.
If you’ve been meaning to try going back to paper but haven’t found the right setup yet, start here. The right notepad is a small thing that makes a surprisingly large difference.
— Oliver Strand, reformed digital-only worker and now a committed paper note-taker with a six-month supply on his shelf
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