I think the shops are the worst though for some of the nonsense out there.
I have heard the sales spiel in that spotter shop in Leeds and in transair in London about pens and charts.
In fact someones dad asked me in Transair while I was waiting with my ickle red day log book and a couple of black chinas. What the hell the guy was on about. I really didn't have a clue why you would need even 5% of what the guy was on about. The sales persons heared me and in a very sarcastic tone asked me what I knew, seems you need about 2 charts, a pack of permant OHP pens, a pack of none permant OHPs, some gizzmo to work out circuit directions, a thing which was mask for fan lines and circle thingy's, vor thing's which you stick on the chart, a normal square, a foldy ruler thing and a postitive flight bag full of !!!!e which I wouldn't use.
My reply of 700 hours as an instructor and all you need is a china graph, a thumb which god gave you anyway, a chart, a square and a stopwatch if you were gay didn't go down to well. The dad had a laugh though just cut his CC bill down from 125 quid down to 25 quid.