(re-post)
A friend told me she had just bought a packet of ten pencils (although she only needed one: she could not buy a single) and found the lead kept breaking when she tried to sharpen them.
I recalled some eco-friendly pencils (again in a packet of 10) that I had purchased a few months ago; the 'wood' kept 'buckling'. And then the bunch (yep, ten!) of eco-don't-give-a-darn pencils I got produced a lead mark that was so light you could hardly see it – and the erasers were so hard they did not delete – um, I mean erase.
Finally I tracked down pencils (10!) at the local pharmacy with a name I recognized: papermate. The adjective "classic" was encouraging.
They work! They sharpen well! The lead is dark! The eraser works! They are "old fashioned."
Which suits this pencil sharpener completely.