Congratulations to our Round 9 Finalists!
Sending anniversary cards to your employees send a message to them that their time with your company means something to you.
When I celebrated my one year anniversary, my boss stopped by my desk and dropped off a beautiful card and actually sang a quick song. (I know a little corny, right?) The card was signed by her, my immediate supervisor, the owner of the company, the CEO and the COO. It was wonderful. I have to say, all of this attention from my boss and supervisor made me feel like my work was valued.
The greeting inside the card not only said, “Happy Anniversary” but it stated that they “Appreciated my contributions and they realize I am part of their success.” What a fantastic thing to hear from the people you work for.
This type of inspiration motivates me to give all I can to my company. Sometimes all it takes is a small gesture to give an employee the encouragement they need to do everything in their power to make the company a priority. Sending anniversary cards to your employees will instill loyalty and promote a positive work environment. Inspiration and motivation stimulate effective employees. Take a little time to show appreciation with employee anniversary cards and your business will create and maintain a high-quality workforce.
Throwing a party or heading out for drinks on St. Patrick’s Day has become a tradition for most people, Irish or not. Why not this year, bring the St. Patrick’s theme into your office and plan a party right there at work? Don’t go overboard but make it a green day!
In our break room in order to keep things healthy, we put out a spread of green and orange jello and a selection of fruits and vegetables last year. Keeping it green and orange, we had carrots and broccoli with ranch dressing and green grapes, green apples and oranges.
Lunch was easy. For our St. Patrick’s Day party in the office, we called a local deli for their expertise. They catered in corn beef on rye sandwiches topped with sauerkraut. We also put out a selection of orange soda, root beer and green flavored Gatorade.
Then on to the fun stuff. Of course, we had to put out the necessary dessert spread for the party. We had a variety of cupcakes, cookies, and donuts all decorated with St. Patrick’s Day goodies. One coworker filled a green and gold top hat with those chocolate gold coins. Our boss had an ice cream bar set up with mint chip, pistachio, and vanilla ice cream as an added treat.
A great time was had by all, and we even managed to get plenty of work done. For a fun time, throw a St. Patrick’s Day party in your office this year!
There’s no doubt presentation plays a huge role in the process of mailing out greeting cards. Whether it be sending out cards during the Christmas season, cards celebrating the New Year, Thanksgiving cards, or even classic Birthday cards, you want to choose a design that stands out from all the rest. Leaving an impression usually occurs with the first thing someone sees. When receiving a greeting card in the mail, what is the first thing you see? Unless people suddenly start sending greeting cards with their postage stamp on the actual card, then the first thing you’ll see is the envelope.
If you order your greeting cards from The Gallery Collection, you have a few nice options when it comes to choosing the type of envelope you want to send your cards in. You can choose either white or buff color for your envelope, and the inside can be white, silver, gold, or pearl. The process of sealing your envelopes is where you can get creative. The general option offered is “moisture seal” style envelopes, where you can either lick the envelope or apply a liquid based substance then press down to seal them up. For a slight upgrade in price, you can also choose to select “seal-fast” envelopes, in which the hard work is pretty much done for you, all you have to do is remove the wrapper to reveal the adhesiveness and press down to seal.
My personal favorite option is the embossed foil seals. These elegant and eye-catching seals come in either gold or silver, to compliment the specific envelope beautifully. The 1 inch seals come in packs of 50. The small additional charge is surely worth it to get that extra oomph with your cards and stand out from the rest of card senders. Not only do the embossed foil seals look fancy and unique, they also provide an easier route to opening the envelope for the recipients. Instead of clawing through the envelope seal, they can simply open the 1 inch seal and get to see the beautiful card design you chose. Sounds like a win-win to me.
Deciding what to get for your Boss’s birthday is definitely a time when the statement “it’s the thought that counts” comes into play. What’s really going to make an impression with your boss is to think of something that she is interested in or has mentioned along the way and gift something along those lines. For example, if you know your boss rides horses, you can find a small horse or something related to horses that she can place on her desk to remind her of the passion she has for horses. It’s sure to bring a smile to her face and remember you in the process. Or perhaps she has mentioned a specific movie she wants to see or a favorite wine that she likes or would love to try. It shows that you have been listening and not just hearing “wa, wa, wa” when she speaks like in the classroom of a Charlie Brown episode.
If you want to go for a bigger ticket item for your Boss’s birthday, group gifts are a great idea and often even preferred by the boss rather than several individual gifts. Just think of the teacher at year end with 30 apples from her students instead of one awesome gift certificate to the spa that she can really enjoy. Your co-workers will be thankful too as you can often make a bigger impact with your gift and end up spending less individually. Again, be sure to consider your boss’s interests and hobbies when thinking of a group gift but some great ideas include a gift certificate, a desk accessory such as a Galileo thermometer or small plant, tickets to a show or movie or even some sweet treats or balloons to celebrate the occasion. If your boss likes the attention, you can make more of a spectacle of her birthday and have balloons or flowers delivered so the whole office can see them, making everyone super jealous in the process.
If you don’t really know your boss that well or are new to the team, keep it simple and generic or ask someone who does know her well.
Good luck with your gift buying! And whatever you do decide to get, do not forget to include a birthday card!
Disclaimer: My boss happens to be a woman which is why I referred to my boss as “she” in this post. But, I’d like to add for the record that male bosses are great too!
Congratulations to our Round 8 Finalists!
Most people associate greeting cards with the Holidays. A business, wanting to reach out to associates and customers, will send out printed cards in the hopes that the recipients will remember the company fondly in the future.
But there is so much more to greeting cards. One of the best ways a company can maintain a positive relationship with its employees is to mark the special occasions in their lives. Birthdays are made a little more special with a birthday card from everyone in the office. Throw in a small token gift such as a scratch-off lottery card and it’s a great way to celebrate an employee’s special day. Similarly, sending an anniversary card to mark the anniversary of an employee joining the company sends the message that every employee is valued by the company.
The larger a business gets, however, the more difficult it can be to keep track of everyone’s special days. Add to that the hassle of getting a signature from the boss every time, and it’s not hard to understand why a company wouldn’t bother with it at all.
But there’s a solution for that.
Ordering birthday cards and anniversary cards printed with a few signatures and perhaps the company logo and keeping them on hand for when the moment arises is the perfect way to give employees that feeling of belonging to a company that is a family.
Step One: Find a greeting card (or cards) to match the tone of your office. There are cards for every corporate environment, with clean bold lines or whimsical designs.
Step Two: Choose a generic but sincere message that can be used for anyone in the office. If you want to create your own message, that can be an option too.
Step Three: Get the company logo and the signatures of the people in the office who always sign the cards. Send them to the The Gallery Collection and they’ll get printed on every card. No more chasing down the boss to sign a dozen cards at a time!
Step Four: Have your cards shipped to your office. Then they’re ready whenever you need them. A birthday/anniversary database kept up by an administrative assistant or the chairperson of a company “Sunshine Club” ensures that every card is delivered to every employee on time.
In this age of email and text messages, a value of a greeting card has risen exponentially.
Some of the biggest mistakes in marketing are made by the smartest people. When you have a brand you need to make sure that brand is up front and center in everything you do. Sometimes this thought gets missed in the simplest of ways. For example think about the business Christmas cards you send out each year. The smallest little detail on this seemingly small bit of marketing material can make all the difference.
Did you know you can get a Christmas card that actually features your company name on the front of it? Of course, you did not or you would have just stopped reading this article. If your business has something to do with trucking get an industry specific trucking holiday card that has a nice truck on it and your company name on that truck. There is no excuse it is easy to do with today’s technology. If I am running a law firm there needs to be some sort of judicial card out there that I can get my name on the front.
The reason you make sure and do this is because most people do not throw Christmas cards out right away. They keep them on their desk or on a cubicle or in the company kitchen area. Maybe other perspective clients see that card with your name on it and maybe down the line when they need a trucking company or a law firm your name pops into their head for some reason. They will not know exactly why it popped into their head but we’ll know.
Greeting cards can be a great way of keeping your name in front of current and prospective clients. We’ve been discussing which type of Greeting Cards you should buy in bulk and have come up with several types that are a worthwhile investment.
We make it a point to always send an annual Holiday Card – sometimes at Thanksgiving and sometimes a bit later with “Season’s Greetings”. A few years we actually chose a Happy New Year’s card. I always go to The Gallery Collection first because you can count on having an extensive selection of beautiful designs to choose from and the quality is always excellent. It’s hard to go wrong.
With summer help from college kids, it’s easy to order early & have our holiday cards all done and ready to be mailed well before the fall. I make sure to order extra cards in case we want to add new contacts to our mailing later on. This way, we avoid the stress of having to rush to prepare and send out several hundred cards right at one of the busiest times of the year.
Since our holiday cards have proven to be such a hit for several years running, we decided three years ago to also start sending out Birthday cards to our clients too. Seeing the overwhelmingly positive response, we’ve decided that It’s well worth the money, time, and effort. There have been lots of calls, emails and notes from the people we really want to hear from – our clients.
Anniversary cards are also good to buy in bulk because you can keep them on hand and send them to anyone you want to, any time of the year. Again, it’s good public relations. You could always go with keeping an Anniversary Assortment Box on hand, but this year we wanted to go with a specific card with our own greeting printed inside. This way we customized our cards just the way we wanted and there was no extra cost for this option.
If you don’t already send your customers holiday cards, birthday cards, or anniversary cards consider adding them as a part of your normal business routine. It’s simply good public relations and the payoff could be great!
Congratulations to our Round 7 Finalists!
