Tag: greeting cards

What To Look For When Buying The Company Christmas Cards

Were you just asked to purchase holiday cards for your company? Whether you are a seasoned pro or you found this page from frantically googling for guidelines . . . Here are some ideas to get you moving.

Firstly, it’s important to be aware of you audience. Think of who will be receiving these cards. Are they religious? Mixed religions? Non-affiliated? What’s their age? Answering questions like these should help significantly condense your options, whether you’ve narrowed it down into a category of cards or have decided to get more generic (Holiday, Seasons Greetings, or Winter scene) cards.

Next, think about the intent of your company Holiday card—is it meant to gain customers or show thanks for their business? Then keep it polished, maybe use foil to create an elegant, sincere card. Are these festive cards for your employees or a close boss? These should boost morale, show appreciation, and perhaps be funny or casual.

Think of your budget—if you need hundreds of cards, buying in bulk could save you money. Also if you choose The Gallery Collection, you even have the freedom of customization. You quickly and easily create a holiday card, choosing from hundreds of card designs, dozens of greetings, or write your own!
No more excuses, it’s time to select your perfect company christmas cards!

Why should my Business send Holiday Cards?

Sending Holiday cards to your customer, vendors and employees is a necessary for any business.  The extra expense of these tokens of gratitude will prove worthwhile in the end.  It is an advertising method that has been around for years with proven success.

Your customers and clients will appreciate that you are thinking of them during the holidays.  It is a show of appreciate for their business and will inspire them to continue working with you in the future.  Holiday cards show to your customers that their business is valued. 

Vendors that you deal with daily or monthly basis will also see that they are on your mind when they receive their holiday cards.  This could result in better discounts on future orders or maybe other perks such as free samples.

As for your personnel, any employee acknowledgement always leads to a more successful company.  Happy employees make for a better bottom-line.  The holiday season is the perfect time to thank them for all their hard work and effort.  I suggest you mail these cards to their households.  Getting a sign of gratitude such a holiday card mailed to their home will truly make them feel special.

Holiday greeting cards will result in only positive feedback from all of your recipients.

The Benefits of Custom Greeting Cards

Custom greeting cards are perfect for every business. No matter what line of work you are in, you have at least 100 customers or clients that deserve a custom printed greeting card from you or your business. I have read some marketing facts that show it costs 10 times less to keep a current customer than it does to get a new one.  This is the benefit of custom greeting cards. It also shows your appreciation to your current customers or clients in a very inexpensive way and it preserves your ongoing business relationships.

By the way, custom greeting cards are wonderful for personal use as well. The greeting cards are excellent for birthdays, holidays, or any special life occurrences. Custom greeting cards really touch the hearts of the people you send them out to.  In our world of faceless electronic communication it has become very important that we reach our customers in a memorable way.

Whether I send out a single greeting card or a few, say for a holiday, I almost always receive emails and text messages thanking me for the greeting card I that sent.  When I receive this kind of feedback I become more aware of the impact I created. One positive is that I have made someone smile and be happy, so I feel good too!

Another positive is that my greeting card has physically been opened and read, I wonder about emails we all send, sometimes it is just easier to hit “delete all”.  There is no question in my mind that my card will be placed somewhere in their home or office, for quite a while.   

Are you in the Market for Greeting Cards?

How do you shop for greeting cards?  When I was in the market for our yearly supply of birthday cards, I wasn’t exactly sure where to start.  My predecessor would make trips to the local discount store to purchase greeting cards.  No offense to her as she was doing the best she could, but the cards were always so flimsy and looked cheap.  This was not how I thought our business should be represented.

The first thing I did was hit the internet.  I went to multiple sites and requested catalogs.  This was a great way to start.  Most companies not only sent me a catalog but a sample of their greeting cards and sometimes even their envelopes.  It was really helpful as I was able to compare the quality of greeting cards from each company.

Once I narrowed down my choice to The Gallery Collection, I hopped on their website to see their full line of greeting cards.  It was so difficult to select one from all the beautiful designs.  They were nice enough to send me samples of my 6 favorite.  I then passed them along to my colleagues in the Human Resources Department for a vote.  We have the perfect birthday cards that I am proud to send to our customers and staff.

Keeping Greeting Card Assortment Boxes on Hand

How many times has an occasion popped up unexpectedly and you didn’t have a greeting card on hand? Running to the store isn’t always an option. We are always busy and just don’t have the time to stop everything. It makes perfect sense to keep an assortment of greeting cards on hand for different occasions. The Gallery Collection has many different assortment boxes available.

While there is always the option of buying one card design, sometimes you just don’t want to give out the same card to everyone. An all occasion assortment box will give you an array of cards to choose from. Birthday Cards, Anniversary Cards, Get Well Cards, Sympathy Cards and Congratulation cards can be at your fingertips. Ready to send out at a moment’s notice.

You can purchase beautiful, high quality cards at a fraction of the cost that you would pay at a department or stationary store.

If you mainly send out birthday cards, there is a birthday card assortment only. There are three options to pick from. For other occasions, there are other card assortments available like sympathy assortment boxes, thank you assortment boxes, get well assortment boxes, or anniversary assortment boxes. This is just to name a few. If you like to write your own message, there is a Fine Art collection that are blank inside.

With all the options available, you will be ready to send out your well wishes whenever the occasion pops up!

Facts about greeting cards…

  • Annual retail sales of greeting cards are estimated between $7 and $8 billion. Americans purchase approximately 6.5 billion greeting cards each year.
  • The most popular Seasonal Cards are Christmas Cards, with some 1.6 billion units purchased (included boxed cards). This is followed by cards for Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Graduation, Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving and St. Patrick’s Day.
  • Seven out of Ten card buyers surveyed consider greeting cards “absolutely” or “almost essential to them. Eight out of Ten of these buyers expect their purchases to remain the same going forward. Of the balance, twice as many card buyers say they will “increase” their purchasing as say they will “decrease” their purchasing in the coming year.
  • Women purchase an estimated 80% of all greeting cards. Women spend more time choosing a card than men, and are more likely to buy several cards at once.
  • Younger card buyers and those who are more technology savvy are currently the ones most engaged in buying paper greeting cards online.
  • Most people now acknowledge many more birthdays than ever before because of Facebook, but they aren’t necessarily sending fewer cards as a result.
  • The tradition of giving greeting cards as a meaningful expression of personal affection for another person is still being deeply ingrained in today’s youth, and this tradition will likely continue as they become adults and become responsible for managing their own important relationships.

Adding Your Brand to Greeting Cards

The main purpose of sending greeting cards is the act of showing a friend, colleague, client, customer, etc. that they matter to you.  Receiving a greeting card is always a welcome event.  A side benefit of sending greeting cards is the opportunity they provide for businesses to promote their brands.  Greeting cards can function as relationship building items and soft marketing materials.  When attempting to use a greeting card in this manner, there are some points of decorum and restraint to keep in mind.  There is the danger of over-promoting your brand in your cards to the point that your recipients could only view your card as a marketing vessel and thus ignore any of your true genuine good wishes.

Here are some general guidelines for your branding to keep your greeting cards off the proverbial wall of shame.

  1. Keep it Simple in Sympathy Cards and Get Well Cards – While it is certainly acceptable to include a company’s or organization’s name or even their logo in a sympathy card or get well card, please be wary of how you do so.  It’s best to keep font sizes and styles on the smaller side for your firm’s name in these greeting cards.  You don’t want to call too much attention to your company.  Also, if you opt to include a logo, it should be kept on the smaller side as well and preferably printed in a neutral color.  If your logo is bright, multi-colored, and cheerful, it would be wise to consider printing it in just a plain black or green ink.
  2. Avoid Redundancy – You may wish to include your company’s name and your logo in your greeting cards, which is great, unless your logo includes your company name in it.  Cards with a printed company name right above a logo that also includes the company name can sometimes look redundant.
  3. Watch for Overexposure – It may be tempting to plaster your brand all over the greeting card putting your logo or name on the front and inside of the greeting cards.  Keep in mind that you don’t want your card to scream marketing material, nor should it.  A good rule of thumb is to look at the card you’ve created before ordering and ask yourself, “If I received this card, would I feel that the sender actually cared about me?”  If the answer is no, tone down some of the branding on the greeting card.

Why Get Well Cards Are Important in the Business World

Get Well cards are extremely important inside and outside of the business world. Get well cards let your employees, supervisors, or whoever is ill, sick, or injured know that they are being thought of during their trying time of illness, sickness or injury.

Imagine how the person in question would feel when they open a card full of well wishes and good thoughts from their co-workers. I, for one, would feel extremely pleased and happy to know that I was thought of enough to warrant a Get Well card. On GalleryCollection.com, there is a variety of Get Well Cards including the Get Well Roses Get Well Card, the Get Well Basket Greeting Card, and the Garden Get Well Greeting Card.

They also have an amazing Get Well Assortment Box, stocked with thirty five Get Well Cards; with nine different designs. Sending a get well card to your employee or supervisor creates a kind of caring and empathetic representation of your company, and it will make your employee or supervisor happy to know that they have been thought of, and it may even make them feel just a little bit better!

Tips On Choosing The Right Greeting

Although there are dozens of ways to say the same thing, not all greetings are created equal. Here are some tips on choosing the right greeting for any occasion.

Keep your audience in mind. If your business plans on sending out holiday cards, consider choosing a secular card and greeting. Keep in mind that not all of your employees may celebrate Christmas. It is best to take a “happy holidays” or “season’s greetings” approach, so all employees feel represented and included. Religious greetings, such as greetings with scriptures or references to God, should typically be limited to personal use or religious groups, like a church organization.    

Thank your employees. Another popular choice for business greetings is to take the time to acknowledge all of the hard work that your employees have done for the company. These greetings can be used for multiple occasions, including birthday, holiday, and anniversary cards. Of course, thank you cards are the perfect opportunity to show your employees that you appreciate their efforts!

Be inclusive. Greetings that include the phrasing “from all of us” give your cards a feeling of inclusion. These types of greetings are good to use if you are planning on sending a card from a group, like the management of a business, or from an entire family.

Add a graphic. If you want your card to have a cute, light-hearted feel, you can choose a greeting that also includes a graphic. A happy birthday card with a cartoon cake or a Christmas card with a happy snowman make for fun greetings. Decorative lines underneath a greeting can give your card a chic and sophisticated appearance. Along with the graphic, you can also play around with the font styles. Script fonts are typically more formal, while printed fonts are generally more informal and playful.

Although your greeting is important, don’t stress over the abundance of options! If you’re spending time agonizing over whether to wish someone “joy and happiness” vs. “good health and success” for their birthday, just remember that whoever receives your card will appreciate the gesture, no matter what wording you’ve chosen. And if you can’t decide on a greeting that encompasses everything that you’re looking for, you can always create your own! 

How Quickly Should I Send a Sympathy Card?

It is unfortunate when a family member, friend, acquaintance or coworker loses someone close to them.

As a caring individual, you want to share your sympathy and let them know that you are thinking about them in this trying time. You want to send a sympathy card, but how soon is too soon, and how late is too late? Take a look below for some items to consider:

How well did you know this person?

If the person is close to you, send it as soon as you can. Your sympathy card will be seen as thoughtful, even if it arrives on the early side.

On the other hand, if you are not particularly close to the individual, you may want to hold off a few days before sending a sympathy card. A card from an acquaintance may not be welcome in the first few days of grieving. To be safe, do not send the card before the funeral or service.

Sending a card by mail takes time

If you are sending a sympathy card cross country or internationally, send the card on the sooner side. If you don’t, the card may arrive past the time. However, sending a sympathy card late is better than not sending one at all.