Greeting Cards Capture Emotions

I laughed, I cried, my soul was touched. All these emotions came from reading greeting cards at my local gift store.

Relatively inexpensive and easy to display, greeting cards are a compliment to any existing product line you carry. In fact, gift givers are more likely to purchase a greeting card at the same place in which they purchased the gift. In essence, you have a captive buying audience. You sell a gift and the greeting card purchase is inevitable. It’s as simple as that.

What You Need To Know About Greeting Cards

Over 7 billion dollars worth of greeting cards are purchased each year. To effectively capture a piece of this market, it is important to know the ins and outs of the greeting card world. Seasonal and every day are the two categories which divide the greeting card market.

Seasonal greeting cards are just as the name implies; cards revolving around a holiday season. For example Christmas cards, Halloween cards, Easter cards, Valentines Day cards, and Mother’s/Father’s Day cards, as well as graduation cards are all considered seasonal or holiday cards. These types of cards account for 50% of greeting card sales. In this group, Christmas cards are the big sellers with 60% of the category’s sales.

All other cards are lumped into a category called everyday. These cards revolve around events that can occur on any given day. Birthday cards, sympathy cards, congratulation (wedding/engagement) cards, anniversary cards along with friendship cards make up the everyday card group. Parallel to the Christmas cards in sales, birthday cards are the top seller in this category.

We’ve shown you the numbers on why greeting cards are good sellers, what greeting cards are and the identifiable groups they belong to. But, you want the answer to the most important greeting card question “how do you sell them?”

Greeting card marketing is kind of like that movie “Field Of Dreams”. You know the one where Kevin Costner builds a baseball field on the premise “build it they will come”. Greeting cards are that field. Select good wholesale greeting card suppliers with themes in line with your products and they will sell.

Tips For Selecting And Selling Greeting Cards

A tip to keep in mind when selecting card from your wholesale greeting card vendor is balancing trendy with traditional. You will want a combination of trendy as well as classic greeting cards. Trendy cards are those types that play music, have led lights along with movable artistry, or even humorous political cards. Classic cards are the cards that are timeless. They follow a pattern that has been seen for ages. For example, classic greeting cards are often the Mother’s Day cards embellished with calligraphy and floral pictures or wedding cards with a very formal and proper tone. However, that doesn’t mean this is the only style for these types of cards. With greeting cards, you have the many options running the gamut from humorous to classic and from artistic to cartoonish.

A versatile assortment is the strategy that works best for most gift shops. Carry a wide selection in both the seasonal and everyday categories. Select cards that set you apart from the crowd. Look for quirky cards that most people won’t find in the “marts”. Find cards that evoke an emotional response. The idea with greeting cards is to affect the person purchasing the card. Greeting card buyers want to feel emotion because they are using the card to send an emotional message.

“Heavy on the holidays” is a strategy that suits flower shops. Weight your seasonal selection with more Mother’s day and Valentine’s Day cards as convenient add-on sales. However, a few every day cards will still be needed. Don’t forget the blank greeting cards which are fantastic ways for customers to personalize their floral gifts.

Greeting your customers with seasonal and everyday cards puts you in the game with the potential to win a piece of a 7 billion dollar market. Your “Field Of Dreams” resides in greeting cards sales. Offer a card for every occasion and they will sell.

The wholesale greeting card vendors at FGmarket can provide all your cards needs from humorous to sentimental, from classic to trendy and from quirky to cards made from recycled paper. To jump start your search for the perfect greeting cards for your store, we have profiled a few of the many wonderful greeting card companies available through the FGmarket wholesale directory.

Reach Out and Touch Someone With Greeting Cards

Help customers stay connected to family and friends by offering a variety of greeting cards. Appropriate for many occasions; greeting cards usually accompany gifts, flowers, and balloons. Giving your customers the convenience of purchasing greeting cards, as they purchase gifts, will boost your add-on sales. Customers will appreciate this convenience and your intuitiveness to their needs and wants. Saving them time will increase your sales. This FGmarket newsletter highlights a few of the many wonderful wholesale greeting cards available through our suppliers.

Choosing the Right Greeting Cards

You don’t need to stock thousands of greeting cards; select a variety of the basics, which include birthday cards, thank you cards, sympathy cards and anniversary cards. Augment your basic greeting cards with blank cards, humorous cards and animated greeting cards. Carry seasonal holiday greeting cards when appropriate. With this combination, customers will have a wide variety of cards to choose from for any occasion. Wholesale greeting cards can help you capitalize on niche markets. By carrying hand adorned, bi-lingual, religious and other unique greeting cards you can target a potentially unlimited market. These vendors provide various greeting cards options.

Some of Me Cards offers an extensive and beautiful selection of hand adorned wholesale greeting cards. In addition to the traditional sized greeting cards, they carry a selection of 5 1/4 x 5 1/4 square cards with a paper liner. These square cards offer a stylish look and a more refined presentation. You’ll find cards for every occasion and holiday including new baby, apology, congratulations and sympathy. Not only great for add-on sales, these greeting cards with their paramount quality and designs are “gifts” themselves.

High-quality wholesale greeting cards and stationery are found at Page Stationery. Unique custom and boxed stationery compliment their greeting cards; perfect for even the most discerning customer. Using soy-based inks when possible, Page Stationery products will appeal to your environmentally conscious customers. Specializing in custom wedding, baby, holiday and stationery sets designed on high-quality papers; they, also, carry exquisite holiday greeting cards, imprintable coasters, note cards and photo cards. Their products are great for the eco-friendly or discriminating markets.

Bi-lingual Greeting Cards

The Hispanic community is growing and creating a substantial niche market. Nos Vemos Greetings caters to this developing customer base. Dedicated to providing the best of both worlds; they combine Hispanic values with American aspirations to create greeting cards for all occasions. They supply a new generation with brightly colored greeting cards from sixteen different categories including children, family, friendship, love, everyday, humor, religious and proverbs. All of their cards are bi-lingual as well. If you have a large Hispanic customer base, Nos Vemos Greetings are sure to be a big hit.

Special Interest Greeting Cards

Grab your part of a multi-million dollar industry; carry greeting cards that celebrate pregnancy and birth. Waiting For You offers cards for baby on the way, new baby, big brother & sister, preemies, adoption and special occasions. Their cards depict real babies with cute expressions, poises and greetings to meet all your customer’s needs including cards for expectant parents, grandparents and cards for twins. These cards are sure to attract attention of those with a special interest in all things baby. Great way to boost baby gift sales.

Embrace the individuality of your customers and address their “niche” market needs. Carrying greeting cards based on customers’ interests is easily accomplished with these specialty card suppliers. Barnyard Friends features cute and cuddly animal greeting cards. With a feminine twist Gina B Designs offers a fun and whimsical side to everyday greeting cards. And who can’t use a bit of humor to brighten their day? Greeting cards from Cute Old Women Stuff features cards especially for women with themes they can relate to on a daily basis. Although they specialize in birthday cards, you’ll find entertaining cards for all occasions. The fun doesn’t stop there. MJ Zoom offers whimsical cards featuring stick figure characters that are a sure fire way to bring cheer to someone’s day.

Looking for a spiritual format with religious and Christian greeting cards? Due Season Word uses a Christian perspective to communicate a spiritual message with original writings and designs. Their cards provide the means to say the right thing at the right time to those in need of a comforting, uplifting or fun word. By the same token, Dear Cards offers a more traditional Christian greeting card that features scenes from nature. Both companies offer spirituality and sentimental messages in clever greeting cards.

People have a driving need to connect with each other. Encourage your customers to “reach out and touch someone” with your line of greeting cards. Providing your customers with convenience and a unique selection of greeting cards promotes loyalty and continuous sales. So connect with your customers and carry greeting cards from these and other FGmarket wholesale greeting cards suppliers.

Contributor: Jill Evans