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As published in
Greetings Magazine
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Personalization at it's best
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Maria Anderson personifies the new consumer that stationery and party stores need to attract. A recently married young account executive with a new house in developing Lancaster, California, she is part of a wave of consumers looking for unique and personal invitations and announcements that even a few years ago would have seemed outlandish. |
Her latest Christmas card illustrates the trend.
"I really wanted this Christmas card to be special" she explains. "It was our first Christmas in our new house. And since this event was important to us, I wanted our Christmas card to convey how special the year had been."
Maria quickly decided that the standard Christmas cards wouldn't do. Too ordinary. But she wasn't happy with the standard alternatives either. "I looked at photo cards on the Net," she remembers, "but they just didn't convey what I wanted to express - I guess they weren't personal enough."
That changed when Maria ran into a retailer on the Net who was using Personalized Expressions, the top imprinting software for the Stationery and Party industries. "One of the girls asked if I had considered sketches rather than photos" Maria relates. "I hadn't of course. But once she said it, a little light bulb in my head turned on. I thought to myself - that might be just the answer!"It turned out it was the answer. Maria's husband, John, enjoys drawing and casual sketching. In short order he had a black and white sketch of their house. Then it was back to the retailer for the final touches. "They had great ideas" Maria says. "They put little lights around the house to give the card color, and then matched the font to the colors of the lights. They even added a line to the back stating that John had created the drawing. It was fantastic. Just what I wanted.
"Maria represents a new wave of consumers says Angie Becerra, vice president of Colors by Design and Personalized Expressions. "Consumers today want something different. And their tastes and demands are constantly changing. As a retailer you have to be prepared to meet your customer's changing demands. If you don't, you won't have a thriving business."Angie is quick to point out that Personalized Expressions is the best program for accomplishing this task. "I don't think anyone seriously questions that PE is the superior software" she says proudly. In her mind there may be substitutes, but most are sadly lacking in one area or another. "The great thing about PE is that it's always changing - adding features and giving retailers more ways to meet and exceed their customer's demands" she says.
In fact PE has evolved so much over the years that Becerra thinks her nearest competitor "is years behind." As evidence she sites the fact that last year Hallmark corporation selected PE as their imprinting software after an extensive review of all the alternatives.And Becerra is quick to point out that PE is not content to rest on its laurels. This year, as in past years, it continues to evolve, perhaps at a faster rate than ever. New for PE this year is a set of photographic card stock and software features that she thinks will knock the socks off both retailers and consumers alike. "Retailers may be amazed to learn they can ghost any image, turn it into a special shape or transform a color photo into a gray or sepia print, and print it on our special photo stock," she says. "but when they discover that with our software they can take a photo, and then tint just one part of it, they'll be amazed" she says laughing. "All that with your invitation software; no other program on the market can match it!"
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