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When you spot an opportunity in the market, true entrepreneurs keep the idea to themselves while enlisting the support of experts who can help facilitate their venture. This was most definitely the approach Emma Cooper took with her Cards of Kindness greeting card publishing concept, persuading Woodmansterne Publications to share their inner most workings. PG found out more about this plucky nine year old with a passion to start a greeting card company.
Emma Cooper has wisdom beyond her years. Despite having been on this planet for less than a decade, she is not only conversant in the power of greeting cards and what subject matter is like to hit the spot with consumers, but also sees the sense in keeping her embryonic business plan well away from her peers at least until it is more fully fledged. As head of one of the UK’s leading card publishers, Seth Woodmansterne, managing director of Woodmansterne Publications receives a fair amount of post connected to
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the third generation card publishing business which he now heads up, but one hand written envelope attracted his attention recently, asking to be opened before the computer generated statements, invoices, and direct mail items. “It was a great example of the power of a handwritten envelope of which we in the greeting card industry do well to remind ourselves,” Seth, a Above: The first letter Emma sent to the Woodmansterne team, that only the stone-hearted would have ignored. Below: Card publisher of the future, Emma Cooper in the Woodmansterne design studio with designer Rachel Hyde. Right The cute thank you letter Emma sent to Woody following her visit.
member of the UK Greeting Card Association, stressed to PG. The envelope contained a prospective submission, nothing new there as Woodmansterne receives them every day from artists and illustrators. The difference with Emma’s one, was that it was couched as a business proposition, one with such heart and soul that it could not be ignored. In a tidy handwriting style that would certainly beat most doctors, and those in the greeting card sector for that matter, Emma stated her intention: ‘I would like to create a card business named Cards of Kindness’ elaborating that she envisaged the designs would be animal-based, suitable for main sending occasions. Submitting two of her prototype designs, Emma’s main request was that Woodmansterne would consider publishing them as cards, in return for which she would give some money to charity as well as a credit to the company. Seemingly well aware of the importance of ‘sealing the deal’, Emma confidently pressed for a prompt response from Woody. And, it was a full slam dunk for this talented youngster, as it was not long before she and her dad Mark were invited to Woodmansterne’s Watford HQ and given the red carpet treatment, with Emma and her