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State of the Nation
Inset: The good ship Greeting Cards is in full sail on the high seas!
BATTLING THE ELEMENTS ‘Steady as she goes’ was the nautical metaphor of the annual State of the Nation article in last year’s PG February edition. Back then, with memories of Covid fading fast, the greeting card industry was generally cautiously optimistic about the industry’s prospects for the coming year. So fast forward 12 months, and to continue the briny theme, the industry finds itself facing somewhat stormy conditions, battling many violent gusts coming from many different angles and yet remarkably remaining on a steady course. The ongoing uncertainty of the future of Royal Mail, the inflation busting increase in the cost of stamps and a continuing decline in retail footfall have presented three hefty headwinds for the UK greeting card industry in the last year. On the retail front, unlike 2023 when Paperchase went bust and disappeared as a standalone high street retailer, there were no major retail casualties in our sector during 2024, although a worrying number of independents seem to have had enough and are throwing in the towel. However, the comments from both multiple and independent retailers about trading this Christmas have largely been positive (see Viewpoints pages 29-33). In fact, in many cases, the positive nature of trading for cardies, with flippant headlines announcing the demise of Christmas cards being way off the mark. The work that the GCA has done in regard to dealing with Royal Mail uncertainties has been incredible, as was the huge amount of positive publicity that our industry achieved in the national media prior to 34 PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
Above: The battle continues for the industry to safeguard Royal Mail services and keep stamp prices acceptable to the consumer. Left: The GCA’s Cardmitment has worked wonders to promote card sending, thanks to widespread industry engagement.
Christmas as well as the widespread engagement with its overarching Cardmitment campaign. Looking at the UK economy generally, the economic situation is not great. Growth seems to have stalled. Rachel Reeves’ first Budget has had a damaging effect on business confidence and investment with inflation remaining stubbornly high, preventing the interest rate cuts that could give the economy a boost. There is talk of a return to stagflation, a combination of no growth accompanied by above target price rises. More pessimistic commentators are even mooting the possibility of a technical recession, in other words, two quarters of negative growth. While this seems unlikely, it will certainly be a tough couple of months for the economy before the increases in public spending announced in last October’s Budget feed through and hopefully give the economy a bit of a boost. But looking at the general retail scene, some 13,500 retail stores closed their doors for good in 2024, a 28% increase on the 10,500 who shut in 2023. This is lower than the closure figures from 2019 and