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Take Three...
The Personal Touch There are other bird, bovine, hippo and canine-branded personalised card websites cooing, snorting and woofing out in cyber space already, but brother and sister team, graduates Dom and Geri Copsey, sensed a few years ago that there was a gap in the market for matching personalised cards and giftwrapping paper (with personal photo uploads). So, with the help of their dad who runs a printing business, DomandGeri.com was borne. Geri: “It’s been interesting for us to watch the rise in the personalisation market over the last couple of Above: Some of the personalised years. These days you can pretty much personalise anything! I think that there is a genuine demand for people to customise giftwrap (and cards) available from Domandgeri.com for all occasions. as much as they can as a lot of customers like to get their hands on something unique. Now, having the ability, through Below left: Dom and Geri have created a personalised matching Domandgeri.com, to customise your own cards and matching wrapping paper can make any occasion extra special. card and giftwrap concept. The last 12 months have been fantastic and superseded our expectations with what we could achieve so quickly. Our personalised giftwrapping paper has even been featured on ITV, The Gadget Show and reality series The Only Way Is Essex. The latter part of this year and into 2017 will see us branch out further into the offline space with personalised wrapping paper pop-up shops. We’ve already had some great feedback from these and, as our wrapping paper prints in just a few minutes, it means customers can buy there and then and take their order home the same day!” Dom: “Geri’s expertise lies with the creative design - she’s always coming up with new card and wrapping paper designs for different occasions. My focus is on the marketing side of the business and growing the brand organically. Dad helps out too and we have a busy office near Leeds where we print personalised cards, wrapping paper and party banners.” Positives Of This Alternative Path - Dom: “Being an online retailer, we can keep overheads low and ensure that there is a greater focus on customer care. An important element for us as a personalised greetings company is to ensure we can also personalise our customer service too. We now have nearly 2,000 positive reviews on Trustpilot - that’s a lot of happy customers! Our customers seem to like the fact that when they order from us they will often receive an email direct from one of us – Dom or Geri! As recent graduates, we’re now working full-time at DomandGeri.com; we’ve got big plans for 2017 and beyond!”
Box Of Delights Papergang is a monthly subscription box for paper lovers brought to you by the team at Ohh Deer. It was a concept created to allow Ohh Deer to express their deep-rooted obsession with papery goods and create a real sense of community. Katie Ford, communications coordinator for Ohh Deer, reveals how this unique greeting card concept works: “Each month our 'Papergangsters' receive a box filled with brilliant stationery and other paper products. The product selection always varies but could include: Notebooks, greeting cards, post it notes, art prints and desk accessories. We wanted the box to be accessible and affordable, and it's really great value for money being priced at just £9.95 + shipping, with the contents being worth at least double the price of the box each month. Each month really varies. We often start by deciding a theme and then from this we decide if any illustrators would be suited. We also do a lot of the design in-house too. It's a great platform for illustrators as their work is sent out to thousands of our subscribers and each box contains a detailed card describing who the products were designed by.” Positives Of This Alternative Path: “From a business perspective the subscription model is great as it's reliable and fairly predictable. When we first started, it was hard to predict how subscribers would react and it's always a learning curve but you soon get to understand what customers want. It's also a great way of trialing and experimenting with new designs, illustrators and products. We really feel as though it's created a great feeling of community around the brand, we call our subscribers 'Papergangsters' and when they join they receive a woven patch of the leader of the papergang - his name is Drew. We also encourage our customers to post their ‘unboxings’ on social media and it creates a real buzz. And additionally, we make sure a selection of the products our Papergangsters receive are exclusive for a period of time, and then these are added to our main website a while later.” Above: Lots of lovely stationery items inside a Papergang box for Ohh Derr's Papergangsters. Left: Unveiling the paper goodies inside a Papergang box from Ohh Deer. PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
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