22-23_muk.qxp_Layout 1 15/08/2019 12:35 Page 22
CARDSHARP
Redef ining Dictionary Def initions Antidisestablishmentarianism. For some reason that word, the longest in the English Dictionary, popped into Cardsharp’s head recently. It was coined in the 19th century to describe opposition to the political movement for disestablishment of the Church of England from the British State. As to why it came into Cardsharp’s brain may be something to do with hearing of the plans for the Greeting Card Association’s 100th Anniversary celebrations thereby prompting thoughts on the industry’s history, or it could be down to watching new Dragon, Sara Davies, breathe her own fire in the Den of the BBC TV series. Cardsharp shuts the dictionary and attempts to define the current ‘establishment’ in the greeting card sector. The BBC’s Dragons’ Den is not Cardsharp’s regular Sunday night viewing. To his mind, after so many years, the format of the TV programme has become a bit stale. Most of the businesses or protobusinesses entering ‘the Den’ in the later series seemed more interested in drumming up publicity than genuinely seeking to grow into substantial concerns. But unable to miss all the advance publicity that there was to be a young dynamic female Dragon joining the established fire breathers, Cardsharp was intrigued, especially as she has a connection to the card sector. New Dragon Sara Davies is a 34 year-old selfconfessed “Straight Talking Geordie Lass”, who started her business at the age of 19 while still at university. And what’s more she has made her estimated £35 million fortune indirectly through greeting cards.
22
PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
vigour made the other established Dragons seem very grizzled. Adorned resplendently in pink high heels, she described one suitor’s ideas as “All fur coat and no knickers” as she joshed with fellow Dragon, Touker Suleyman, referring to him jokingly as “Uncle Toukey”. What Sara was doing, whether wittingly or unwittingly, was breaking the mould, taking on an ‘Establishment’, and in the process becoming part of a new ‘Establishment’.
Above: New Dragon, Sara Davies. Right: PG Live’s lunch hall was sponsored and decorated by Tache and Louise Tiler, two publishers who only started five years ago.
As a student she had spotted the huge popularity of greeting card crafting as a hobby and so developed a device for home envelope making. Since then the ‘Crafting Queen’, the moniker the show’s producers have now given her, has sold millions of these devices around the world, not to mention all the other accoutrements for the home crafter brigade to make cards at home - or, at least fill up the stash in ‘back bedrooms’ throughout the UK for well intentioned creative projects. Anyhow, to Cardsharp’s mind, Sara’s appearance on the programme is like a breath of fresh dragon’s fire. Her relative youth and
‘The Establishment’ is a term used to describe a dominant group or authority in a nation, organisation or a market. The Establishment’s influence is said to be dominant within this. It is a term that can be used as an insult or plaudit, depending on whether you are a member or on the outside of ‘it’. The greeting card publishing fraternity has always had a form of Establishment at the top. In the 1970s, and until the late 1980s, it was the pin-suited greeting card publishers that occupied that position.