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Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark

By | October 13, 2011, 2:00pm PDT

Summary: The Cards iOS app lets you create and mail personalized greeting cards directly from your iPhone or iPod touch — and it’s putting fear into the hearts of American Greetings and Hallmark as a result.

Remember iCards, the free online greeting cards that Apple once offered via MobileMe? Well forget all that newfangled digital stuff, Apple’s going into the printing and postage business. As part of its parade of apps, Apple has released its vaunted Cards app for iOS (App Store, free).

Cards allows you to easily create and mail personalized greeting cards with your own text and photos, directly from your iPhone or iPod touch. Simply take a photo and create a beautiful letterpress card with a few taps and swipes. The best part is that Apple will print and mail (as in postal) a card to any U.S. address for $2.99 and any foreign address for $4.99 — including postage.

The Cards iOS app is so compelling that American Greetings Corp.’s (NYSE:AM) stock dropped by as much as 10 percent on Tuesday afternoon after Apple announced it. It’s unclear how the Cards announcement affected Hallmark Cards, Inc. as that company is privately held. One thing’s for sure though, it sure beats shopping for a boring, generic card in your local drug store.

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Topics

Card, Parade, Apple Inc., Apple iOS, Mobile Operating Systems, Jason D. O'Grady

Jason O'Grady is a journalist and author specializing in mobile technology. He has published six books on Apple and mobile gadgets and his PowerPage blog has been publishing for over 15 years.

Disclosure

Jason D. O'Grady

Jason D. O'Grady is the creator and editor of O'Grady's PowerPage, which has been publishing mobile technology news since 1995. He maintains an advertising relationship with the following legacy advertisers on the PowerPage:

  • Amazon Associates
  • Google Adsense
  • Tekserve

    • Advertising on the PowerPage is brokered by a third-party agency (BackBeat Media) and he recuses himself from these negotiations.

Biography

Jason D. O'Grady

Jason D. O'Grady developed an affinity for Apple computers after using the original Lisa, and this affinity turned into a bona-fide obsession when he got the original 128 KB Macintosh in 1984.

He started writing one of the first Web sites about Apple (O'Grady's PowerPage) in 1995 and is considered to be one of the fathers of blogging. He has been a frequent speaker at the Macworld Expo conference and a member of the conference faculty. He also co-founded the first dedicated PowerBook User Group (PPUG) in the United States.

After winning a major legal battle with Apple in 2006, he set the precedent that independent journalists are entitled to the same protections under the First Amendment as members of the mainstream media.

O'Grady is the author of The Nexus One Pocket Guide, The Droid Pocket Guide, The Google Phone Pocket Guide, and The Garmin nuvi Pocket Guide (Peachpit Press), the author of Corporations That Changed the World: Apple Inc. (Greenwood Press), and a contributor to The Mac Bible (Peachpit Press). In addition, he has contributed to numerous Mac publications over the years, including MacWEEK, Macworld, and MacPower (Japan).

When he's not writing about Apple for ZDNet at The Apple Core, he enjoys spending time with his family in New Jersey.

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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
suzannerae 15th Oct
A partner with the PO has been doing that for years.
View in thread
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Move along, nothing to see
toddybottom 13th Oct
Just Apple laying waste to more companies.

I, for one, welcome our new overlord.

"The Cards iOS app is so compelling that American Greetings Corp.???s (NYSE:AM) stock dropped by as much as 10 percent on Tuesday afternoon after Apple announced it."
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
msalzberg 13th Oct
@toddybottom

I fully agree. We should always have competition; therefore, Apple shouldn't be allowed to get into any new business.
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We should always have competition
toddybottom 13th Oct
@msalzberg
Glad we agree on that.
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The funny thing about competition ...
jscott69 14th Oct
@msalzberg ... is that sometimes, someone (like Apple) comes along with an idea that makes better sense than the one we have now.

Competition improves the breed.

There's nothing that says Hallmark or American Greetings can't create their own apps and set up printing and distribution to handle them as Apple has done. But the two major card co's have -- thus far -- chosen not to.

Unfortunately, now they're behind the 8-ball, and that's not often a good place to be. But perhaps they could come up with a better plan: they could allow you to pick from any of their gazillion existing cards, create a custom card (like Apple), and perhaps their printing and distribution could be through their local stores, where they could drastically reduce shipping times down to a day, since the cards could be printed and mailed right in the destination city. That would even help keep all their chain stores open.

Disruptive technology can really shake things up.
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
LoverockDavidson_-24231404894599612871915491754222 13th Oct
If someone sent me that I would delete it immediately. Cards are personal and so they better come snailmail with a hand written note and signature.
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Delete it by how? Burn? Trashcan?
Bruizer 13th Oct
@LoverockDavidson_

You do realize this is a snailmail only service?
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
LoverockDavidson_-24231404894599612871915491754222 13th Oct
@Bruizer
No I didn't realize that.
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Don't be blinded by your bias.
msalzberg 13th Oct
@LoverockDavidson_

"Apple will print and mail (as in postal) a card to any U.S. address."
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
LoverockDavidson_-24231404894599612871915491754222 13th Oct
@msalzberg
I must have overlooked that part.
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
msalzberg 13th Oct
@LoverockDavidson_

It was mentioned in the second sentence, and then mentioned again and italicized five sentences later. Easy to overlook.
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Glad I'm not related to you then
Laraine Anne Barker 14th Oct
@LoverockDavidson_
Writing is too flaming painful!
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This is brilliant.
terry flores Updated - 13th Oct
For a while, online greetings cards were interesting, but when they became synonymous with trojans, they fell out of favor. My spam blocker doesn't even let them through anymore.

But a card that you create online and send through the mail is perfect. No security issues, and the recipient gets something they can keep (I have all my birthday cards since I was one year old).

The greeting card companies were already dealing with a drop-off in business anyway, and competition from Chinese knockoffs sold in dollar stores. This is not good news for them unless they develop their own apps pronto.
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
Doctor Demento 13th Oct
@terry flores
Yeah, I don't really buy the idea that Apple making an app means that suddenly an entire industry is wiped out....
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
terry flores Updated - 13th Oct
@Doctor Demento - Wiped out? No. There are many scenarios that still favor physical purchases, like the last-minute card pickup. But the additional loss of revenue can further endanger their profit margins.
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Will Apple allow this?
toddybottom Updated - 13th Oct
@terry flores
"This is not good news for them unless they develop their own apps pronto."

Here is the problem though: Apple probably won't allow their apps into the iTunes ecosystem. Without access to the iTunes ecosystem, their apps will die a painful death. Apple is able to leverage their music and video ecosystem to kill the competition in totally unrelated markets. This is strictly forbidden.
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
dave95. Updated - 13th Oct
@toddybottom

Why would Apple block them? You don't see Apple blocking any other competitors to their iTunes services so why would they block greeting card companies? Rhapsody, Napster, Spodify, Nook, Amazon Kindle....many competitors offer competing apps and services in the App Store. Hallmark already offers a couple of their apps. You can find a couple other eCard apps in there. Nothing's stopping them from offering the same service as Apple.
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Re: C2 PC tournament! EverythingFPS: Server settings update!
sdghkiehj 13th Oct
http://itshrunk.com/7e7cac ....
good to visit
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
dave95. 13th Oct
Sadly I don't see any other company of Apple's stature offering such a service to their users. I can't imagine them getting much revenue out of it (?) but yet they continue to offer it to their users.

Hallmark still have a solid brand name. They can choose to seat back and watch Apple become a threat, in their space. Or they can follow suite with their own service in the app store, leveraging their strong brand. Just make sure Apple gets their 30% cut happy
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Why - only a very small percentage of humans own iPads / iPods...
Timpraetor 14th Oct
I cry FUD ...

My brothers and most of my non-industry friends don't own i-devices. When they want to send a card, they go to the store, buy one, sign it, stamp it, and mail it.

While we, the tech elite,might want to believe that we "are" the world, we're really still a very small minority.
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Excellent point.
jscott69 14th Oct
@Timpraetor So, perhaps this should be a wake-up call to Hallmark and American Greetings to drastically improve their web services and offer custom-printed & (snail-) mailed cards. And they can even create an Android and Windows Phone version.
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
aep528 14th Oct
Hallmark stores have been de-emphasizing cards for years, so I don't know how worried they need to be. Granted, I have no idea if they have a comparable on-line offering. For many types of cards, get well or sympathy cards for example, I much prefer to send a card myself with a hand-written note because it feels more personal.

As a side note, I work for a company that does mobile photo-product ordering, and it is really, really difficult to get the small screen to accurately reflect the final product. Heck, we had the same problem with our big touch-screen kiosks for larger products or goofy aspect ratios. Maybe later I'll download Apple's app just to see how they handled it.
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Glad to see Apple "pushing the envelope" ...
jscott69 14th Oct
Not only is Cards convenient for iOS users, but Apple already has an infrastructure (probably contracted, no doubt) for printing beautiful books from iPhoto and this probably gives them another way to leverage that for even more profit.

And it's another example of products that leave you scratching your head wondering: Why hasn't anyone done this before?

Of course, I'd hate to see Hallmark or American Greetings go under because of this. But they have strong brands and haven't lost the market (yet), so if they respond wisely, I'm sure they'll do fine.

In the meantime, Apple has once again given us a great example of the kinds of business can be built atop the iOS platform, when you think outside the box.
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Personally I prefer receiving a Jacquie Lawson card
Laraine Anne Barker 14th Oct
to anything from Hallmark et al, whose stuff is way too expensive.
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RE: Cards for iOS puts Apple in the snail mail biz; pits it against American Greetings and Hallmark
suzannerae 15th Oct
A partner with the PO has been doing that for years.

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