Greeting card stores thrive after attacks

CNY Business Journal (1996+), Oct 26, 2001 by Kropf, Annemarie

When tragedy strikes, some businesses flounder and some thrive. The greeting-card retail business exemplifies the latter.

"We've been fine," says Dianna Henkle, manager of Matthew's Hallmark Shop in Utica. "We haven't had any negatives at all."

Henkle says that within the first week after the attacks, "thinking of you" cards rose 20 percent. Sympathy cards rose five percent which she says is a decent increase.

Along with the store's location inside Sangertown Square in New Hartford, Henkle says that selling patriotic merchandise, such as T-shirts, candles, and stickers, helps the business.

Darcy Poole, manager of Tracy's Hallmark Shop in Ithaca Mall, says that her store has been selling out of some flagrelated products. In addition to flag pins, she also sells apparel.

"For the month of October, we've been doing really well," Poole says. "Patriotic merchandise has done really well. We've sold out of T-shirts."

Poole says that while customers are shopping for sympathy cards, she is selling more gifts, such as stuffed animals, than anything else in the store. She declined to mention what percentage of sales cards made up.

"We have a lot of gifts people can buy," she says, "so we're not worried about the holiday season."

At Balloons Over Syracuse in the Galleries Mall in Syracuse, gifts sit on the shelves while cards fly off the racks.

"We've seen an increase in cards, but people have stopped buying anything else," says Joe Walker, owner of Balloons Over Syracuse and 69 Cent Card Outlet.

Walker says that the sale of stuffed animals and party goods is down 70 percent, but card sales are up 50 percent. In 1998, the company became the first store in the United States to sell one million cards in one year, but Walker says that number has significantly increased.

"Probably over the last three to four weeks, that number [one million] has almost doubled," he says. "We sold 3,000 cards a day and now sell 5,000 cards a day."

Popular cards include birthdays, getwell, and "keep in touch" cards. "These were all things we were too busy to do a month ago," he says, "but now we are finding the time to do them."

Walker says that before the terrorist attacks, it was mostly middle-aged and older women buying cards. Now, he says, it's everybody.

"Everyone grew up at the same time," he says. "People are making life more important instead of their jobs. ...The faceless person on the other end of the phone is not as important as the person who knows your wife's name is Vicki and she just celebrated her 50th birthday."

In addition to selling cards, Walker also does balloons for special events. One creation is the American flag out of balloons. "Anything red, white, and blue is very big right now," he says.

Though Walker says he has always sold patriotic merchandise, he doesn't agree with others who suddenly began to carry such items after the attack.

"If it was something else, they'd be jumping on the bandwagon."