Greeting Cards

A greeting card does something a postcard can't: it opens. Four printed faces — front cover, inside left, inside right, and back — give you a cover that earns the open, an interior that carries the message, and a piece substantial enough that people stand it on a shelf instead of dropping it in the recycling. That is why cards are the format for the moments that are supposed to feel personal: a holiday greeting, a thank-you, a donor acknowledgment, an appointment reminder that reads like a note rather than a notice. Because they are printed on heavy cover stock, the fold is not just a crease — the sheet is scored first so the coating bends cleanly instead of cracking along the spine.

Size is the first decision, and every option here is a single-fold card measured at its finished, folded size. A2 (4.25 x 5.5) is the compact note-and-thank-you card; A6 (4.75 x 6.5) is the all-purpose greeting that suits most holiday and acknowledgment mail; and A7 (5 x 7) is the roomy invitation and photo card with the most cover to work with. Custom trims are available when a program needs its own size. The flat sheet before folding runs twice the finished width and folds once down the center, and each finished size is built to slip into its matching announcement envelope — the A7 card into an A7 envelope, and so on — so the card and the thing that mails it are designed as a set.

Stock and coating set how the card feels in the hand and how the inside behaves. The cover weights are 100lb Gloss Cover, 100lb Cover, and 14pt — all heavy enough to stand up and score cleanly, with a different hand to each. Coating is your call: AQ on both sides gives durable, crisp color that survives the mailstream, while None / Uncoated leaves an inside that takes a pen, so a signature, a handwritten line, or a personal note reads as genuinely written rather than printed. On heavy cover, the score line is what keeps a coated fold from cracking, and preflight checks that the score, the bleed, and the safe area all land correctly across the fold before anything runs.

Printing can be 4/0 Full Color Front Only, when the cover carries the design and the inside stays clean for a message, or 4/4 Full Color Both Sides, when all four faces are in play. Either way, variable data personalizes the program in a single pass: the inside message can address the recipient by name, and the same list drives the address on the envelope, so the card that says "Dear Sarah" arrives in an envelope addressed to Sarah. That is what turns a card from a keepsake into a mailable, trackable program — personalized donor thank-yous, patient recall reminders, and customer loyalty touches that each land looking one-to-one.

Every card order runs the same disciplined path as our largest mailings. Your artwork is preflighted for fold marks and score placement, bleed, resolution, and the safe area across the spine; the list is CASS-standardized, NCOA-updated, and deduplicated; the envelopes are addressed with the variable data, the cards are scored, folded, and inserted, and the job is entered Full-Service with an Intelligent Mail barcode for the automation discount and tracking as the mail moves. Reorders start from the saved artwork sized to the exact product it ran on, so next year's holiday drop matches this year's without re-setup.

A greeting card mails as a First-Class or Marketing Mail letter inside its envelope, so the postage rules live on the envelope, not on the card itself. The finished A2, A6, and A7 folded cards drop into matching announcement envelopes that fall inside USPS letter dimensions, and the envelope carries the addressing: a clean address block, a return address, postage or an indicia in the upper right, and an unobstructed barcode clear zone across the lower edge so automation can read and sort every piece. For mail that is meant to feel personal — holiday cards, thank-yous, donor acknowledgments, appointment reminders — a live First-Class stamp and a printed indicia both work, and qualifying nonprofits can send acknowledgments at Nonprofit Marketing Mail rates when the volume and content qualify. We address the envelope with the same variable data that personalizes the card, enter the job Full-Service with an Intelligent Mail barcode for the automation discount and end-to-end tracking, and price a First-Class stamped drop against a presorted letter from your actual list so you see the real trade between the personal touch and the postage.

• Folded finished sizes: A2 (4.25x5.5), A6 (4.75x6.5), and A7 (5x7), plus custom trims — each is a single-fold card
• Cover stocks: 100lb Gloss Cover, 100lb Cover, and 14pt — all heavy enough to stand and score cleanly
• Coating: AQ on both sides for durable color, or None / Uncoated when you want the inside to take a pen or a signature
• Printing: 4/0 full color front only, or 4/4 full color on all four faces
• Heavy cover is scored before folding; preflight checks the score line so the fold doesn't crack the coating
• Variable data personalizes the inside message and the envelope address in the same program
• Mails as a letter inside a matching announcement envelope; the envelope carries the address block and barcode clear zone
• Qualifying nonprofits can send acknowledgments at Nonprofit Marketing Mail rates; reorders start from saved artwork