DECATUR - Americans are in the process of mailing themselves 1.9 billion Christmas cards, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Given this paper white-out of Victorian firesides, snowy landscapes, carolers, Christmas trees and even the occasional nativity, it's increasingly tough to make anyone notice your particular festive missive.
Unless you've got a bit of psychological edge, that is, like the Finn Group. Industrial and organizational psychologists James Finn and his wife, Paula, have re-thought the traditional Christmas card approach and unwrapped something special. Their Yuletide greetings come inside cards emblazoned with custom, thoughtful artwork and are as much anticipated as presents under the tree.
Each year, their office on Decatur's northern edge pours forth a bounty of more than 300 cards that wing their way into the hearts of business customers, colleagues, family and friends.
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"Do we look forward to them? Absolutely," said Ryan Aupperle, co-owner of Forsyth-based Heartland Ag Group, a farm management and real estate business and sometime-customer of the Finn Group.
"The Finns go out of their way to make a personal touch on whatever they do, and the cards are just a signature of theirs. I remember last year's card, which was a drawn silhouette of both of them. That was a classic Finn touch."
Any company would like to have customers talking about them that way, which shows the Finns' approach is working. The couple's business model is complex, but basically, they provide services ranging from career counseling and personal development to hiring and promotion and organizational consulting and psychological trouble-shooting to companies big and small.
"What we offer is a service, not a product, and what we have to sell is our expertise," Paula Finn said. "It's not the sort of thing where we can say to a customer at Christmas, 'We make these so, here, have some'. What we do is much more abstract, but the Christmas cards are a way to let customers and friends know we are thinking about them and that we care."
Stock images from a box of store-bought cards don't spell "caring" loudly enough for the Finns. So, every year, they spend a chunk of time hunting up ideas and commissioning art to grace their personalized Christmas greetings. The couple's silhouette drawings last year, for example, were done by a Chinese artist the Finns discovered at an Arts in Central Park event in downtown Decatur.
"Her work just caught our eye as being perfect for us," said James Finn, who is easily recognizable on the Christmas card artwork by his stubbly hair. "Paula and I are both pretty artistic and creative people, and there is a lot of fun for us in designing the cards and making them special."
Pretty much anything visually appealing goes. In one year, the bright Santa-red Volkswagen Turbo Beetle that Paula Finn drives wound up decorating several different card versions in different ways: one card had a picture of the car withan illustrated Christmas tree on the roof; another suggested cleverly the car's swoopy shape with a series of crimson curves.
All bore the message "Jingle Bug � Jingle Bug" and continued the theme inside with "Oh, what fun it is to ride in a RED horse open sleigh � "
Other cards have Christmas ornaments with timely messages, like "Celebrating 10 Years of Service" when the now 14-year-old company was marking it's first decade, while yet others sport paired illustrations that reflect a theme of partners married in life and business: two little decorated Christmas trees, for example, or an elegant drawing of a couple wrapped-up snug in a heart-decorated sleigh robe taking a winter excursion.
The Finn cards draw recipients in like a personal note, offering a smile that makes people stop what they're doing and remember them. The only drawback is that, having done custom cards for most of their years in business, their clients and friends won't let them take a year off.
"We tried it one year when we bought stock cards instead because we ran out of time," James Finn said. "We got a lot of feedback from people saying, 'Well, where is your Christmas card? How come I got this Christmas card, which is not your Christmas card?' I tell you, once this got started, it's been like a snowball rolling downhill with its own momentum; people want it to continue."
And more and more people appear to be setting their own snowballs in motion, according to Sue Watts, manager of the William Street Press printers. William Street handles the Finns' custom card printing and design work, and Watts has seen increasing numbers of business customers going down the custom card route.
"I think the cards present a much better image; it looks like you care," Watts said. "And, like with the Finns, it's a goodwill gesture toward the end of the year. People notice things like that."
Most customers, however, order anywhere from 25 to 50 cards, as opposed to the Finn blizzard running into the hundreds. But anyone lucky enough to find just one psychological original waiting in the mailbox might want to hang on to it as a future collector item: An example of the world's first Christmas card, commissioned by a British businessman in 1843, sold for more than $37,000 back in 2001.
Holiday shipping bits
UPS Inc., the world's largest shipping carrier, expects to deliver roughly 22 million small packages on its busiest day this year - projected to be Dec. 21.
UPS, based in Atlanta, said that's about a 40 percent increase over normal daily delivery volumes.
It said that for the entire holiday season, stretching from Thanksgiving to Christmas, it expects to deliver roughly 400 million packages around the world, up slightly compared to the 2008 holiday season.
Here are some U.S. Postal Service holiday facts.
16.6 billion - The number of cards, letter and packages to be delivered between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
2.11 billion - Number of vehicles used to transport holiday mail, including 142,000 half-ton trucks.
839 million - Number of pieces of mail processed on Dec. 14, the busiest mailing day of the year.
30 million - In pounds, the amount of mail the Postal Service will process for overseas military installations, including war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan.
234 - Number of years the U.S. Postal Service has been delivering holiday cheer.
Important dates to remember if you want your letters and packages to arrive before Christmas.
Dec. 4 - Military mail destined for Iraq and Afghanistan.
Dec. 16 -Parcel Post
Dec. 21 - First-class mail
Dec. 23 - Express mail
For more information about delivery service and deadlines, go to:
