Happy Anniversary!

"Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes.  How do you measure, measure a year?"  In case you don't recognize the lyrics, they are from the song "Seasons of Love" in the musical Rent.  The musical and this particular song have always been among my favorites.

Today is the one year anniversary of "A Plethora of Postcards".   First post was July 5, 2009.  So how does one measure a year?  Well, here are a couple ways:

1.  By the number of posts:  The original goal was to post a postcard a day for a year.  As of today (before this post), 354 posts have been logged - not quite 365. There was one planned lapse (my three week trip in April) and one technology-induced lapse over Christmas. I did miss a very few days either because I forgot, or because I was having fun and got home too late.

2.  By the variety of subjects as measured by the tags:  I've attempted to add labels for every post, although I haven't been completely consistent.   A look at the labels shows 22 labels for the Mystery Sender, 15 for California, 12 for Mexico, 10 each for Christmas, colleges, and Postcard Friendship Friday, nine for New York and New York City, eight for England, seven each for Florida, France, Spain, and bucket list, six each for Morocco, Oregon, and Portugal, and five each for China, Fez, London, the Olympics, Paris, Postcrossing, road trips, Thanksgiving, and San Francisco. A marketer or an anthropologist might be able to draw a variety of conclusions about a person whose interests/choices appear as above.  Or not.

3.  By the readers:  There are 45 of you who have registered as "followers".  I appreciate every one of you, some of whom I know and some I don't.  I know some of my friends and relatives show up, perhaps daily, perhaps occasionally, and I always like it when someone mentions having read something of interest here.

4.  By the providers of the content:  There are a host of regular postcard providers including my Mom, the Mystery Sender, my friend Julie who takes the most exotic trips, my friends Chris & Noel who faithfully send cards when they think of it, my friend Yolanda who lives in China right now, my friend Paula who travels a lot, my old friend Rachel in Chicago who always sends something fun [I'm feeling like I am giving an Academy Award speech and am going to forget someone important], my friends Jack and Lorry who send postcards and who support me no matter what hairbrained project I'm up to, my friends Paul and Gayle with whom I pick peaches although we haven't found any peach postcards yet, my new friends and fellow postcard people Chris, Christine, and Sheila, and finally all the folks who participate in Postcrossing and Postcard Friendship Friday.  Phew.  And everybody else who sends me postcards, regularly or not.  Thank you to everyone and for every postcard!

5.  By the amount of time keeping the cards in order:  The sheer volume of postcards and keeping them sorted and choosing which card to post is a challenge.   I am starting to understand why postcard people specialize, whether in bridges or painters or transportation methods or hotels or time periods.

By any measure, it's been great for me.  I've enjoyed the commitment, I've learned about a whole sub-culture of people I never knew existed, I've practiced writing, and I hope I've entertained you to a certain extent.

The question now is, what next?    I'd love any input.

In the meantime, postcards pandering to the old adage "sex sells".

Mystery Sender Makes A Point

The mystery sender's postcards often make me laugh out loud.

At first I thought this was a postcard for the Blue Man Group, who I've not seen perform. Rather, it is an ad for a Colourings Make-up Studios in the Body Shop in four of their New York locations, offering a free professional makeover

S/he complains that on many advertising postcards, there is not enough room on the back to write a message. And to prove the point, sends the same card twice, #1 of 2, and #2 of 2. I've only posted the front once. Definitely true when the postcard is used for a specific promotional purpose; not necessarily true when they are picked up on a postcard rack, where the advertiser hopes the postcard might be used in a non-digital form of viral marketing.

Jimmy's Kitchen Hong Kong

Jimmy's Kitchen & Landau's still exist in Hong Kong, but I have no recollection of ever being in either. At first I thought I had perhaps just picked the postcard up at an advertising rack somewhere. However, my note to myself tells me otherwise - one of the restaurants was in the same building as Saatchi & Saatchi Hong Kong, where I was meeting. A quick address check of all three would suggest that this is no longer the case.

I must have gone to Hong Kong on business five or six times, but the best was when I stayed over the weekend to be with my friends Paula and Menis who were living there at the time.

One night, while out to dinner in Wan Chai, we had a long discussion of what sounded like a mythical creature: Hong Kong Elvis. Sure enough, after we left the restaurants, we literally bumped right into him. Much hilarity ensued. Check out this video of him. I can't believe he's still wandering the streets!

Postcard Advertising - Mr. Jenkins

Found. Mr. Jenkins postcards, from a famous Tanqueray Gin ad campaign in the 90s. A month ago, I mentioned Mr. Jenkins when I featured Mel, Mr. Jenkins' female and vodka counterpart in a previous posting on postcard advertising.

This eccentric, celebrity-like, but not celebrity, endorser is very much the precursor of "The Most Interesting Man in the World” campaign, currently running for Dos Equis Beer. Both appeal to a potentially aspirational male self-perception: Mr. Jenkins as bon vivant, sipping on gin martinis in a variety of manly or semi-manly situations; TMIMITW, as suave machismo. Both do an incredible job using subtle exaggeration which activates the smallest seeds of desire and admiration we often aren't even aware exist. The big difference is the "Mr. Jenkins" campaign only used billboards and postcards, while "TMIMITW" campaign started as radio (by far the best ads) and expanded to national television. Big difference in $$$$$.

A note on postcard advertising: I was convinced that postcard advertising had all but disappeared. But, this weekend I was in Hood River, Oregon. There, in the local coffee place, was a rack with postcards advertising a variety of local businesses. The medium lives!

Postcard Advertising - Museums in NYC

More postcard advertising, all collected in New York City in the 90s. In this case, ads for a variety of museums. How better to reach potential prospects who like to be out and about by speaking to them when they are out and about in bars, restaurants, and coffee shops?

Postcard Advertising - Hong Kong

Two from Hong Kong, one for ribbed condoms, one for a graphic designer and stylist.

I like the message on the back of the condom ad, graciously greyed down so you can write your own message over it.

Postcard Advertising

Here are two examples of postcard advertising from the 90s.

In bars, restaurants and coffee shops in major cities around the world were mounted postcard racks (usually in the halls outside the bathrooms) with free postcards advertising any number of products/services. It was a great idea, and an early example of viral advertising - a company distributes free postcards, usually with an interesting graphic, provocative message or, at minimum, extension of an existing ad campaign, and you pay out of your own pocket to mail it to other potential consumers (a.k.a. your friends).

A quick look for this company, Maxracks, suggests that the company continues to exist, but only to send virtual postcards. Now that I think of it, I haven't seen any of these racks in a while with the exception of in a Pasta Pomodoro, which had their own postcards only in these racks.

The postcards below, Mel for Tanqueray and Altoids "Curiously Strong", were both extensions of big, visible ad campaigns at the time.

Mel for Tanqueray Vodka was an extension of the more famous "Mr. Jenkins" campaign for Tanqueray Gin, but not nearly as interesting. Mr. Jenkins was quite popular. I remember one headline which read something like, "Mr. Jenkins regreted the demise of the macrame bikini" (may not have been exactly that, but close enough). In fact, Mr. Jenkins in many ways is the father of the current campaign for Dos Equis beer - "the most interesting man in the world". Mr. Jenkins had a very similar personality.

The Altoids campaign ran initially on bus shelters, with a number of different versions, all with the "Curiously Strong" tag line, all a lot of fun. This campaign really made that product the ubiquitous mint it is today.