'Love You' Cards Cost More
ANN ARBOR NEWS PHOTOS BY JACK STUBBS
Reporter Mary Jo Staples Ponders Choice Of Valentine’s Day Cards
‘Love You’ Cards Cost More
By Mary Jo Staples
(News Staff Reporter)
If you waited until today to buy a Valentine greeting — don’t feel guilty. Last-minute card shoppers are in the majority.
Almost 70 per cent of the Valentine cards sold are purchased during the week prior to Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14, according to Dorothy Hutchinson, buyer for gifts, cards and stationary at a downtown card store.
Mrs. Hutchinson adds, “The $1 cards sell very well — particularly the day before — it’s a last resort.”
Although the store-bought cards may not be as personal as those red-construction-paper hearts of grade school, verses are available to suit almost every relationship — from sweetheart and mother to godfather or ex-beau.
“Personal expression” cards are the most popular this year, Mrs. Hutchinson says. For 50 or 90 cents the buyer can select from more than a dozen mood pictures of lovers embracing, swans, sunrises or “I Love You” messages.
For the verse, there are another dozen or so phrases or sentences to choose from, including: “Love speaks always but not always in words” and “Love is reaching . . . touching . . . discovering.”
Card stores used to pick out their selections individually. But even the Valentine business is not exempt from the computer’s pragmatism. Selections are made according to previous inventories and sales on the basis of the number of cards sold in the father, mother, sweetheart or cousin category.
There is an increasing number of cards with black persons featured in the design. Mrs. Hutchinson says her store began to carry the cards because of an increased demand.
Humorous cards are ever-popular. For the modest romantic, Lucy from the Peanuts clan says on one card: “It’s Valentine’s Day . . . And I can offer you a gorgeous face, lots of charm, plenty of personality, beautiful, shiny hair and the prettiest eyes in the world.”
Another card features a waif in pigtails, asserting “I may not be sexy but I’m sincere.”
Does the increased prices for cards, which formerly would have cost 20 or 25 cents and now cost at least a dime more, deter would-be cupids? Mrs. Hutchinson says: “No, it’s just like everything else. They complain but they still buy them.”
A few dime and 15 cards can be found if the buyer looks at the back of the card before considering the design or message.
For persons who want to give a message of love in a more lasting form than a card, small books of Valentine verses and large posters featuring various symbols of love are available.
Two high school students were among the reflective buyers yesterday who mused over the exact meanings of each word and how the messages might be interpreted.
One suggested they chip in and buy a Valentine for an acquaintance at school and put it in his locker without signing it.
As one teen-ager commented: “He’ll go crazy figuring who it is from. He’ll think somebody likes him.”
Jack Walsh, a retired printer at The News, also was selecting cards for his favorite Valentines. He said he was sending cards to his niece and two other ‘young lady’ friends who work at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital. “I get a kick out of sending these crazy cards,” Walsh explained.
One humorous card he selected read: “Valentine, You Turn Me On.” And on the inside it concluded: “After That, I'm Fully Automatic.”