Kiva Postcards

[Guest]

.

[cpbailey]

Hey,

Some of these photos are gorgeous.  I was thinking that postcards might be a really neat way to reach people.  In volume, they would probably be fairly affordable.  Teachers could use them on bulletin boards or to write to students (sometimes teachers send a postcard before the school year starts). 

If they came packages of a dozen with 3-6 different photos, there would be variety. 

Another option would be Christmas or greeting cards.

Colette

[QueenOfHearts]

I agree Colette...either postcards with the variety you are talking about or ever packets of small note cards with a blank inside that you could use for any occasion.

Queen

[Henry]

something else to consider is www.amazingmail.com  where you can upload the picture and create a postcard from there to send out.... ( I love amazingmail.com )  the quality of the finished product is fantastic.  I send party invitations out from them frequently and once did my christmas cards.. oh...and my condiment of the month club gift I sent out two christmas ago.    Pretty card with pictures of nice condiments on it.....  then it said  "to receive your gift, go to your nearest fast food restaurant and pick up your condiments"   LOL! 

[Diane R]

Maybe it's possible to use an on-demand printing site of some sort (with a link from the online Kivastore?) to order printing of a set of blank notecards with the 12 calendar photos on it?  Or even offer several collections for buyers' choices.

--Diane.

[Jill]

         I really liked your idea of postcards, or some kind of cards, Colette.  There are so So many wonderful pictures.   
As wonderful as the Calendar, hopefully, will be, it's going to be a killer for each of us to look at it
and think about all the pics we loved that couldn't be included. 
I'm wondering if there's anyone who either knows or
who would be willing to explore whether it would be cost-feasible
 to get as many as two hundred (or even more) different Entrepreneur photos made into cards. 
They'd have to be cheap, individually, to make what I'm talking about worthwhile.
(Your original idea could cost more and still be worth it and a neat addition).
       
          I thought back to my tomboy childhood, when I spent hours and hours and hours playing with my baseball cards. 
That was when baseball was and deserved to be "America's Pastime," and when the Dodgers were kings! 
Then, a generation or two later, it was kids absolutely totally engrossed with their Pokemon cards.
       
           Now we're supposed to be grownups, but in addition to their "function-ability"as media of correspondence and,
like the calendars, as an irresistible (we think) introduction/invitation to Kiva,
why not, if it's feasible and they'd be high quality,
at least for Kiva fanatics, parents who want to enrich their kids' minds, and for teachers in their schoolrooms,
     
      Why not have a big big selection available for "collection-building" purposes,
and for using, like the really old-fashioned "calling cards",
where you can leave one
at any friend's, acquaintance's, or relative's house or place of business we happen to stop by?
       
             You could use them like playing cards and play games like "Go Fish" and "Concentration" with them.   
You could encourage parents and teachers to get a slug of cards along with a big map of the world
and brainstorm all kinds of geography, cultural, history, current events and other educational subjects that could be explored or made more enticing, starting, at least in the beginning, merely by introducing kids to our Entrepreneur cards and a map.
       
          If somebody else would be willing to do some of the investigating and legwork, 
if it wouldn't be too expensive to get samples, I'd be happy to contribute to a "Let's Check It Out" fund
to explore the quality and potential of the idea.
     
          As I was writing that, it occurred to me that
it would probably be A VERY VERY GOOD IDEA
TO HOLD OFF ON DOING ANYTHING ABOUT THIS, assuming anyone's interested, 
UNTIL WE'VE COMPLETED THE CALENDAR PROJECT, but then,
AFTER.........

[Steff]

I have ordered blank notecards from Heifer International and use them for birthday, anniversary etc.  I would definitely order Kiva cards.
Steff

[chris]

I'm wondering if there's anyone who either knows or who would be willing to explore whether it would be cost-feasible to get as many as two hundred (or even more) different Entrepreneur photos made into cards. 

200 would be a minimum order.... for 1000, you'd be looking at about $0.10 each.

The problem is, they would be 1000 of the same postcard.  If you wanted postcards of many borrowers, you'd need to get bulk stacks of each of them.  Alternatively, there could be a collage of many borrowers.

I posted (and mentioned to Fiona) a long time ago about a "print this on Shutterfly" link under all the borrower pictures on the Kiva site.  I have seen this feature on several photo galleries around the web.  For each picture printed, the site owner -- Kiva in this case -- gets a percentage.  In fact, I'd like a "print your entire portfolio on Shutterfly" option, so I could decorate my refrigerator.

[cpbailey]

It seems that selling groups of 12 postcards with 3 or 4 different pictures would be feasible.  If they sold well, another collection could be created.  With shipping being a consideration, packages of 25 or 50 might also work.

Shutterfly...I wonder why they didn't go for this.  It seems it would bring in some revenue. 

In any case, the calendar is the priority now.  Let's put that to bed before another project is undertaken.  Just thought I would bring it up while pictures of all the people are in our heads.

Colette

[wind5001]

I like the idea, especially because we have to exclude so many GREAT pictures because of too small pixelling for the calendar. I'd hope that we could include "smaller" pixelled pcitures on the cards, because the print is smaller, too. Therefore, the quality of the picture does not need to be so high.

Is that correct? 

[wind5001]

Just to revive this thread and bring it back up to everyone's attention:

Note-/postcards ought to be discussed here!