There is nothing like unexpected thank you cards to bring that smile back to your face after a long day. Thank you cards provide that delightful little spark that can turn your day from a gloomy, rain drenched day to a sunny one. I remember being in fourth grade in class working on sheets of paper with crayons attempting to make all sorts of cards as class assignments. Every holiday was usually ripe as an excuse for our teacher to assign us with the task of creating our own holiday card from scratch for our parents. This was when I first came across the idea of sending out cards for all occasions.

To not send an acknowledgement after receiving help or even a friendly gesture is equivalent to not saying please before asking for something. With social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, it is increasingly easier to stay in touch with friends, family, and acquaintances. These sites do allow you to essentially send a thank you or birthday wish to someone you know as opposed to sending a physical card. Though, no matter how much our technology seems to advance, there are some things that will always stick around and corporate thank you cards are one of those lasting treasures. Sending a thank you card to your boss or supervisor for simply helping you out could always lead to that long-awaited raise you were looking for. So as the New York Lotto’s motto goes, “Hey, you never know!”

I am in the middle of moving for the first time in many years. Packing, shifting, and unpacking boxes is not my idea of a good time. I am hoping I won’t have to do it again for quite a while. (If my first reaction to my new pad is any indication, I won’t! I love it!)

I am lucky enough to have helpful parents and friends who were there to aid me in the move. I was also of enough sound mind to keep a box of Thank You cards on hand (and unpacked) so that I could write out enough notes of gratitude to make it seem like Thanksgiving around the new Casa de Dee!

Next week, my new furniture is being delivered. You can bet the delivery men will be receiving Thank You cards with their tips – especially considering the rotten weather forecast! The Verizon FIOS technician is next on the list, although I have to wait an unbearable three weeks for my installation.

The next time I have to do this all over again, it’s no question – a moving company will be hired! And yes, I’ll be sure to have a box of Thank You cards at the ready on that occasion, too!

Have you ever sent thank you cards to contractors for a job well done?

I recently had work done on my house. It was not the most pleasant experience for a few reasons:

• My husband, Dan, and I were newbies to major home improvement jobs. We didn’t know what to expect and stumbled through the process a bit. (What, we need a permit???)
• The work we needed done was unexpected, necessary, and completely practical. (Not a “fun” cosmetic project such as a beautiful kitchen or bathroom renovation we could admire when finished.)
• We had just built up our savings to buy me a new car, and now that plan is on hold. (Booo-hooo!)

It all started in March. Mounds of melting snow coupled with days of heavy rain caused flooding in our basement. We couldn’t ignore the problem. We hired a reputable masonry company to waterproof the basement, which included rebuilding our crumbling entryway and installing French drains and a sump pump.

The work wouldn’t be done for a few months, so we at least had time to prepare and save money. April came, and so did my birthday. The cash my family stuffed inside of my birthday cards would go straight to the basement job. Happy birthday to me! And Dan’s birthday was in June, so the gift money inside his birthday cards would go towards the job as well.

When the project finally started, my nerves were shot. Could we afford to do this? Will the workers do a good job? Remind me again why I wanted to buy a house?!

Three days later, the job was done. Everything went smoothly and the work looked great.

I sent our contractor, Adam, a thank you card to express my appreciation. Throughout the entire process, Dan and I had pelted him with lots of questions. Adam was always so patient and put us at ease. Sending a greeting card wasn’t necessary, but I thought it would be a nice gesture since we were so pleased with the work. And hey, maybe the next time we hire them they’ll remember the gracious thank you card I sent and give us a discount!

When I was a little girl, my mother not only taught my siblings and me manners, she insisted on us using them. From as far back as I can remember, she never let us get away without using them. Oh, Dad contributed to these life lessons as well, but it was Mom who was the diligent enforcer of the rules. Saying “Thank you” was just as important as “Please,” “May I,” or “Excuse me.” Thank you was a way to acknowledge that you appreciated what the person had done for you. What does this have to do with corporate thank you cards you might ask? Just think how you feel when you have taken the time to do something for someone and they don’t even acknowledge it. You might think it was a waste of time and why would you bother to do anything else. In business, that is the last message we want to convey. Whether or not it is an employee or a business associate makes no difference. Everyone wants and needs to be appreciated.

Now I’m not saying that if one doesn’t receive a thank you note every time that they do something, they won’t do it again. What I am saying is, knowing that someone has taken the time to show that they have noticed your efforts will go a long way in the goodwill department.

My mother used to have a saying (and I bet your mother did too) – You will catch more bees with honey….you know the rest. What applies in your personal world applies in the corporate world. Now more than ever, it is important to apply all of those life lessons that our mothers tried so hard to instill in us. Although my mother is no longer with us, I am grateful everyday that she took the time to ensure that manners became a part of my everyday world. I don’t have to think about it. It is a part of my everyday. It’s as natural as brushing my teeth.

Although not limited to thank you cards, keeping a supply of business greeting cards on hand is one of the best ways to convey your message. Having a supply on hand ensures that you will always have a card ready to go, for any occasion.

Recently I sent my father a personalized thank you card as part of an ongoing joke between us that started about 40 years ago. It involves postage stamps or rather my lack of them. I enclosed an entire sheet of postage stamps in the greeting card with an explanation that I was finally repaying him for all the stamps I had “borrowed” over the years and thanked him for letting me have one whenever I needed to mail something. Well, his response was definitely not what I expected. Instead of graciously saying thank you, his reaction was along the lines of, “It didn’t begin to cover what I had helped myself to over the years!”

He proceeded to remind me of all the times he had gone into his stamp drawer in his desk and discovered there was not a stamp to be had. He remembered the one time when the mortgage was almost late because I had taken his last stamp on a holiday weekend back in the 70s when they couldn’t be purchased online or at the supermarket. My reply to that was, “Well if the post office is closed there is no mail delivery on a holiday anyway!”

Looking back, I must admit I did “help myself” to a lot of his stamps but for good reasons. I had a pen pal that I wrote to all the time in grammar school (very educational). I used to mail in to a lot of contests throughout high school (to win prizes) and mail in rebates for items I purchased (both of which would save Dad money in the long run). In college, I would usually help myself to some stamps to take back to school with me so I could mail him letters asking for money when I needed it. It was cheaper than calling him collect on the phone, I rationalized. After I got married and moved out-of-state, the stamp borrowing ceased for a few years and I bet Dad missed that I didn’t need him for his stamps all those years.

But the marriage ended and I became a single Mom with lots of bills to pay and pennies to pinch, so when I visited Mom and Dad I would usually bring a few unstamped bills home with me with an explanation that I hadn’t had time to go to the post office to buy stamps. Dad’s reaction was usually, “I didn’t know you even knew where or what a post office was!” Do I detect sarcasm?

I am better these days with my postal issues because I discovered you can buys books of stamps from the cashier at the supermarket. What a great idea! I bet Dad wished he had come up with that idea years ago. I am not even going to attempt to repay my father for all the stamps he thinks I still owe him. But I will mention this – my daughter called me the other day to ask if I had a stamp and a thank you card to send to her aunt to acknowledge the check she had just sent her. I guess there is a “stamp gene”…and you just can’t fight heredity!

Have you ever found yourself at a loss for just how to say “thank you” to someone? Whether in a business or personal situation, you should never want to let the opportunity pass to let someone know how much you appreciate their generosity or actions.

Business thank you cards may be a little tricky since we want to keep it professional but still add a personal touch. Perhaps a note written inside an already imprinted card is all that’s needed. Thank you cards sent in a personal situation can be totally different. Sometimes silly or funny, they nonetheless let the recipient know how much their act of kindness meant to us. Often times sending or receiving thank you cards brings back a flood of memories, sometimes bittersweet, that allow us to replay the occasion in our minds.

Sending or receiving thank you cards is one of those “feel good” moments that in this fast paced world can be few and far between. We need to be sure the opportunity doesn’t pass us by.

Design #621AE

Design #095AY

Design #503AR

The short answer is, “Yes!” But let me tell you a little story to back up that opinion.

There was a time when I would have thought it gauche to send typeset personalized thank you cards, instead of carefully handwritten notes on watermarked custom stationery. Not only was I taught manners at home and at school (this was in the famous “olden days” when such niceties were still part of a school day), but I had also read “Miss Manners” and “Dear Abby” newspaper columns aplenty. One of my first adult reference book purchases was Amy Vanderbilt’s Complete Book of Etiquette. I have even read it!

There is an old saying (the older you get, the more of these you acquire) that, “the exception proves the rule.” When I was a young mother living in a small town, I had a dear older friend who chaired lots of volunteer work for local worthy causes. This was a lady of impeccable upbringing and easy-going perfect etiquette, who continually amazed me with her knowledge, abilities, and personal energy. She easily corralled lots of other volunteers and shamelessly charmed business owners into donations of goods, services, and cash more extensive than they’d ever intended.

The thing is, you always knew when giving in to her first request, she was sure to hit on you again and again. And, somehow, you gave in every time. You even did so with a glad heart. How come, you ask?

Well, she was charming, and she did lead by example, and she did always have a devilish twinkle in her eyes. She also made sure each person and company got its name in the event program or newspaper notice or organization newsletter. She even hosted lovely thank you parties, in her own home and at her own expense, for her volunteers. But her most effective recruiting tool was her marvelous thank you notes. Their wonder was in their very personal, graceful, and sincere phrasing. A person might measure their personal value to the community by counting how many of these they had received and saved.

Sadly, the aging process took the steadiness from her hands and her writing became undecipherable. Fortunately, she was among the first to observe this phenomenon, and true to her nature, she devised a solution. She composed a lovely note of explanation and thanks, had custom greeting cards printed with this note in a graceful scripted font, with her full name imprinted below the note’s text. She used these for her thank you cards for the rest of her life. Their most touching aspect was her handwritten first name beside her imprinted name, which I think was sort of her way of proving why she needed these typewritten personalized thank you cards.

Personal thank you cards are generally sent to acknowledge gifts received for a birthday, an anniversary, a graduation or some other special event. Or a card of thanks can perhaps be written to a person who did a special favor such as helping someone move or being supportive during a time of great need. Thank you cards are not normally sent for what should be every day niceties, but last week I encountered a situation that drove me crazy. Its result was so positive I decided to acknowledge a good deed done by a person who was really just doing what she was supposed to do. Let me explain…

I needed to buy these particular shelf units for my basement to house my vast collection of compact discs, so after work I headed for that famous Swedish discount furniture store that, if I wasn’t careful, would have me heading in the wrong direction as soon as I left the parking lot and entered the store. Now, I work in customer service, so I am perhaps a bit more sensitive than most when it comes to customer service issues such as getting help to easily finding my way around a store or getting any questions I have answered satisfactorily. Having been to this store before, my antennae were up.

The place’s setup forces a customer to walk around and around and around in search of the particular item they are looking for (making sure, of course, that one passes each and every area on the way to wherever it is they’re going). For me, not finding the shelves after looking in what I thought were the two departments they had to be displayed in, I looked around for an associate to whom I could ask for directions. Of course, there was no one to be found…anywhere!

So, making a fateful decision, I decided to head back to the checkout area where I knew there were employees. Sure enough, I noticed two groups of three having a grand old time watching long lines of people trying to pay for their items. Breaking up the one coffee klatch, the person I spoke to – pointing back from whence I came – told me to go back to the lighting department on the same floor I was on, make a left, and the shelves would be on my right. I dutifully followed her directions explicitly.

CD shelves? Nope.

So, after another lengthy search, I found another rocket scientist with a badge who also showed his pointing skills and told me to find the elevator (a harrowing thought), go to the second floor, walk through the home furnishings department, chuck a right, and the shelves would be in a bin. I followed his instructions to a tee.

Nope, again!

So then I decided to just roam around until I bumped into someone who looked like maybe they worked in the store. After what seemed like the equivalent of traversing five par fives, I came upon a young lady who offered to actually ESCORT me to where I needed to go. We hiked back to a completely different department where, voila, there they were…those nasty things I came to the store to buy!

Now, I won’t go into detail about what I had to go through to give them my money. But, needless to say, when I arrived home, I immediately got out a thank you card, and with the swift stroke of a pen, I wrote a greeting of thanks to Alice (yes, she was wearing her name tag).

I mailed the card out yesterday.

Corporate thank you cards fill a big vacuum in our modern society and they can fill it with a good impression of your service. It used to be that every time you completed a transaction, at a retail store or with an in-house service-person or even over the phone, the cashier or service person would say, “Thank you,” and probably smile at you. If you were dealing with a really well-run business, those thanks were offered with genuine sincerity.

Nowadays, it seems to me the “service person” is too busy chatting on a headphone set or with fellow employees or “hanging-out with friends” to even look at you, let alone speak to you. Even if they are all alone, it’s often as though you’ve ceased to exist once they’ve taken your payment.

I’ve started saying “Thank you” to them as I put away my change or credit card or receipt. You’d think they’d take the hint, but sadly, the best reaction you can usually expect is if they say, “You’re welcome,” or “That’s okay,” while turning away, as if they had done you a favor.

If you are planning to order business thank you cards right now, or if you already use them as Standard Operating Procedure, you are among the best and the brightest, determined to succeed and grow and persevere. The particular card you choose to send conveys more than your thanks; it tells the receiver a lot about how good you really are.

Design #325AY, Royal Thank You Card, shows you as a true “stand up” kind of business associate, a reliable and clear-thinking person with a great deal of integrity. The embossed blocks of dark blue and lighter blue create a firm backing for the gold foil scripted “Thank You,” set within a fine gold frame. The sturdy ecru matte-finish card stock shows a clean, wide margin around this design, giving substance to your thanks.

Design #325AY - Royal Thank You Card

Design #043AT, Corporate Thank You Card, displays modern flexibility on a sound and practical foundation. Presented on subtly textured ecru paper, a perfectly balanced equal-sided nine-part diamond is embossed as the center background, with a level and central embossed line all the way to the side edges. The rainbow foils of the elegantly scripted “Thank You” glow forth in shades of blue, teal, and silver. The “recycled paper” symbol on the back of this card adds a footnote on your sense of responsibility to others.

Design #043AT - Corporate Thank You Card

Either one of these “true blue” corporate thank you cards will represent you with the kind of honor that invites repeated trust in you and in your organizational abilities.

All of us at one time or another in our lives has had the real joy of celebrating a special day, whether it was a birthday, anniversary, or a graduation, and have received lots of great gifts. And following these celebrations, we have all sent out thank you cards to those special people, thanking them for their generosity and thoughtfulness.

However, another excellent reason for sending thank you cards would be to let an employee know how much their work and loyalty is appreciated by their bosses and supervisors. These business thank you cards, given out without any fanfare but with a firm handshake and done unexpectedly, would be a tremendous morale booster, especially now when the economy is flagging and people’s minds may be distracted by negative economic news.

Lord knows how many people are worried about whether they may or may not keep their jobs or if they can pay their bills on time. But receiving a small note of appreciation from an authority figure can do wonders for an employee’s state of mind and productivity.