Retailer’s making its mark as Glasgow store is added to Paperchase acquisitions
Postmark is going international! As the specialist greeting card retailer opens its first store outside the capital with a branch at Birmingham New Street Station, the news broke that Postmark is crossing the border into Scotland.
With the Glasgow store expected to open at the end of May, the London-based indie retail group headed up by Mark and Leona Janson-Smith will have more than doubled its holdings inside six weeks as it capitalises on the demise of Paperchase.
The Postmark sign has been raised above the doors in Battersea Power Station, as well as in King’s Cross, London Bridge, Waterloo and the Birmingham train station sites in April alone, and a store in Victoria railway station is soon to follow along with one in Richmond, plus the Glasgow site, which will take it to 14 stores with its current outlets in London’s Balham, Blackheath, Chiswick, East Dulwich, Greenwich, and Wimbledon.
“We’re going international!” joked Mark of the Scottish store plans. “It’s all been exciting, if rather hectic as we opened three stores within 10 days. The logistics of getting everything in place ready for the openings has been somewhat challenging, but the sales have been good.”
After Waterloo was unveiled on 21 April – with Leona admitting “no, I can’t stop singing the line ‘couldn’t escape if I wanted to’…”! – the Birmingham outlet is the latest, opening on Saturday, 29 April.
While there’s a cohesive feel to the shops’ look, Mark has stressed the new sites “will not be Postmarks as we know them for a while as we’re working with the old fittings but, once they’re all open, we will work through re-fitting them.”
All these additional Postmark stores are jointly owned by the Janson-Smiths and the Cardzone group, part of the joint venture agreement forged with the two retail businesses in April 2021 for future stores.
