Tom and Maureen O’Connell of Just Cards and Thorntons in St Ives, Cambridgeshire chat about Valentine’s Day sales and their concerns for the year ahead.
Heart Throb: “We found Valentine’s Day sales to be a bit flat this year. It didn’t help with it falling mid-week; people tend to be a bit more extravagant at weekends! Quite a few of our customers mentioned that they were not ‘doing’ Valentine’s and we understand the younger generation is not fully engaged and probably relying more on social media.”
Loving It: “There’s a lot of new products we are loving at the moment. For example, we were impressed with Laura Darrington Design’s new designs. We also like the Wildlife range from Ling Design, More than Words from Second Nature and the month/birthday cards from IC&G. Plus, Noel Tatt’s new Milestones range of combined age and relations looks fabulous.”
Big Love: “Sadly there’s not a lot we love about life at the moment – business has been rather flat since Christmas and we’re concerned about supplier price increases, negativity surrounding Trump and Brexit as well as, of course, the dreaded rise in business rates.”
