Rachel Jerabek, Author at Thysse

Business Holiday Cards That Stand Out: Our Design Story

Rachel Jerabek — Mon, 12 Jan 2026 17:11:44 +0000

When design, craft and specialty finishes come together

Business Holiday Cards That Stand Out: Our Design Story

Turning The Company Holiday Card Into a Brand Moment

So every year, we send out a holiday card. This isn’t an original idea, I’m sure you receive a couple holiday cards every season. But when you think back to last year‘s haul... is there one card that still stands out?

Well, this year, Thysse‘s goal was to be that card. To be the most beautiful and unique card to land on our clients’ desks. Every company has probably had this same goal at some point. Whether for a holiday card, a direct mail piece, product packaging or even an in-store retail experience. You wanted to create something that people would remember, something people picked out from the group, something that delivered that ‘wow’ factor and sparked conversation.

From Concept to Craft

For the holiday card, we kicked things off like we always do—sketching, pulling together mood boards, throwing around ideas as a team. We explored color, texture, format and then settled on a concept that felt timeless, elegant, and just… next level.

Storytelling Through Custom Holiday Card Design

There are a few aspects that really played a role in elevating this year’s holiday card. To start, this card isn’t just something pretty to look at, although we’ll talk about that in a second. It’s designed to unfold like a story as you open it, like stepping into a warm, happy memory that invites you to resonate with the design.

The couple ice skating on the front of the card is a nod to one of my personal favorite winter activities, and I’m sure a favorite for many others as well. I also infused a little company personality, or Thysseness as we like to call it, by featuring an illustration of our headquarters behind the skaters. This helps to bring Thysse intothe scene and adds a branded touch.

Specialty Finishes That Deliver the Wow Factor

I chose a unique duplex paper for the card. Duplex means it comes black on one side and white on the other. This duplex stock allowed for a rich, elevated black exterior while still allowing for those bright pops of color on the inside. It’s not a stock you come across often, and the quality of the paper is something you notice the second you pick it up.

Now, let’s talk about the finishes that really make this card stand out. I designed a custom diecut window that reveals part of the inside of the card from the front to complete the snow globe look. It adds dimensionality and gives the card that one-of-a-kind look you just can’t replicate.

Instead of using a standard deep yellow gold for the illustration of the snow globe base, I chose a metallic gold ink. It not only elevates it, but printed over the black paper, it gives this faded, nostalgic, almost vintage feel.

I selected two different foils to fill in the rest of the illustration: a shiny silver foil featuring a frost pattern for the ice, and an iridescent opal foil for the snow. The opal foil is used again inside the card to create the effect of falling snow, visible through the die-cut, like a snow globe that’s just been shaken.

Finally, I chose to emboss the “Happy Holidays” text and the ‘Thysse’ nameplate to give the warm message and our company name prominence while adding to the overall tactile and dimensional experience.

When Craftsmanship Meets Brand Experience

Every decision, from design to materials, was about creating an unforgettable, tactile experience. And then, we brought it to life right here at Thysse. Everything was produced in-house from printing, foiling, embossing, die-cutting and folding. This gave us full control over every last detail and the quality of the finished piece, which is something that really matters when you’re working with specialty finishes.

When the final cards came off the press, they looked… show-stopping. It was exactly what we envisioned. That’s the power of craftsmanship. When design, craft and going the extra mile with specialty finishes come together, the result resonates. It gets noticed. It’s remembered.

Create Print That Gets Remembered

Anyone can send a physical print piece, but with Thysse, you can create something unforgettable. Inspired to create something unforgettable? Let’s do it together!

The post Business Holiday Cards That Stand Out: Our Design Story appeared first on Thysse.

Direct Mail: Dying or Thriving?

Rachel Jerabek — Thu, 04 Apr 2024 17:41:35 +0000

Trends & Insights from Thysse's Direct Mail Experts

In a recent interview, Margaret Pepe, USPS Executive Director of Product Management, shared that overall direct mail volumes dropped in 2023, but predicted growth in 2024.

Surprisingly, overall mail volumes dipped, but performance is up. In a recent survey of 250 businesses that use direct mail (report by Lob and CompereMedia), 84% identified it as their highest ROI channel in 2024 – a 17% jump from 2022.

82% of respondents plan to increase their direct mail budgets in 2024.
85% indicated mail delivers their best conversion rate.
84% agreed it produced the best response rate out of all channels they use.

Thysse can confirm these findings. Our direct mail clients are increasing their usage. As we analyze trends and engage new customers, several insights stand out and may prove useful to you:

1)Trade Secrets

Companies with direct mail experience and success often keep quiet about it. (We sign a lot of lengthy NDAs.) Competing for attention in a mailbox is typically a 1:6 matchup, which drops to 1:1 or 1:0 within an industry. In the digital environment, competition starts at about 1:4k ads– each day. Organizations that have developed successful mail programs are difficult for competitors to detect.

2) New Use Cases

Thysse is seeing growth in all mail outreach, with a new trend in frequent, "triggered" and relatively small, personalized mailings. A common goal is lead nurturing within digital campaigns. For example, when an email is opened several times without a conversion event, that interaction could trigger a postcard mailing.

Here’s what that might look like:

This example illustrates:

Success depends on the average lifetime value of your customers (CLV) and current customer acquisition cost (CAC).
Data is valuable. What would you do with DM_3A and DM_4B?
Optimization takes a sustained effort over time and offers significantly better value than one-off blitzes. Use budgets to break mailing volumes down to levels that can be sustained for at least three iterative mailings within a campaign.
Print and digital outreach have a lot in common and can be managed using the same techniques.

The big driver over the past few years is speed. It’s fast and easy to get personalized print messages delivered. It used to be prohibitively slow for effective time-sensitive touches, but with new digital press technology and Direct Mail Automation solutions (DMA), mail files can go from your screen to on-press in just hours, not days. Many of our new mail customers are surprised by how sophisticated the process is.

3) Opportunity Cost

An ongoing trend (and challenge) is bridging the print opportunity awareness gap with many digital-only marketers. While all marketing channels are subject to ROI analysis, there's often a reluctance to test in the print assets space despite the significant cost of experimentation in the digital landscape. Not testing is not knowing, which equates to a hidden opportunity cost for businesses lacking direct mail experience.

4) Targeting

While digital targeting options are undeniably incredible, many marketers are unfamiliar with the unique options available to mailers. Targeting Specialists listen to campaign goals and apply their experience and vast data modeling resources to provide custom-tailored and highly targeted lists of prospects. Familiar demographic attributes can be refined with thousands of other powerful filters to generate incredibly dialed-in lists. Overlaying drive-time-distance, category-specific purchase history, dwelling type (condo vs. house)– even intent data like pre-car buyers, pre-home buyers and expecting mothers are available. If you haven't worked with a Targeting Specialist before, you may be surprised by the options.

We Sometimes Hear

"I can't track it"

Mail tracking solutions have come a long way, but lack the performance insights into every campaign interaction that are available in the digital landscape. That’s true, in aggregate- but that granular detail is available for a subset of your overall mailing. With volume, statistically significant and incredibly reliable data comes out of mailings, making it a leading way to test messaging and validate targets.

Additionally, overall performance is easy to measure for new mailers with benchmarking, simple split tests and versioned offers. Attribution can actually get tricky the longer you mail.

We’ve seen highly sophisticated marketing teams inaccurately measure the impact of their long-established mailing programs and cut them. The ensuing revenue declines undergo troubleshooting, which often result in “The Three Ups”: Mailings are back up, revenue’s up and hands are up.

"Direct Mail Costs Too Much"

The cost of direct mail is higher, per impression, than digital. A fact that chills interest in adding mail to marketing mixes. But customer acquisition cost and ROI are relative. Like all digital campaigns, if an iterative and sustained effort is applied within a converting marketing funnel, your chances of success and driving down CAC are statistically good with mail. Referring back to the survey results, direct mail may actually be your highest ROI channel.

Final Thoughts:

So, is direct mail thriving or dying? The fact that it can deliver better ROI is a difficult opportunity to ignore. As experience with modern omni-channel direct mail widens and confidence in the channel grows, Margaret Pete’s prediction about the future of direct mail is easy to agree with.

If you’d like more information about Thysse’s direct mail solutions, reach out. Our friendly experts are here to help you.

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