All the stall set up for selling Eid-cards present a deserted look, and one of the card sellers told this scribe the tradition of wishing Eid Mubarak to dear ones through Eid cards was gradually becoming less popular among the people, especially, the young generation. The younger were more prone to modern and faster means of communications especially through the Internet and or using cell phone messaging services the ever-popular SMS.
While in the past two decades, Eid cards sale had gradually risen, printers and card sellers now feared the trend had peaked and with more efficient and cheaper means of communications, the paper Eid card might be going out of fashion.
Usually, the sale of Eid cards in the city started from the first day of Ramazan. However, the major sales were made between 15th and 25th of Ramazan. Traditionally, every year the post office announced a cut off date. This date allowed the post offices to deliver Eid cards in time.
Retailers say most people kept that date in mind so their business almost came to an end by the 25th day of the Ramazan. During those ten days in the Holy month, people visited the bookshops and other places where varieties of cards were displayed on racks and they bought them at prices ranged from Rs 10 to Rs 100. Of late, newer varieties even cost more than that.
Another trend that had emerged in the past couple of years was the entry of charitable and social welfare organisations in the Eid card business. These organisations printed the cards and put them on market with the promise that proceeds of cards would go to social work.
Major corporate entities had also started to have bulk printing agreements with those charitable organisations so that they could be seen as good corporate citizens.
However, on the whole, the Eid card sales this year had slumped. A bookseller at Chowk Ghanta Ghar Multan Mazhar Kaleem who always displayed Eid cards on racks in front of his shop in Ramazan, feared the tradition of sharing delight of Eid with favourites through Eid cards could vanish in next five or seven years.
He says five years before when he started the business he managed to sell Rs 70,000 worth of Eid cards on which he earned more than Rs 12,000 as profit. However, he says last year he could sell only Rs 20,000 worth of cards. This year he expected even less.
Last year, he says six shopkeepers had displayed cards on their shops around Gole-Bagh (Gulgasht Colony), Sadar Bazar, Hussain Agahi, Gulshan Market which now reduced to just two including his shop this year due to decreasing trend of sending Eid cards to family members and friends.
A Printer & Publisher Javed Shad said he supplied 0.5 million cards of different denominations in last Ramazan to different parts of southern Punjab and other major cities of Pakistan but this Ramazan his supply figure had slumped to only 0.1 million cards.