Panda Joy has launched their 100% tree-free greeting card range, using bamboo and cotton linter as a source to eliminate the use of virgin trees to produce greeting cards. The creators of the sustainable and eco-friendly greeting cards are the Oxfordshire-based publisher, the latest addition to the UK £1.7 billion greetings card industry.
Panda Joy believes sustainability and sharing joyful moments can, and should, go hand-in-hand. Therefore they want to contribute to healing the planet and its communities by creating lasting moments of happiness without leaving a trace on the Earth, encouraging everyone to live in harmony with the environment and its communities.
Greeting cards are 100% tree-free
Consisting of 75% bamboo, 25% cotton linter, and 100% Joyfulness, Panda Joy’s greeting cards are 100% tree-free making them truly sustainable. Now that is something many greeting card companies cannot say.
Unique Joyful Panda character and aesthetic
The uniqueness of the Joyful Panda character allows each design to showcase distinct personalities, joyful illustrations, and fun colour accents. The aesthetic will make Christmas, birthdays, Valentines, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Birth announcements, and much more Joyfuller, safe in the knowledge that you are helping to save the planet at the same time.
Gives back to the planet and communities
Panda Joy gives back to the planet and its communities by committing one-third of profits to organisations and charities dedicated to their shared mission of making the world a better place. A portion of the profits goes towards supporting environmental and social organisations every time a Panda Joy greeting card is purchased. Currently, the company supports MicroLoan Foundation (www.microloanfoundation.org.uk), Lend with care (www.lendwithcare.org), and Ecologi (www.ecologi.com) to preserve the planet and spread joy to its communities.
The publisher is a minority, woman-owned business and the team behind Panda Joy is the Ashiru Family, led by Birgit, mother-of-two. They saw the ritual of sending greeting cards sky-rocket during the pandemic and showed a guaranteed way to ignite a moment of happiness, say thank you, and still stay connected with loved ones.
We do not ever really stop to think about the impact the relatively small action of sending greeting cards can have.
Besides other occasional cards, more than one billion Christmas cards are thrown in the bin every year. To them, this was not the right way to spread joy.
“What can we do today to have a positive impact on the environment and its communities? Can we afford to do nothing? What kind of world do we want to leave to our children?” the family themselves.
Panda Joy came with a big vision and an even bigger mission. The family wanted to develop a product that would help preserve the planet and have a positive impact on the communities that live on the planet.
“From the outset we wanted our product and brand to be climate positive and community sustainable to allow people to share Joyful moments without the guilt of harming the environment”, said Birgit.
“Having learned that more than 33% of paper cards are not recycled in the UK, that it takes 5-15 years for paper to breakdown in landfill and that 1 billion+ Christmas cards are estimated to be burned or dumped in landfill every year, it seemed an obvious choice to create a sustainable greeting card product to make a difference. The concept will be developed from Christmas, Birthday, and Thank you ranges to a much wider range of products for different occasions to share Joyful moments. Our brand motto, Naturally Sustainable, Naturally Joyfuller sums up what the brand stands for. We like the word Joyfuller, even if it is not one most people have used much – it dates back to Old English times, meaning ‘more joyful.’ Joyfuller has a much better ring to it, don’t you think?”
Consumers spent £1.7 billion on greeting cards in 2020, making the UK an important market for the greeting card industry. A total of 708 million individual greeting cards were bought in the year, not including Christmas card boxes and packs or packs of Easter cards, according to the published UK Greeting Card Market Report 2021, commissioned by the GCA (Greeting Card Association).
Birgit said: “The majority of these cards are still not produced sustainably, which in the long term is not good for our planet and its communities. Now, with Panda Joy’s sustainable and eco-friendly greeting cards, customers can share Joyful moments Joyfuller without feeling guilty.”
