Hallmark, Having Launched Gay Greetings, Holds the Course

Hallmark Cards continues to pursue a business plan to make greeting cards available for those "non-traditional" families on your list, supplying its stock of wedding and civil unions-themed greeting cards to all 500 corporate-owed stores, plus a number of the 3,000-plus independently owned outlets.

The firm--the very name of which is synonymous with wholesome greetings on any occasion--has responded to consumer needs with four same-sex union themed cards.

Last year, Hallmark made a splash by introducing its first congratulatory greetings for two-groom and two-bride weddings and civil union ceremonies, noted a May 14 article at Contra Costa Times.

The company's plan was always to get the line of cards into its stores over the course of a number of months. Now, a year later, that goal has been reached.

Though such cards can be obtained online and printed at home or sent as electronic greetings, high-quality ready-made cards of the sort that Hallmark produces fill a niche that has long neglected for so-called "non-traditional" families.

The Contra Costa Times article quoted the executive director of the group Children of Lesbians and Gays Everywhere (COLAGE), Beth Tepper, who said that she used to have a hard time finding the right card come Mothers Day, given that her own mother has a same-sex life partner.

Said Tepper, "I thought maybe I was the only one" who had to face that situation.

Added Tepper, "Lots of people think that."

Although Hallmark is not planning to introduce cards following other same-sex family themes (Mother's Day greetings for two mothers, anniversary cards for same-sex marrieds, and the like), the greater availability of greetings for single-gender couples tying the knot will be welcome in the eyed of many families looking to send the appropriate message as marriage equality, too, becomes more widely available.

The article cited a company spokesperson as saying that Hallmark was simply responding to needs and wishes that its customers had expressed in surveys.

Said Sarah Kolell, "Our decision to offer these cards wasn't reactionary.

"We go to consumers and ask, 'What are your needs and how can we help you connect with people?'"

The cards shy away from politics, displaying instead a sense of discretion and decorum in depicting a pair of hearts or matching tuxedos, with text that offers wishes to "partners in life and love," rather than to two husbands or a pair of wives.

Said Kolell, "We just use general language about love and celebration."

The response Hallmark has received has been more positive than not, the article said.

In business, the most crucial response to a product is that of the market--and there seems to be a big market for life partners wishing to avail themselves of the rights, protections, and obligations offered by marriage equality.

With New Hampshire poised to become the sixth state to extend family equality to gays and lesbians, joining Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut, and Vermont, wedding bells could soon be ringing all up and down New England; in the heartland, Iowa has also embraced marriage equality for gay and lesbian families, and a push is on to make it legal for same-sex couples in New York and New Jersey.

Even in California, where marriage rights were summarily yanked away from gay and lesbian families after six months of marital equality, a chance remains that the state's Supreme Court will agree with lawyers who argued that Proposition 8 went too far, revising the state constitution rather than amending it; after all, marriage equality there was only possible because existing laws barring it were found to contradict constitutional guarantees of equality before the law.

In theory, an amendment targeting a single demographic for exclusion from an otherwise-universal guarantee changes the legal fabric of the document itself, rather than tweaking its meaning. If the justices of the state's Supreme Court agree with this reasoning, they might well strike down Proposition 8, restoring marriage rights to all families in that state and re-starting California's potentially lucrative same-sex wedding market in all its facets.

Moreover, if California is any indication, gay and lesbian families are itching to tie the knot: in that six-month window of family parity, 18,000-plus same-sex couples flew up the aisle to pledge their devotion. That's a lot of cards to sell in one state all at once--even more, if multiplied by six or seven.

The four same-sex themed greetings will go on sale at all 500 Hallmark shops that are owned by the company; more than three thousand franchise shops are owned by independent businesspeople, who will decide whether or not to carry the new greetings, the article noted.

Kolell told EDGE that the individual shop owners will be the ones to make the determination as to whether or not the same-sex union themed cards would be in demand in their areas.

The Contra Costa article cited Kolell as noting that there are surprises involved even in the demographics of the sale of such cards: "It's not necessarily as common-sense as one might think," said Kolell, noting that the greetings sold well in a Kentucky town.

For some, the idea of political inclusion of GLBTs through legal equality is threatening; little wonder then, that last year Concerned Women for America spoke out against Hallmark for its initial foray into greeting cards reflecting social inclusion.

As reported Aug. 22, 2008, at PinkNews, the anti-gay group's president, Wendy Wright, warned that Hallmark would lose customers by launching the new line.

The article quoted Wright as saying, "Customers used to be able to trust Hallmark to produce quality products that were safe for all ages.

"Now parents will need to steer their kids from Hallmark's section of the greeting card aisle and away from its previously heart-warming movies for fear that they too will push homosexual messages."

But families have not steered away from Hallmark en masse since Hallmark dipped its toes into the gay greetings market, and indeed it is because of customer feedback that the company launched the line and has stayed the course in making the four designs appropriate for same-sex weddings and civil unions available at more of its outlets.

At the moment, Hallmark has no plans to introduce more designs relevant to same-sex families, so those who, like Tepper, have two mommies (or two daddies) to greet on other occasions will still have to look online, where companies such as Zazzle.com or CafePress round out the greeting card selection.

Even so, Tepper found the new line of greetings to be "very encouraging," the article noted.

"We're treated differently," Tepper observed.

"So when we're treated like traditional families, with respect, it's all the better."