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‘They’ll be Around as Long as People Shake Hands’: Why Business Cards Won’t Die
October 19, 2017 -
Creative designs have helped reinvent the paper business card while high tech versions can project your image in 3D.
Your business card says a lot more about you than you think, as anyone who has watched the scene in American Psycho, where bankers compare their expensively made yet largely indistinguishable cards, will know.
While most saw this as the ultimate display of absurd masculine competition on 1980s Wall Street; for one company it was market research. Black Astrum produces diamond-encrusted business cards for a select number of exceedingly wealthy clients.
The company’s concept director, Sufian Khawaja, says: “Looking beyond the diamonds, when developing the Signature card, we spent more than six months searching for the perfect material. We tested the material’s scratch resistance, how much it weighed, how it looked and felt in the hand, even how it sounded when it was dropped.”
The cards cost between £300 and £1,500 each, depending on the number of diamonds included in the design. Clients include members of the royal family in the Middle East, as well as business people in Europe and China.
Khawaja says: “For many of our clients, wealth is no longer a distinguishing factor in the circles in which they move. In an ever-increasing digital world, people still like to leave a lasting impression and our cards allow our clients to do just that.”
While Black Astrum supplies a very niche market, business cards still play a role in corporate life, despite the digital revolution. Richard Ellis, chairman of the Original Cottage Company, says he regularly uses them with owners of holiday homes and his financial advisers alike. “It’s got your email address, mobile number, the company you work for. It’s an incredibly cost-effective, simple way of passing over details, without standing there and typing lots of information into your smartphone.”
Having this information on a physical object helps trigger the memory of a business acquaintance. Asi Sharabi, chief executive of the children’s book publisher Wonderbly, says: “You can always go back and dig in your box of business card memories, and find some lost gems; or some people that you didn’t really think would come in handy.”
The Guardian
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