The Anti-Hallmark

How did such close communication with your reps and customers benefit you most?

Let me ask you this. Did you know that adult stores customers are now mostly women? It's a changing market! It's no longer for dirty old men.

Thanks to our reps -- who like us because we come out with new designs every seven weeks, and the fact that we pay our commissions precisely on time -- we were able to identify that trend in the marketplace, that sex shops were becoming mainstream, and design for and sell to them.

We make a line of bachelorette cards, as I mentioned. We have a line of divorce cards [congratulating divorcees on their freedom and independence]. We have cards that no family-oriented company could ever make.

Even if Hallmark and American Greetings and all the others are now starting to use words like "slut," or something in their cards, they still don't want to be making things like a "flick" card, which we do. This is a greeting card to cover a light switch, and the hole is cut out -- you know, so the men look like, switch on… they're "on." These are selling like hotcakes. The characters are funny -- doctors, Santas, snowmen, cowboys, dancers. If those ever stop selling, we just find out what's funny now, and design something new.

What was the darkest day for Smart Alex?

I had to learn that if you are well-known for one thing, that's what people want from your company. It is like a brainwashing that happens out there. People want what we originally sell them.

Back in the early '90s, we started a second company called Silver Dog. It was an avant-garde, high-design, greeting cards company. My partner, Mark Taylor, joined Smart Alex after working as a graphic designer for Montgomery Ward for years. He is the senior art director for Smart Alex today. We just had our 19th anniversary. He is my "ear." Maybe it was a way to show off some of the designs he and I are capable of… something different. Two years later, all the clean cards companies were doing the same things.

We had to go back to the places where they can't go. Nothing poetic or flowery. And we had to do the things they can't do, which is humor, edge, but with nice, highly graphic designs. Also, when we tried making gift tags, coasters, and other things, they just weren't as profitable. It's like this: would you buy spaghetti from McDonald's? Probably not! That's where you want a hamburger.

Do you still design and write your own cards?

Yes. I do some of them. Mark does some of them. Since I am deaf and he is hearing, it's like we cover two different worlds. It is a wonderful relationship personally and creatively. Also, we find a lot of freelance designers and the like online. The Internet is a big help to find them.

Writing a card is harder than designing one for me. Deaf humor is funnier to me, and more visual. My deaf friends will have to ask me about things we print like puns or slang and other written humor. So I prefer to design. I love Photoshop. It is one of the world's greatest inventions. Designing a card is fun to me, and relaxing thanks to Photoshop.

Speaking of software, what technology has most impacted your business since it began in the '80s?

I think about the time when we didn't have fax machines, pagers, e-mail, relay services, videophones, etc. It was very difficult for me to run the business being deaf in the hearing world then. I overcame all the obstacles.

When I needed to engage the services of sales reps nationwide, picking up the phone and giving them a call was simply not an option. So I constantly traveled.

Customer service was another big challenge. Every order and communication had to be done via mail. This put me at a four-day disadvantage compared to my competitors, which bothered me a great deal. It was my routine for three years.

I honestly can't tell you how I managed to keep it up. But I'm glad I did. I think maybe e-mail and instant messaging have been the most important technology for me, because they resolve all of that. And for the deaf community too.

Did you ever publish that book of photography you set out to do?

Even though I went to a photography school for college at RIT in Rochester, I haven't been involved in photography in quite some time. I'm a CEO and a graphic designer. But I am no longer a photographer.

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