In 1994, when cassette players were playing hits from Nirvana and Ace of Base, and the computer was still an unheard of luxury, four innovative individuals gathered together in one modest little Moscow basement.
Discussing politics, economics and the weather, they suddenly realized that Russia has so many wonderful holidays, but for some reason, absolutely no good greeting cards. The situation needed to be changed.
And off it went! The innovative individuals came to an agreement with the American company, American Greetings. They printed the first greeting cards..
Only then did they realize that there were no envelopes of the needed size. So they brought a container full of envelopes straight from the States. Then, some more. They wanted to print special cards with foil and embossing. Turned out — there was nowhere to print..
So they discovered the Kaluga Polygraphic Company, the only one in Russia where this was possible. The first customers appeared — the Russian State Post and book stores.
The new business was gaining pace, and our sales were booming, with annual growth of up to 60%! We were so overjoyed that we bought our first Maсintosh computer and even hired someone who knew where its ON button was. Next came the crisis, the growing competition, our foreign business trips, more ideas, contracts, partners, yet another crisis… and so on and so forth.
Over time, the tiny basement office turned into a spacious three-storeyed building in the center of Moscow where we kept creating our greeting cards. The old Macintosh has long been replaced with state-of-the art equipment; however, we retained our learnings, a penchant for greeting cards, and an aspiration to make people happier.