Corporate Charity Christmas Cards

The practice of exchanging Christmas cards was invented by the Englishman Sir Henry Cole in 1843. Cole was keen to make his friends aware of the need to help the poor and needy during the holiday season, so he commissioned artist John Calcott Horsley (now known as the designer and artist of the first Christmas card ) to paint a map showing the feeding and clothing the poor.

However, the final design centered on a group of rich colorful revelers sipping a glass of wine and enjoy Christmas fare. On the margins of the map, illustrated in a single shade of gray, were representations of the poor.

Despite the good intentions of the card, he was shot to show young people sipping wine as it was considered "fostering the moral corruption of children. The slogan now widely used as follows: "A merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you. Sir Henry sent these cards to all his friends and parents this year and in so doing has created a custom which has continued until today. Only 1,000 of these cards have been printed have been sold for a shilling each (5p) in 1843 and are now highly prized collectibles, one of which is sold for £ 8,469 at auction in the United Kingdom in 2005.

As Christmas came and went, drawing new map appears, with the maps of the silk and satin fringes, folded maps like fans or cut to the shape of birds and candles, but strangely these cards at the beginning rarely featuring winter scenes.

Custom Christmas card quickly became popular on the American side of the Atlantic, but for more than 30 years Americans had to import cards from England. Then in 1875, a German immigrant named Louis Pranf, opened a store lithography and published the first Christmas card of the United States. His initial designs are not related to Christmas and featured work simple flowers and birds generics. However, they were a huge success and in 1881 Prang was producing more than five million Christmas cards.

Christmas cards have become a universal practice with millions of Christmas to be exchanged between friends and families each year throughout the world. Charity Christmas cards have become a fundraising tool for many important charities and champion of children's rights - UNICEF - is credited with inventing the concept.

Although technology has brought us new forms of communication such as email and e-cards, the card classic Christmas remains more popular than ever and it is unlikely to disappear anytime soon.