Keeping my cards close

My obsession with postcards -- certain clever, eclectic and funky postcards featuring local businesses -- started with a wine-related card, likely the one created for Silvertree Deli and Gourmet Market in Suttons Bay, Mi. I figure as much after meeting Will Harper, founder of PoCards, who tells me this was the business' very first one. He remembers snapping the photo, back in 2006, and while I have since accumulated dozens more of his postcard creations, I know I've had this particular one for a long, long time.

In fact, I tell Will, I took the Silvertree one, which is posted below, and grouped it with three other cards in a cool, black frame that hangs from my dining room wall. The others also follow a wine theme, representing another area specialty market and two local vineyards. One of them is of the two Labs, above, which is for Gill's Pier Vineyard & Winery in Northport. Here's the one from Silvertree:
I'm not surprised to hear that I'm far from alone in collecting PoCards, which number well over 100 in the Traverse City area. In wooden box displays in or just outside 65 northern Michigan businesses, PoCards are eye-catching thanks to their unique designs and slogans. And, they're free - to both the passerby and the merchant willing to host the display of six postcards.


"PoCards are dual-functioning," Will explains over coffee at Cuppa Joe in Building 50 -- which happens to have its own PoCard. "They're postcards, and they're also billboards. The image piques your interest, you pick it up and turn it over."


Which is where you'll learn more about the small business or non-profit. Usually the front is simply a photo, drawing or painting with or without words that won't necessarily call out the business name. The image alone just draws you in. Here's the one for Cuppa Joe:

You might actually send the postcard to someone -- apparently about 20 percent of them get tossed into the mail -- or like me, you might hold onto them. Along with framing a few, I've got a few posted alongside my computer. I also have a drawer full of them, waiting for inspiration to strike. You never know when one will suddenly take on new meaning, a fact I realize after noticing one of my PoCard finds from long ago is for Shady Lane Cellars, a Leelanau County winery for which a now-good friend's husband is the winemaker.

"They just don't get thrown away like other ads and coupons," Will says, telling me the story of seeing one of his cards at his dentist's office. "You see them in the weirdest places. You see them everywhere. People keep them around."

Businesses opting to advertise the PoCard way sometimes have their own ideas for their postcard. But just as often, Will is coming up with catchy one-liners, like "Flour Power" for Leland bakery Stonehouse Bread and "Super Posh" for Posh Pet Boutique. He's also behind "Knot Like Anywhere Else!" for the restaurant Knot in Omena. He's especially proud of the card he created for Old Town Optical in Traverse City. He came up with "Miles of Styles" for the business' thousands of frames as well as the front cover design featuring Lake Michigan shoreline and the words, "Northern Michigan is beautiful...make sure you're seeing it clearly!"

He's also pleased to have four PoCards featuring paintings by well-known local artist Charles Murphy.

Four years in, however, Will shares that he'd like to pass the baton to another creative and eager business person -- someone committed to sharing the clever cards throughout the region. It's an advertising approach that works, evident in the other markets in which PoCards has made a presence; a friend of Will's originally started the company in Bend, Ore., where Will was living at the time, and it's also going strong in Hood River, Ore., East Portland, Ore. and Aspen, Co.

No doubt Will's next adventure, whenever that may happen, will prove successful. Along with launching and operating PoCards here, I learn the former windsurf shop owner and writer helped start the popular M22 business and continues to serve as wholesale/sales manager for the company.

But I can't help hoping he'll stick around for awhile and keep coming up with clever ideas for his PoCards. Shopping downtown, hanging out at Building 50 or visiting the Warehouse District, I'm always on the look-out for a card to add to my collection.

Learn more about PoCards at the company's web site. I'll end with another of my favorites, which also happens to be for Leaping Lizard, one of my top stores to visit when downtown.