Paper Trail- Business Cards

The more mundane and crass cousin to the visiting card is the business card (also known as a trade card). The purpose of a business card is to advertise, so a business card should never be left as a visiting card. Only the most uncouth tradesman would consider them a suitable replacement. Any mention of a profession on a visiting card was very impolite. The only exceptions to this rule were professions with a title such as doctors, lawyers, clergy, and military men. Their very name advertises their vocations. Most business cards list the owner’s occupation, business address, specialties, and services. If the card gives a business address rather than a home it’s a business card.

Unlike books or posters, cards were printed on the small hand presses ubiquitous to every printer’s shop. They were cheap and quick to produce making business cards available to even entrepreneurs of the lower class. By the 1860s, every printer’s shop had a typeface book full or sample text in a variety of styles. Business owners often chose an eye-catching typeface or a variety of eye-catching typefaces with little regard to taste. With the spread of lithographic techniques, cards could advertise twice as loudly in bright colors. Even after paid advertisements blossomed with explosive growth of magazines and newspapers in the 1850s, business cards remained an essential tool for businessmen of all trades and classes. Anyone could have a stack of cards in their pocket, ready to be presented to future clientele, left at every door in the neighborhood, or tacked to the wall of public gathering places.

While ubiquitous in the Victorian world, middle and lower-class households reused and re-reused every spare scrap of paper they had on hand. A fine visiting card might be spared and kept on casual display, but after being handed to a potential customer business cards saw a lot of use. Price quotes, directions, and shopping lists commonly cover their blank white backsides.

Next week, I’m pulling out story hooks, adventure ideas, and mysterious clues revolving around visiting cards and business cards. The following week, Paper Trail will be available to download for free on this blogs resources page.