Our vision is to be the leading omnichannel retailer in celebration occasions
cardfactory was founded on a simple, yet powerful insight: the appeal of sourcing and selling greeting cards direct to the customer at low prices. Since the opening of our first store 25 years ago our ambition has grown to support customers in all their celebration needs. The broad celebration occasions market is significant in size and creates a targeted cardfactory market opportunity of c.£13.4 billion in the UK. This includes the UK greeting cards market worth c.£1.4 billion, UK celebration essentials at c.£2 billion and the UK market (for these categories) of gifts at c.£10 billion.
As part of our Opening Our New Future strategy, we are expanding our market focus from our core in greeting cards to target the broader celebration occasions market.
Greeting cards
c. £1.4bn UK
The current core of our business.
Gifts
c. £10bn UK
(Identified target) Includes categories such as soft toys, stationery, books, candles and confectionery.
Celebration essentials
c. £2bn UK
Includes party and balloon categories alongside other card adjacent categories such as wrap, bags, tape and stamps.
UK greeting cards market FY24: Key highlights
41.6m
Number of cards bought in the UK, per annum
779m
Number of cards purchased in the UK, down from 851m in FY23
93.6%
Proportion of UK adults who purchased celebration essentials
Source: cardfactory bespoke annual UK greeting cards market surveys Feb 2023 and Feb 2024 (3034+participants annually) commissioned with Dynata.
International market presence and opportunity
Bringing our exceptional card, gift and celebration essentials offer to global consumers.
In recent years, we have been using our proven partnerships model to expand our reach internationally as we access an £80 billion market across our seven territories of interest; USA, Canada, Middle East, India, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Existing partners include The Reject Shop in Australia and Liwa in the Middle East. With our acquisition of SA Greetings in South Africa, we now have our first presence within that market both as a retailer and wholesaler.
c. £80bn+
Card, gifts and celebration essentials market size
7
Markets of interest
USA, Canada, Middle East, India, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa