I decide to print my visiting cards

I was short of my visiting cards. I needed a pack of 200 badly as I was leaving for Bangkok to see my old pals and attend an Alumni dinner.  We were to meet after 25 years. Some of my pals were business tycoons, successful fund managers, chief sustainability officers and holding high position in the Governments. Of course the crowd also included some of our “old flames”. That was the attraction.

Each visiting card is literally a (small) space you get to express yourself. The card, through its looks and feel (I mean the paper), actually tells what you’re all about. Some print their photos on the visiting card for a personalized introduction. This is useful when you meet someone and don’t recall the face later. Yes, business cards are still important for networking, building relationships, making a first impression in business, and marketing. Essentially, they represent your identity and success.

My wife had a different point of view. She said that by now I must be so famous that I should not be  needing a visiting card to get introduced. “Do you think Prime Minister Narendra Modi carries a visiting card?”. She said. I told her that I am not that world famous and I have never met Prime Minister Modi as yet.

But I knew that even the most famous and all mighty did carry visiting cards. These include Dr Albert Einstein, Steve Martin, Donald Trump and Mark Zuckerman and several more. While Einstein’s visiting card was utterly simple how he used to be, Donald Trump’s card shows all the might and arrogance in his powerful signature right on the top of the vising card. Those famous on social media and film world, like Steve Martin and Mark Zuckerberg, put a line that is a bit bold and funny on their visiting cards that may just startle you. Steve doesn’t even declare who he is. Just a line and his signature!

Given these variations, I decided to take advice of my Professor Friend. Fortunately, he had some time.

“Oh Dr Modak, visiting card design this is a serious subject. A right visiting card makes a huge difference”. He said this when I apologized for taking his precious time.

First, we decided to finalize the size of the visiting card.

Professor took good look at the pockets of the “smart and casual shirt” I was wearing. The pocket size was quite roomy and could accommodate most visiting cards

“Dr Modak, let us go for the standard size”. Professor said. The standard sized (89 x 51 mm) visiting card easily fits in the shirt pockets.  But this size is bit odd to put the cards in a standard size wallet. Professor warned me that if I wanted to put a few visiting cards in my wallet then I would need to resize the visiting card to 85.6 mm × 53.98 mm matching the size of a typical credit card. Considering that I could just collapse if the sugar gets low, especially in travel, I thought of printing a non-standard visiting card that will fit into my wallet like a credit card. Professor agreed. Wise decision, he said.

“How about the folded visiting card Professor?”. I thought I should use this style, as I had lot to tell my batchmates about my several positions and decorations over these years using the extra space.

“Come on – do you want to overload such nonsense information to your friends when you meet after so many years? Professor snapped.

I remembered meeting people who exchanged their folded vising cards with me that contained additional information such as Member Rotary Club Colaba, Independent director at Healthy Living Resort, Chiplun, Visiting faculty at Ramarao College in Navi Mumbai etc. I agreed with Professors suggestion. Purpose of a visiting card is not to present a short version of your CV.

My young colleagues in the office suggested that I use a QR code on the visiting card instead. That’s all you need, they said. I agreed that adding a QR code to visiting card can be a useful tool for providing additional information and directing people to your online presence. QR codes can be easily scanned by smartphones, allowing people to access information quickly and easily. While many people are familiar with QR codes now – thanks to online ordering of food, I thought some (especially my friends) may not know how to scan the QR code.

But I really hate getting introduced to people via QR code as you need to do one more step of scanning with a smart phone and in party you wouldn’t do this and get to know who the person was after reaching home. Yes, I am a bit old fashioned and not ready to be digitalized. So, I dismissed the idea, especially when I noticed that Professor himself did not use a QR code.

What should a visiting card contain was our next question. Visiting cards typically include the position, company you work for, phone number, email address, and a small design to make the card catchy or memorable. I guess this is the minimum information a vising card should carry. Well if you want to be trendy then you could put just the name on the front face of the card and details or the QR code if you wish on the other side. Telling that know me first! and see details later.

Talking about trends, Professor suggested that I should consider calling myself differently on the vising card e.g., say that you are a passionate environmentalist rather than saying that you are Managing Director of Environmental Management Centre Pvt Ltd. According to him this style may invite conversations to understand more about you. Vising cards should encourage conversations – he said. I never knew this perspective in the design of the visiting card. As I hated the term environmentalist, I started thinking of other statements such as concerned and committed to the protection of planet’s environment.  But this statement looked rather stereotyped of the UN kind. I realized that after reading this line on my vising card, no one will be interested to know more about me and do a conversation. I therefore decided to park this idea for a while till I discover who am I other than MD of EMC Pvt Ptd.    

We continued our discussions further. Professor advised me to consider using a plantable paper that has embedded plant seeds or use paper from left overs after cutting large paper sheets in printing shops. Essentially, here one side is printed with your name and a gibberish stays on the other side. Professor said that these options are good to use in parties to get differentiated from others ordinary and show your commitment to environment.

I thanked Professor for all this help. I was really confused now how do I present my new identity to my friends when meeting after 25 years.

Finally I ordered 3 sets of visiting cards – one for batchmates in the business making good money , one for those of academic types and those with the Government. Why not I said to myself, I want to project my identities differently to my “stakeholders”.

When I told my wife about my plan, she asked if I was making a special design for my “old flames”. When I said “yes”, she presented to me 4 attractive card cases so that I don’t mess up giving a wrong card while exchanging.

Now friends, that sounded difficult for me to do when in the party, especially after few glasses of Beer Singha. While the idea was fundamentally right, it was not practical and that’s what happens to most good ideas isn’t it?

So I decided not to carry vising cards to Bangkok.

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Cover image credits to https://www.jukeboxprint.com/blog/history-of-business-cards