Postcrossing Blog

On 14th July 2005, the Postcrossing project started its first steps in spreading smiles through postcards. It was a small project done for the love of sending and receiving postcards from all over the world, and the hope was that there would be more people sharing the same love and interest for snail mail.

Fast forward 5 years and this same project is now responsible for over 4.5 million postcards connecting about 200 countries. It binds together people from different cultures of all ages and genders, with different political and even religious beliefs. Few other hobbies can claim to have achieved the same results, and we are quite proud of this!

Throughout these years, Postcrossing has gone through several milestones, thanks to the work of a team of volunteers as well as the precious support of its members who helped it reach what it is now.

Postcrossing is sending out a bold message to the world today: postcards are not something from the past. In fact, we feel like we are starting a postcard revolution and proving that no technology will ever replace the intimacy of a handwritten postcard. :)

Thank you everyone who made this possible. Let’s make the next 5 years even greater!

Please join me wishing,

…aaaaaaand because a birthday is not complete without presents, we have a big contest to announce! :)

We would like you to take a picture of yourself posting some postcards at your local postbox. Why not go do that now, we’ll wait here for a bit… Done? Now mail the photo to this email address, and don’t forget to add your username, so we can know who you are! That was easy, right? We’re hoping to make a big slideshow of smiling postcrossers around the world!

By July 31st we’ll randomly choose 5 people, who will each receive a pack of 60 postcards from MOO. :)

Many of you already know MOO, but if you don’t you should really check them out – they help you to make batches of professional glossy postcards, with a set of your own pictures or using some of their cool ready-made designs. If you’re a postcrosser who has never tried MOO before, you’ll be happy to know that they are offering all new customers 10% off 20 or 60 packs of postcards with the voucher code POSTBIRTHDAY5! (valid for one order only until the end of July, excludes delivery).

On July 14th 2005 the Postcrossing project was open to the world with a goal: to connect people across the world through postcards, independent of their location, age, gender, race or beliefs. Any mailbox could be turned into a surprise box.

But what started as a small pet project quickly turned into a fast growing community spread through out many different countries. And today, 4 years later, over 2 million smiles have connected more than 100.000 members across the globe making this project surpass all its best dreams and hopes.

Over 4 years Postcrossing has evolved considerably and this last year was a specially busy one. It’s been a long path in many milestones along the way and to share them with you, we have put together a Postcrossing History page. If you ever wondered how it all started, we hope you’ll find your answers in this page.

We hope to continue to connect the world through smiles and postcards. A big thank you to everyone who make this possible!

Happy birthday Postcrossing!

Postcrossing is three years old today! Horray! We couldn’t let this day go by without thanking the most important part of the project: you!

Since it’s early days, Postcrossing has always focused on having its’ members as a central part of the project. Without you, Postcrossing would simply not work. And what started as a single person pet project, now reaches 184 countries and 57000 members. Furthermore, we reached our first million of Postcards exchanged and we are now on the fast track to the second million! So, once again, thank you!

It’s been a very busy year in the Postcrossing headquarters – the busiest so far, and also the most productive one! In February, after several months of work, we proudly published a major new design of the site with a fresh new look and several new features. This was a very important step on the Postcrossing life, giving it more room to grow and allowing for easy implementation of new features.

But several other events happened during this last year. We had the 1 million postcards contest – thank you everyone who participated! And we organized a donation collection for the SIchuan earthquake, proving once again that Postcrossers are a certainly very special community of users.

The new postcards limits were very welcomed by everyone, favoring the active users as they send more postcards and at the same time keeping a sensible limit on the newcomers.

More recently, we have created the Postcrossing Supporter and Ambassador virtual badges for those of you who help supporting this project by donating money to it or by helping it through an outstanding contribution. If you didn’t noticed the nice looking badges on the site yet, then head to www.postcrossing.com/support for more information how to get one by helping this project grow even more.

By the way, have you heard the news? A marriage was celebrated between two postcrossers who met on the website, and have since moved to Finland! We are very happy to know that this project provided a way for them to meet. Do you know any other nice facts about Postcrossing? If so, be sure to let us know!

We hope you have enjoyed this last year as much as we have. Here’s to another exciting year, filled with smiles and busy mailboxes!

Thank you!