Leading greeting card publisher and franchisor, Card Connection, has announced the ‘Mrs Brown’s Boys’ design has become the fastest selling greetings card in the company’s twenty-one year history. The design was introduced in late August 2013 and is now selling three times faster than the other best-selling cards in the same format category.

“The risqué nature of Mrs Brown’s Boys meant we had to consider this license particularly carefully,” explains Michael Johnson, managing director, Card Connection. “However, the appeal of the series demonstrates the widespread popularity of the humour. We have had to reprint the design several times and have heard from franchisees needing to restock retail displays with the design and seeing customers buying them before they have even left the store!

“We are continually committed to providing our franchisee network and their valued retail customers with the best and most commercially appealing designs,” continues Johnson. “So we work closely with our licensing partners to select characters that are best-suited to our market and to keep us ahead of our competitors. In this case, Danilo, who hold the license for Mrs Brown’s Boys, really came up trumps!”

Following the popularity of the Mrs Brown’s Boys design, Card Connection has worked with Danilo to introduce a second card, this time in their popular Luxury Tall format. “Early signs are that this card could prove to be equally successful!” concludes Johnson.

Card Connection is one of the UK’s largest card publishers and is the market leader in the franchised distribution of greeting cards. The business’ unique model of consignment sales has resulted in a strong brand and established reputation which has been proven over many years and in 2013 Card Connection celebrated its 21st year in operation as a franchisor. Through its franchisees Card Connection supplies about 12,000 retailers throughout the UK.

Card Connection is part of UK Greetings, which is a subsidiary of American Greetings Inc., one of the largest greeting card publishers in the world and has limited vacancies for franchisees that are keen to run an expanding business. Since the franchise network in the UK is complete, the available opportunities now consist of acquiring an already-established territory from an existing franchisee. These vary in price according to their level of development, but start at £7k + stock + Card Connection fee with earnings potential in excess of £50k per annum.