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People Matters
delighted he was to hear such a “positive story in the current gloomy climate”. Immediately recognising the design, Simon made contact with Kevin Shepherd, the artist who painted the original card. “Kevin is now producing fine-art prints, mainly of animals; not cats though!” Simon told Roe. But the story does not end there, as unbeknownst to Roe, her son Jay also got in Left: Jay surprising his mum with a framed print of the card on Christmas Day. Below: The inside of the Code 100 card.
While the practice has gone on for so many years, it was only a few months ago that Roe decided it was about time that Simon Elvin heard about this incredible story of one of his cards. Struck by how “the card has endured numerous house moves, the endless handling of children, grandchildren and now great grandchildren, it's a either a minor miracle or testament to the quality of your cards,” Roe told Simon, keen he knew about the important place the card had in her family life. “I thought you might like to know that you can certainly advertise durability on any future advertising campaigns!” she suggested. As soon as he received Roe’s email, Simon responded saying how
touch with Simon with an idea of a special Christmas present for his mum - a framed print of the card. While Simon’s personal delve into the company’s archives to try and find the original design was not successful, he worked with Sarah Vockins, the publisher’s senior design manager to turn a photo of the original card into a print that was sent to Jay so that he could surprise his mum on Christmas Day, making for an emotional moment for both mother and son. Exclaiming her joy to Simon on Boxing Day, Roe wrote: “Well, you certainly know how to make someone's Christmas very, very special. I had no idea at all that Jay had been in touch with you and that our special Christmas card exchange would make anyone go to the extraordinary lengths you went to, to make Christmas 2021 so very memorable for us both. I want to thank you so much for the fantastic effort you and your team made to make this magic happen.” While clearly very touched that one of his cards has been a long running thread in a mother and son relationship for three decades, Simon joked that, businesswise, he hopes this practice does not become the norm. “I don’t think we will be encouraging the habit of re-posting cards for 30 years or we will be out of business in no time!” he quipped.
Down to a fine art
Kevin Shepherd is now widely revered for his fine art paintings of British wildlife that he paints in his studio gallery in Ferrers Centre for Arts and Crafts in Ashby-de-la-Zouch, yet he is equally proud of the countless greeting card designs he painted for Simon Elvin over many, many years, including the one that is pride of place in Roe Walsh’s family. “I started working with Simon only a few months after he started the business and continued until I set up my fine art studio nine years ago,” says Kevin, who in addition to creating his own designs was also art director of a team of artists in Simon Elvin’s Leicestershire design studio. “I have the utmost respect for Simon and loved creating all those thousands of greeting cards, often meeting him at 8pm at Toddington Services to pass over the next clutch of artworks, as well as enjoying the regular meetings we had at the offices in Bourne End to go through the pile of ideas I had for designs.” Kevin clearly remembers creating the specific pussycat and mouse design that has been part of Roe and Jay’s life. “Like all of my card designs, I created them by hand, for that one I used gouache and airbrushing. It was all about aiming for that classic ‘ahh factor’, which I sought to capture by depicting the cat’s eye slightly elevated and ensuring that the buyer/recipient immediately saw this at the same time of seeing the mouse,” says Kevin. Kevin feels that the many years he spent painting greeting cards has been invaluable in his current creative chapter of his fine art painting. “Creating cute greeting card designs was all about delivering the ‘ahh factor’ whereas my current mission as a fine art artist is about landing the ‘wow factor’. “’Ahh’ or ‘wow’ factor, it is the same principle. You need to grab the attention with your art, whether it is a greeting Above: Kevin Shepherd with some of his art. card in a card shop or a painting in an art gallery,” believes Kevin. PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
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