Let me say that I am a writer, first and foremost, and know little about augmented and virtual reality beyond what is shown to me. When then am I embarking on a journey to create AR greeting cards?  My brothers are very knowledgeable in building and creating models, animating them, and constructing whole augmented reality and virtual reality games.  I have co-opted their skills to start a new venture known as Hollagram Cards.  We are a fairly new start-up that is testing the waters through Kickstarter.  The challenges have been difficult, but the rewards have been satisfying to say the least.

So what exactly is an augmented reality greeting card and why should you be interested in this?  AR is the part of the wave of the future and is definitely waiting to become more mainstream.  If you look, there are not many AR products out there that are readily available and cheap, save for Snapchat and Pokemon Go.  Other forms of AR require you to purchase expensive glasses just to view it.  It seems that the prices have not yet caught up with consumer demand, for the public does not really understand how it can be applied outside of a game.  Greeting cards can be a great way to introduce people to a stand-alone product that functions and costs the same as any paper card, but have the AR functionality that can be activated via a free, downloadable app.

The greeting card business is frankly over saturated and can range from extremely cheap to expensive and elaborate pop-ups.  There will definitely always be a market for both these spectrum’s, but no one is really offering original, 3-D augmented reality greeting cards.  If we were to step into the future, this is definitely the way to go.  It’s something that has not been seen before on a mass scale and is novel enough to start a new trend in how cards are made.  To be one of the first people to experience an AR card is quite a fun exchange.  Most people have seen pop-up cards, but none have really seen an AR card.  Our cards are more reasonably priced and can achieve the ‘wow’ factor that you are looking for.

We’ve had many bumps and disagreements along the way with this being a family-ran operation, and although we are very new to the scene, our cards speak for themselves.  We have learned a lot about our own personal strengths and weaknesses and also learned how to build a business from the ground up.  It’s exciting to be at the forefront of a new venture that hasn’t been done before.  Because there is no path to follow, we find we must blaze one ourselves, and that has been the hardest challenge.  Hollagram Cards has been a labor of love and we hope you may enjoy it’s fruits as well.