Landslide

     Feeling a little dramatic with this title of this post.  But, I do feel a bit dramatic.  We have a pending historic amount of snowfall coming our way.  The last few weeks have been full at work, home and with the store.  Lots of evaluating of how to make this year better.  So, many places in my life are pretty out of control and it's time to make some tough decisions to make my life work in my favor.  I have already made a tough decision to make my three weeks of vacation time devoted to the goal of making things better.  So, I did find out I have the week off before Valentine's Day.  I will be open at the store with lots of fun promotions.
     So, on to the fun part of paying attention to my collection of Valentine's Day cards.  First, it involves my ride to Asbury Park that I have done daily if not weekly for the last five years.  I pass by a victorian factory located across from a train station in Neptune, NJ.  It is part of that sad part of the area that was busy with produce wholesale buildings, ice cream distributers and some other factories that are all closed tight and haven't seen the light of day for a very long time.  On our train trip to Philadelphia on New Year's Day I also passed a factory building near the train station.  It was much bigger near the city of Trenton, but it had the same clock tower.  The buildings always make me wonder.

On my way to Asbury Park last week I took a picture of the empty building.  While I was researching Valentines I found this story:   http://secretfunspot.blogspot.com/2008/05/2008-ss-adams-products.html     I can't believe it was still in use as late as 2008.  The blog post answered every question that was sparked by my imagination as I drove by it everyday.  So, the door on the bottom has the name Adams and Company.  They were the company that made the nut can with the snake that would jump out, whoopie cushions,  he patented sneezing powder, coin tricks, and many more packaged jokes and pranks.  There was  a store in Belmar called Shatzo's (forgive me for the spelling....I am pretty sure it is wrong). They carried the full line of Adam's products. So, I was familiar with the items and they brought back a lot of memories.  I bought a lot of these as a kid and would enjoy the tricks with my family.  I have a lot of memories in that store, especially the sales help who always watched you very carefully and while you were in this aisle you were probably asked about ten times if you needed help.  My mom complained once on the way home and I was surprised, because I thought they just did that to the kids.

So, the door still says Adams and company and the product was
still distributed from this building.  It seems the company was still family run until it was sold to a California company in about 2009.  I was going to buy some of these butterflies and cards for the store, but after seeing how well we did last year with just making all of our own inventory.  We will continue in that direction.  Kind of makes me sad.  Because I was imagining demonstrating these cards in Convention Hall and how much fun it would be.  There are some cute videos on their website too with a young girl and boy opening these cards and having a butterfly come out.  I might change my mind on this and could promote this card this spring.  It is part of American's contribution to a unique greeting card that has been around for years, so I would love to promote it!
     I found the card quite easily on ebay and bought it quickly.
Here are some pictures of the front, inside and back of the card.

My card had the remnants of the butterfly and I was fine with that.  I love that this was patented.  I love the picture of the woman.  I am guessing it is from the 20's with the bob haircut.  Love how her dress has the same colors as the butterfly.  I went to ebay today and there was a boxed set with all different women on the front of the cards with all different colored butterflies.  I am content with this card and it's story.  The boxed set is selling for $99.  Pretty much out of my price range, but considering everything it is still tempting.  If you like this post, please comment or like my facebook page:    Help, I want to be Esther Howland.