The Story of Leeds Postcards

We are two female artists who produce and publish postcards, button badges and fridge magnets.

We sell direct to customers on this site and through various bookshops, galleries and shops. (if you want to be a stockist click here)

Postcards which are oppositional, activist, feminist, challenging, a voice for the oppressed, impressed, or simply pressed: Activism by design since 1979

WHEN IT HAS TO BE SAID…

Let’s start with the Leeds bit. Leeds is in the North of England. Over 200 miles from London. We are based in Leeds – started in Leeds and made in Leeds.

The cards are not about Leeds. They are not postcards of Leeds. Leeds is not the subject. It was a defiant attack against the cultural hegemony of the South!! By 1996 we were the longest running workers co-op in the country – now it is run on very low overheads and self exploitation. Viva Leeds!

Backstory; where we have been and where we are going

It all started in the summer of 1979 when Richard Scott, an educational book publishing worker, set up Leeds Postcards in a room at his home in Leeds. The first card he published was for health and safety at work sponsored by the British Society for Social Responsibility in Science (BSSRS) warning against the possible hazards of using VDU’s ‘tomorrows technology today’s headache’ how true. And this is why Leeds Postcards is best understood as a (political) publishing house for postcards: Artists/authors are found, campaigns contacted, sponsors found, publicity organised, adverts placed and cards marketed to both the Trade and to groups and individuals.

Richard moved Leeds Postcards out of his home to Aire Street Workshops in 1984 and was joined by fellow CPGB activist Richard Honey to separately set up Leeds Distribution under the Enterprise Allowance scheme. Distribution is the key to success in publishing as it controls what you are able to publish, large distributors had already refused to carry us as the cards were seen as too political.

This was also the year of the miners’ strike. Together with the NUM, Leeds Postcards published sets of postcards in support of the strike with many artists contributing their work to the cause. The Leeds Postcards Miner’s Strike Fund was set up for the proceeds of the postcards. In October Richard employed Christine Hankinson who had experience in educational publishing and newspapers in London. With front page adverts in the Guardian for the sets of postcards in return for donations to The Miners Strike Fund, over £50,000 was raised and given to the fund by the end of the year.

During 1985 it was decided that the three would become a workers collective. Northern Trading Co-operative Company Ltd bought Leeds Postcards from Richard Scott and it was registered with Scott, Honey and Hankinson as directors at Companies House in November 1986.

Gradually we moved on to producing and selling greeting cards and introduced many other ranges; art cards, womens’ artist cards (published jointly with Cath Tate Cards) t-shirts, wrapping paper and posters. The ‘peasant paintings’ from Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign were particularly popular, soon to be followed by ranges of greeting cards for Anti Apartheid Enterprises and Women and Turkeys Against Christmas by Angela Martin became our top selling and first xmas card. We were printing the cards on recycled board and using soya based inks…no one else was doing this.

By 1988 it was decided to expand the collective of workers: Steve Edwards whose business selling cards to students was one of our strongest sales outlets became a member in January 1989 and Alison Sheldon who had been working in diligently in despatch in November 1989. Richard Scott resigned and Dinah Clark joined us in the Spring of 1990. However all the major issues and campaigns that Leeds Postcards had both fought for, and against, succeeded or failed at this time: Nelson Mandela was freed in February 1990. Margaret Thatcher was ousted from power in November 1990. Sandanistas lost power, and of course the Berlin wall fell in November 1989. With the benefit of hindsight it was folly to have expanded at this time – but we did.

With five full time workers and two large units at Aire Street Workshops Leeds Postcards found itself ill prepared to meet the recession of the early 90’s. Large bookselling stores Borders‘ and Waterstones‘ sprang up initially cutting the price of books, piling them high and selling them cheap, effectively closing the small independent bookshops, our main customers. Even stalwarts like Collets in Charing Cross Road and Central Books, which used to be the Workers’ Bookshop, the official bookshop of the CPGB, closed down in the early nineties. None could withstand the the rise of the global capitalism. The big campaigns had ended, Trade Unions had lost their confidence and a new corporate mentality was spreading into the alternative market, which had become fashionable and essentially meaningless. Mainstream card companies bought logos off campaigns like Amnesty International and Greenpeace. We couldn’t compete in this new market (or perhaps didn’t want to ?). By 1995 Leeds Postcards were making an operational loss and we all worked one day less. Both Steve Edwards and Dinah Clark resigned.

1996 turned out to be a heady year of great achievement and loss: Whilst seeking images to publish a card of the tree sitters of the Newbury Bypass Campaign we met the Friends of the Earth online moderator Harry Wykes. He happened to be a fan of Leeds Postcards and offered to build a website for us for free! So we had a website – rare in 1996. Also that year Jeya Ayadurai, from Singapore and a fan of Leeds Postcards from his student days in Leeds, wanted to sell Leeds Postcards in Singapore and his company Singapore History Consultants paid for a stand at the Singapore Stationery Fair which Christine attended in the Spring. So hopeful so far…and then Waterstones’ asked Leeds Postcards to publish a set of Christmas cards for them as our cards had been selling so well at their new flagship store in Leeds…the future looked promising but these positive signs buttered no parsnips.

Our high overheads and poor cash flow meant we had no money to pay ourselves wages. Despite us being the longest running Workers co-op in the UK with a fully backed modest overdraft of only £5000, the Co-op bank refused to help us. Soon Alison Sheldon and then Richard Honey found new employment.

So then the Workers Collective was down to one, Christine Hankinson. After consulting ICOM I was advised that as it was trading at a loss Northern Trading Co-op Ltd would have to be wound up. The ICOM’s liquidation lawyer employed me to sell as much stock to distributors in the UK and overseas as possible and 40 ton of cards were recycled to enable the business to move out of Aire Street Workshops and stop paying rent. I was then solely pursued for the repayment of the overdraft. It was very tough doing this alone, a very stressful time. I bought the title of Leeds Postcards, the archives, core stock , and computer from the liquidator and moved it into my house in Headingley. However with no rent, no staff, no wages and doing all the pre-press work digitally on home computer, it was possible to keep Leeds Postcards going. When my statutory redendancy came through in February 1997 I was able to publish my first print run.

Harry Wykes kept the website up to date but Cath Tate Cards who had bought up most stock from the liquidator to distribute to the trade unfortunately didn’t agree to market new cards, just ones she chose, this would have meant Leeds Postcards would cease to be an independent publisher so I had to go it alone. It was extremely lucky that Graham Draisey who had established the first Oxfam Bookshop in Headingley was a fan of Leeds Postcards. As his small shop was so successful, making a record-breaking million, he was soon appointed to establish a chain of Oxfam Bookshops throughout the UK. and ..As the new shops were opened a spinner of Leeds Postcards was installed in many of these new Oxfam Bookshops. This basically meant that Leeds Postcards could independently survive and carry on publishing. Cath Tate Cards did distribute, those she chose, very well to the Trade and I had a loyal group of subscribers who were my inspiration as they bought cards before they were published and gave me great encouragement.

In 1999 Adam Waller, a Goldsmiths arts graduate and fan of Leeds Postcards, moved up to Leeds and worked for Leeds Postcards. He inspired curator Nigel Walsh at Leeds City Art Gallery to run an exhibition of Leeds Postcards and in In 2000 the exhibition called Viva Leeds 21 years of Leeds Postcards opened and ran at the art gallery for 6 months. It later toured art galleries in Cumbria and Northern Ireland.

Sadly Harry Wykes my online friend and supporter suffered a heart attack in 2005

In 2008 my daughter Thea Mallett joined Leeds Postcards. She oversaw the building of a new website with technology for online buying www.leedspostcards.co.uk and thanks to her enthusiasm and inspiration Leeds Postcards is still here.

and then….In 2018 Four Corners Books, the highly regarded art book publisher approached me to publish a book on Leeds Postcards (called Leeds Postcards). They commissioned me and graphic designer Craig Oldham www.craigoldham.co.uk to select about 100 cards with background information. It is a beautifully produced book in hardback

2020 we’re keeping on keeping on… by keeping in the black and the overheads low. Postcards, a much loved medium are perhaps here to stay with a different audience. A less virtual, more permanent way to express and share your views we will settle for our cards having pricked the odd conscience, raised an awkward question or wittily revealed a political irony. They are becoming small works of art.

Perhaps because of what is happening now, caused by Covid-19 the coronavirus, there will be a revolution, not caused by political activism but by real life and death threatening everyone equally. The perception of whose work is really valuable will hopefully change. Things will never be the same. We’ll see and we will keep publishing if we survive it.

Thanks for reading Keep safe

Christine Hankinson

 

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We can’t just have the internet! Postcards are Forever

 

Call for New Artists

Send any ideas, art, or inspiration for new cards and we will always take a look.

Royalties paid to artists – 10% of the print run for you to sell /or 10% of the trade sales.

if you are involved in a campaign and would like a postcard to raise funds and awareness please get in touch. Or let Leeds Postcards design and produce and publish a card for you: email: xtine@leedspostcards.com 

Amusing, thoughtful, satirical quote postcards. Embracing good thinking, and thinking about the good. Leeds Postcards is an independent postcard press. Our aim is to inform, challenge, question and maybe just amuse.