Holiday Photo Cards from PhotoCardsDirect.com

The holidays are almost here, and it's time to get your holiday cards done! I look forward to sending and receiving holiday cards every year. They decorate our house, filling the spaces above our windows, doorways and fireplace with messages of friendship and love. Even in these tough economic times, I like to set aside a little bit for holiday cards. It's nice to know that there's an online card company that's still within most people's budgets: PhotoCardsDirect.com. Check out their line of holiday cards, they have great designs at a great price!

PhotoCardsDirect.com invited me to print out some holiday cards so we could try out their ordering process and see how the cards turned out. I chose the Scrolled Panel Christmas card because I love the way the photo bleeds all the way to the edges of the card, and I love the scrollwork on the "Season's Greetings" logo. Ordering is super-easy, with lots of little perks like free printed return addresses on the envelopes and free e-cards. Here's how our card turned out:

The Bongga
Here's what I love about PhotoCardsDirect.com:

* It's easy to narrow down your search for the perfect holiday card -- you can select filtering options like the number of photos you want on the card, the photo orientation (i.e. portrait or landscape), the size of the card, even the color scheme.

* You can choose from a variety of greetings inside your card, and you can personalize it with your family's name or names.

* PhotoCardsDirect.com will even give you a link to the electronic version of your card, so you can send a holiday email to people on your email list (let's face it, many of them are going to throw those paper cards away, so you can watch your budget and only send paper cards to the few special people who will cherish it the most!).

* The price is right! Flat, photo-paper cards start at $0.99 per card when you order the minimum amount of 20, and can go as low as $0.55 per card. If you upgrade to cardstock, the price starts at $0.75 per card; folded cards start at $1 per card. Only the flat, photo-paper cards have a minimum order -- if you choose folded cards or flat cardstock, you can order just 1, 2 or 3 cards! I really love that you can get folded cards on cardstock, even if you're on a budget.



The Blah
Here are some things that could be improved:

* I love having pre-written greetings to choose from, but it would be nice for people to be able to compose their own greetings as well.

* Our photo printed out beautifully, but unfortunately there was an error in the design template, and the "Seasons's Greetings" logo did not print out properly. The good news is that when I contacted PhotoCardsDirect.com's customer service, they promptly offered to reprint the cards. Now that's what I call good service! Stay tuned for an update on the revised cards!



The Bottom Line
PhotoCardsDirect.com is a great option for the value-conscious consumer who wants real, beautiful holiday cards, not cards printed on photo paper, but doesn't want to pay high prices.



Win a discount code at PhotoCardsDirect.com
I have a promo code for $15 off an order of 25 cards at PhotoCardsDirect.com, and I'm giving it away to one lucky Bonggamom Finds reader!

To enter, simply follow @PhotoCardsDirect on twitter, and tweet this:

@bonggafinds has a code for $15 off an order of 25 cards from @PhotoCardsDirect -- who wants it? RT this to win it!

Just 1 tweet per person, please. I'll do a search for all valid tweets and draw a random one on November 10. Good luck!

Disclosure: I did not receive a sample or monetary compensation for this post. I received a product sample to facilitate my review, but have not been paid to review the product or give my opinions. Product information is provided by the featured company/product and is indicated in italics. The views and opinions expressed here are my own.