SEASONAL GREETINGS BY TELEGRAPH

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22335, 24 February 1938, Page 15

SEASONAL GREETINGS BY TELEGRAPH

The Christmas and New Year greetings telegram service of the Post Office has become so well established that it appears to be making inroads on the time-honoured Christmas card. During the recent Christmas and New Year period the number of greetings telegrams lodged throughout the Dominion was 380,502, an increase over the previous year of 38,880. This was a rise of 11.38 per cent, both in volume and revenue. There were 311,033 Christmas greetings and 69,479 New Year messages. It was in 1933 that the Post Office made its Christmas and New Year telegram greetings service more attractive by providing appropriate “received" forms in colour. The result was a remarkable increase in the traffic, which more than doubled next year, the 1932 total of 66,188 rising in 1933 to 161,089. The use of the telegraph as a rapid means of conveying good wishes has continued to grow in popularity, for the recent Christmas business shows an improvement on that of 1933 to the extent of more than 200,000 messages. Greetings telegrams are not confined to the Christmas season. Telegrams containing birthday greetings, congratulations, and similar communications are delivered by the Post Office on attractive forms' and in special envelopes all the year round. As a further development of this facility, it is now proposed to provide the sender with pictorial forms on which to write such special telegrams. _ _ .