Postcards, Post-Mortem

We travelers like to brag. Whether we’re at the beach for a day or backpacking through Europe for a month, there’s no better way to say “thinking of you” (or, more specifically, “thinking of you while I’m being awesome on my awesome trip”) than a postcard. But with the rise in smartphone usage and the popularity of social media outlets like Twitter and Facebook, postcards are a dying medium.

According to Web site Tnooz, only 16 percent of 2,000 adults in a recent survey said that they send postcards while traveling. Many cited slow mailing times and the added headache of finding stamps and mailboxes as reasons why they opt for other forms of communication instead. It seems that phone calls, texts, Facebook posts and mass e-mails have increasingly pushed postcards in the direction of the dinosaur.

However, companies like Postcardly offer ways to combine the two by using technology to send printed postcards as easily as sending an e-mail. Although it’s a cute idea, some just don’t find it as appealing as having a Facebook album that all 500 of your friends can see and “like.”

Do you stay in touch with folks back home while globetrotting? Do you prefer sending and/or receiving hard copies, or are you more partial to the virtual version?

— written by Ashley Kosciolek