With a climb in revenue of 6.2% to achieve takings of £542.5m, Card Factory is confounding any hasty obits for the 'analog' greeting card.

It's a fairytale business story: Card Factory was founded in 1997 by Dean and Janet Hoyle in Wakefield as a retailer of discounted greeting cards. The couple began work selling cards from the back of a van at car boot sales and opened their first store that year. By 2010, the Hoyles had attracted sufficient interest to attract an offer of £350m for their business from private equity investors Charterhouse. They took it.

Today, Card Factory, having diversified and harnessed the power of personalisation through online retail, is the UK's leading specialist retailer of cards, gifts, and celebration essentials, with more than 1,000 stores to parallel its online presence, as well as international partnerships. The company's combined workforce tops 10,300.

Here in Gloucestershire, the brand has eight pins in the retail map: at Regent Street, Gallagher Shopping Park and Evington Road in Cheltenham, on Eastgate Street in Gloucester, on Stroud's High Street and Tewkesbury's High Street, on Cricklade Steet in Cirencester and at Regent Walk in Lydney. It is also operating from Broad Street, in Ross-on-Wye.

Card Factory's preliminary results for the year ended January 31 2025 showed that the retailer had continued to build momentum across its estate, total store revenue rising by 5.8% while like-for-like store sales rose by 3.4%. People were also, on average, spending 5.4% more thanks to broader product ranges - which includes new ventures in confectionery, soft toys and stationery.

Adjusted pretax profit came in at £66m – a clear turnaround from last year's trickier times.

Darcy Willson-Rymer, Chief Executive Officer, said: "Our performance in FY25 demonstrates the strength and resilience of cardfactory and our strategy as we continue to evolve the business into a leading global celebrations group. We delivered strong revenue growth, outperforming the wider celebration occasions market.

He added: "Further expansion of our store estate combined with continued development of our gift and celebration essentials categories, were key drivers of our performance."

Card Factory, which is directly owned by Sportswift Ltd as part of the Charterhouse empire, is now halfway into its 'Opening Our New Future' growth strategy, with entry into new markets, including the US, and expansion of existing partnerships.

Mr WIllson-Rymer said: "As we move into FY26, good momentum has continued during our Spring seasons. Despite an uncertain and inflationary backdrop, we remain confident in our ability to deliver mid-to-high single-digit percentage profit growth, underpinned by our strategic focus, our ongoing productivity and efficiency programme and our strong financial discipline."

● In 2023, the UK greeting card market was estimated to be worth £1.51bn. In this figure, the total retail value of single card sales increased from £1.46bn on the previous year. Overall, 94% of UK consumers buy a card at least once a year.