Poor Cleveland! Greeting card company highlights city's poverty status

from The CBC

A hometown company's satirical holiday card features Cleveland's ranking as America's poorest big city.

The American Greetings Corp. card shows a man in a black-and-white photo walking past urban landscape and reads: "Season's Greetings from Cleveland ... America's Poorest City!"

Inside, it says "Happy Holidays."

The U.S. Census Bureau determined that Cleveland was the poorest big city in the United States in 2005, its second such ranking in three years.

"Obviously, our intent is not to make light of the issue. It's just a satirical form of humour that plays well with a certain segment of the population," said Laurie Henrichsen, spokeswoman for American Greetings. "We realize it's not for everyone."

The card was one of 10 test-marketed at three locations, Henrichsen said. Only a few were available, and they have been rotated out of circulation, she said.

The cards were a takeoff on the old "Greetings from" tourist postcards and meant to take a humorous look at news and political events, she said.

She said she could not discuss whether the cards would be more widely distributed in the future.

American Greetings is the second-largest greeting cards maker in the United States after Hallmark Cards Inc.