Postcards Warsaw
Photograph ©2017 by Brian Cohen.

Does Anyone Send Postcards Anymore?

W hile walking down a street in Warsaw as I was passing by a rack of postcards, I wondered to myself: “Who actually sends postcards anymore?”

Does Anyone Send Postcards Anymore?

Postcards were still a way of letting people know that you were thinking of them while you were away from home when I first started traveling. Calling someone via telephone was still expensive; and there were not as many ways to communicate then as there are today.

You can now use technology to communicate with someone at little or no cost, thanks in large part to the advent of the Internet. E-mail messages, instant messaging, and text and video chat can all be employed at no charge in many cases; and photographs can be sent within seconds of taking them — creating customized instant electronic postcards of sorts.

Sending Postcards From Hotel and Resort Properties

I have never taken advantage of this service; but did you know that some hotel and resort properties offered a courtesy service to send your postcards for you at no additional cost?

“Marriott no longer offers complimentary postage on postcards” is what FlyerTalk member xtremeski2001 posted in this discussion last year, giving the impression that Marriott International, Incorporated had such a policy — of which some FlyerTalk members were unaware.

FlyerTalk member cohighcountry1k could not believe that one hotel property wanted to charge four dollars to mail out a postcard back in 2010 which marketed the hotel property. “Even Westin hotels have mailed cards for me! I can understand if it’s a postcard I purchased that I am responsible for the postage — but not the hotel’s post card.”

The general manager of the hotel in question posted an apology to cohighcountry1k in that discussion.

Postcards for Special Projects

Several requests have been posted on FlyerTalk for postcards to be sent for various reasons:

Summary

Postcard Minsk
Photograph ©2017 by Brian Cohen.

I personally cannot remember the last time I sent a postcard; but I would not be surprised if there are many people who still send postcards today…

…but I did not see anyone look at or touch any of the postcards in the rack shown in the photograph at the top of this article…

All photographs ©2017 by Brian Cohen.

  1. Still send postcards. Have some teenagers that love to get actual mail from the post office. That is a rarity for them since so much is digital.

  2. I still send postcards. I always send one to my grandmother, parents, and penpal. Oh and I always send one to myself as well just to see if the post actually worked! To date, the longest one was the postcard from DRC. Took 6 months to receive it back home here in NYC!

  3. If I can find postcards & postage, I do send them. Siblings that don’t travel, their families enjoy them. One of my docs gets a big kick out of receiving them and his staff enjoy seeing them from far off places.

  4. I still send postcards! My parents and other relatives still enjoy receiving them and I love picking them out and sending them!

  5. YES! I always send postcards when I travel internationally…My postcard mailing list keeps growing too! I send them to people who I don’t normally call/email, for instance my sibling’s elderly in-laws who don’t travel much.

    I consider navigating a foreign postal system very much an adventure! You can tell A LOT about a country by their local post office!

    Bonus Tip: Post offices in Australia sell international postage paid postcards for LESS than most places sell just the postcard!

  6. I know people at Postcrossing, a project that allows you to send postcards and receive postcards back from random people around the world, still mail postcards.

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