Custom Photo Christmas Cards | Insert Photo Cards

The best Christmas cards for family and friends have one big quality - they are customized. There are several ways to customized a card, from choosing a special design to writing our own lines, but the one that has the best chances to be kept forever has a photo, either inserted on a card frame, either printed on a custom photo Christmas card.

  There are millions of Christmas cards send every year around the world. It is said that in The United States every household sends out about 28 card, bringing the total somewhere between 1.5 and 2.1 billion. Most of these cards have holiday motives and greeting lines already printed by old, famous and respected companies. Lately, a new trend broke into the Christmas cards market, a trend that emphasise a personal message for friends and relatives so busy that they may have not seen each others in decades. More and more people send a customized picture of their family accompanied by greeting holiday lines.

A photo frame Christmas card is an old idea and it is very easy to create. With today's digital technology it seem to get even easier. There are three basic ways to make custom photo Christmas cards:

- order your custom cards through a website and have them printed and even shipped for you;

- download a card editor or use the free online services of a website;

- take some pictures of your families that you want to send and insert them into a blank Christmas cards with a cutout for a photo.

This is the most convenient way to create customized greeting cards and works the best for a great amount of cards.

There are lots of websites that can produce, print, and send your Christmas cards, saving you time and money. Here is how it works: go to a website like hallmark.com, tinyprints.com, cardsdirect.com, or myexpression.com.They do not require an upfront registration but you have to create an account by the end of the process. Choose the type of card you want (ex. holiday, wedding, baby shower, etc.) chose a layout, background and letter style. Upload a picture from your computer and play around with the options offered by the site until you are satisfied with the result.

At this point you can order just one sample that can be sent to your house or you can go ahead and order how many cards you need.

Some sites also offer a catalog with their templates. Some of these online card services will print the order and ship it to you but others are taking a step further and send them to your friends and family. You will need to upload your address list. It is always a good idea to read their privacy policy just to make sure your friends will not end up buried in junk mail.

The cost of such extensive service is pretty fair considering all the work they save you, from going to the store to buy cards and stamps to hand writing your message for each piece. And when you apply all the discounts they offer then you end with a little over $2 per card.

This method allows users to personalize their own photo as a Christmas card through a photo editor that can be either downloaded, either used for free from a website.

One of the free downloads is Photo Card Maker. This program comes with over 100 free templates for any occasion and the site promise to come up with more. You can choose your template, upload a photo, write a greeting line and customize the card using the tools provided. Then it is up to you to print and send the cards. You will need photo paper, ink, and a very good printer or a photo printer.

The other way to make your own custom photo Christmas cards is to go to a website like Hewlett - Packard and make your card the same way as above. There are numerous sites that have a free online card editor that can be used for holidays, anniversaries, weddings or other occasions. Also, all big companies that manufacture media products make available such free software for download.

The advantage of an installed software is that you can save and store a project on your computer. The advantage of using an online one is that you do not need to load your PC with a program that you may only use once around Christmas time.

The cost of using this method may vary according with the supplies you need to buy ink, paper, printer, envelopes and stamps. The more supplies you need to purchase, the more expensive it becomes.

This method requires more effort and, probably, more money. You will need your own printed pictures and photo insert Christmas cards with envelops and stamps. It woks the best when we plan to send only few cards or for those of us who have Christmas photos already printed. All you need is to buy cards with a cutout frame that accommodate the size of the picture.

There are not many models available for these cutout cards or photo insert Christmas cards. They are offered online by some marketplace websites like Amazon or other websites specialized in this type of services. The price may vary based on the amount but it can go as high as $5 per piece.