Paperless Post is reimagining invitations through design and technology to help people connect at life’s memorable moments. With 175MM users and $37 million in venture financing, we’ve firmly secured our position in the market and a devoted user base. Company-wide we enjoy an amazing ecosystem of an even gender split and healthy balance of engineers and designers. Because Paperless Post isn’t supported by ad revenue, we get to spend our days focused on creating and improving on the ideal version of our platform, product, content, and partnerships for our users. Paperless Post exists to help all people celebrate all the moments that matter to them. We believe that having a team reflective of the diverse world around us empowers us to create a product that serves everyone. For a complete list of job listings, visit http://paperlesspost.com/jobs.

Paperless Post

One of the critical parts of succeeding as a is deciding who you are. I don’t mean describing what your product does. I mean answering the question, what is your mission? Why does your company exist? For us at Paperless Post, an important catalyst in clarifying our mission came in the form of building an adjacent product (paper), and then realizing we had to go back to our roots. startup Most people know of Paperless Post because they’ve received one of our online invitations for a wedding, a birthday, or a holiday party. Over 20% of U.S. adults have used our products, and we have served 120M unique senders and receivers. Last year alone, our users sent over 70M online invitations. What fewer people know is that, until last October, we also ran an in-house paper invitation business, called Paper by Paperless Post. In four years, our paper grew to be one of the biggest custom stationery businesses in the country. Then, last spring, we decided to change our strategy, outsource Paper to a leading retailer called Paper Source, and focus on expanding our online offerings. business I want to tell our story, so that our experience can be useful to other startups finding their way. Launching Paperless Post We started in 2008 with a simple idea. We created a website that allowed people to create online invitations that looked like custom printed ones. They could send these to their guests’ emails and track responses. The product was based on two insights: organizing events is difficult, and people care about how they present themselves in social situations, including online. While it sounds straightforward, the product was technically ambitious. It required a smooth, easy-to-use design tool entirely accessible in the web browser. It needed to let non-designers create invitations they were proud of. We charged a small fee from the beginning, believing that people would pay for a high quality product. Many in tech opposed our idea out of principle. The thinking at the time was that “communication was being democratized.” Twitter was exploding. The least trendy thing to do was to bring the formality of the offline world online. But when we launched Paperless Post, in the fall of 2008, users got it right away. We found out from a news story that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had used our invitations for her farewell party from the White House. Not only did people understand the product, they paid to use it. It’s been growing virally ever since. Going into paper In 2012, we decided to allow our users to order printed versions of the invitations they had designed. It might have seemed like a weird decision, given our name, but they had really been asking for it — the request to print “some or all of my invitations” made up 60% of help queries. Paper by Paperless Post was deployed just before Christmas of 2012, and within a year, it was making millions of dollars. Our online business continued to grow alongside it. By 2014, we were a different company in the eyes of our industry. A push-pull opposition between paper and online From 2015 to 2017, we seemed to be thriving, but beneath the surface, we felt spread thin. Every day, our teams — from engineers to designers — were torn between focusing on the online and paper experiences. While Paper and digital invitations looked similar — that was the point — operationally, they were very different. The more we invested in both products, the more we saw we were running two fundamentally different businesses. Paper by Paperless Post was a physical business, enabled by technology. To offer it, our team had built a renderer to create high resolution PDF files within seconds, and calculated rush order and shipping options so that users could get their packages on time. Like many e-commerce offerings, it improved how people consumed real-world things, in this case allowing you to skip a trip to the stationery store and create a beautiful, physical object. Our online business, on the other hand, was and is different. While it may look similar to a traditional invitation, it’s really more than that — it’s a communication and planning platform. Excelling in our online offering means creating a useful, functional, event management experience; improving how hosts create designs, collect RSVPs, and then message and coordinate with their guests. Being overextended was costing us money; but more important was the opportunity cost. Anything we built for Paper was something we weren’t building for online, and vice versa. We were even having difficulty deciding which product to put on our homepage. We had to make a choice. And we decided that, while people loved Paper by Paperless Post, our online product was what made us us. In addition, the margins for online are about 3x better, the market is bigger, and it brings in new users virally. Furthermore, we realized that we are not even just an invitation company: we use design and technology to help people gather more easily and confidently in real life. This is our mission. And the reason it matters is because we believe that getting together in real life is how relationships thrive. Great design and useful planning tools are far more than a 10X improvement on paper. They make life better by helping people actually get together. That’s why we founded the company. Going back to our roots In May 2017, we decided to end our in-house paper business. We would license our designs to a print expert and let our team focus on one, new, combined online and mobile product. Reducing the revenue from Paper in the near term meant that we had to reduce costs. And that meant laying off members of our team. The layoff was by far the most difficult part of exiting our paper business. If there is one thing I regret, it’s that we didn’t make this change earlier. Perhaps we could have avoided it. The future of Paperless Post To make big changes, we needed to understand why we exist, beneath the layers of features, and business models. But now that we understand this, it has enabled us to make decisions much more easily. Now that we are thinking 100% about our online opportunity, we’ve been reimagining what an invitation can be. We don’t need to use our imaginations too much because we’re building based on feedback we’ve been gathering for years. We’re confident that we haven’t served nearly all the demand that is out there. Our new product, Flyer, is in early beta. It’s targeted at serving a market that Paperless Post hasn’t been able to capture yet: invitations for casual events. The same insights that govern our original product hold true: getting together in the real world is a logistical challenge. And people aren’t just concerned with logistics; they care about how they present themselves in social situations as well. In creating our new product, we’ve also realized something else. People’s needs vary widely from event to event. They need a product that is very flexible. The world has changed since we launched. More than 50% of our traffic comes from mobile devices, and hosts want to reach guests not just through email, but through services like Facebook, SMS, Whatsapp, their blog, etc. To meet their needs, we are changing the format of our design tool so that it works well on a phone; it also doesn’t always have to look like paper. You can deliver wherever your guests are. In addition, we’re expanding the functionality of the event page, so that hosts in the future can use Paperless Post to do more things beyond simply collecting RSVPs — like selling tickets, splitting costs, tabulating the number of adults versus children, etc. Progress is rarely linear. Our Paper offering didn’t last, but it helped us recognize what we really exist to do. To our team, past and present: you created a product that over a hundred million people have used for the most important moments in their lives. The future is exciting, but it’s possible only because of your contributions. Thank you.

Why does your startup exist?

If you work from home, chances are you're relying on various online tools to replace in-person meetings and maintain productivity. However, if your workspace remains cluttered with paper, your home printer never rests, and old reports keep stacking on your shelves, it may be time to consider reducing paper consumption. Doing so can simplify your workflow, increase productivity, and even save you money. Plus, it's an environmentally friendly choice. Let's explore three simple strategies to make your home office paperless. Disregard any backlog and begin today Making your home office paperless might seem like a big task, causing you to put it off. However, simply beginning with small steps each day can lead to significant progress in just a few weeks. If you have a lot of papers to deal with, it's okay to leave sorting and scanning for later. When you have time and feel like doing it, you can go through the papers and decide what to scan and what to throw away. The key is to start reducing paper usage today rather than putting this beneficial initiative on hold. Try using these 5 apps Consider installing a few helpful apps to make your home office truly paperless. They'll assist you in transitioning tasks from paper to digital, bringing immediate benefits. With such apps, finding information becomes effortless—no more searching through piles of paper for hours. Plus, you won't have to worry about spilling coffee on important documents or your pet leaving marks on them. So, these are the apps that will help you go paperless: Scanning apps Gone are the days when you needed a bulky scanner. Now, with apps like or , your phone can do the job just as effectively. Moreover, iScanner, for example, employs a wide range of AI features to make your scans look better than the original documents by removing folds, shadows, and glares. iScanner Adobe Scan Online storage services Sure, electronic documents need somewhere to be stored securely, and choosing the right platform is crucial. When evaluating your options, consider factors like storage capacity, document sharing, and, of course, the cost. Top contenders in this field include , , and . Google Drive Microsoft OneDrive Dropbox E-signature tools In today's digital world, even signing documents has gone electronic. Whether it's a rental agreement or a service contract, you can sign it with just a click. The two most popular services are and . But if you're handling just a few documents, many scanning apps offer an easy-to-use e-signature feature. PandaDoc DocuSign To-do list apps If your workspace is covered with Post-its and notebooks for task management, consider switching to apps like or . These digital alternatives keep your tasks organized and accessible, preventing you from losing important notes or forgetting urgent tasks. Plus, you can easily rearrange tasks and add new information without adding to the clutter. Trello Todoist Notion apps To cut down on paper usage, try ditching traditional notebooks. Instead, jot down your notes digitally using Word documents or specialized apps such as or . While it may feel somewhat awkward at the start, you'll soon find it much simpler to find, organize, and share your notes with colleagues. Notion Evernote Set up an algorithm for new incoming papers Even though you can deal with your pile of papers later, it's crucial to manage new documents properly as soon as possible. If you get flyers or newspapers in your mailbox, take a quick look at them, and if there’s nothing important, simply toss them out. But when you receive letters or official documents, decide what to do with them right away using this simple guide: Put it in the recycling bin right away. Scan and save the digital copy, then throw away the paper one. Scan and save the digital copy, and keep the paper one for a while before throwing it away. Keep the paper version forever. Yes, we can't go completely paperless since there are some documents we need to keep in paper form forever. And here's the main tip, which is helpful in many life situations—Don't Overthink It. If you've decided to use less paper and begun organizing your home office—that's great news, regardless. If you're struggling to change your routine quickly, forgetting to scan documents and dispose of unnecessary papers, don't be too hard on yourself. Starting is always the toughest part, but eventually, you’ll grow into the habit.

3 Tips On How To Make Your Home Office Paperless

How I Over-engineered my Document Storage System With Paperless-ngx

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How to Automate Your Marketing Strategy for Scalability and Growth The best way to reduce the administrative burden of marketing while boosting the impact and effectiveness of your marketing efforts is to utilize automation 30. How to Make Sure Your Nonprofit is Complying With HIPAA It is important for your non-profit organization to comply with HIPAA to protect health data. Here's how you can do so. 31. Nonprofit Vs. Social Enterprise: What is the Difference? Although nonprofits and social enterprises have quite a few overlaps, they are not the same thing. Find out the key differences. 32. What Are the Uses of Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality in Museums? More and more museums are implementing artificial intelligence and virtual reality to give their visitors a better experience. 33. 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How to Track and Manage Your Organization's Technology Every organization uses technology, software, and services to run their ship. However, it's important to keep track and to manage all of it. 45. Public Relations 101: The Types of Stories Reporters Love In the last blog post about public relations, you learned what makes a story attractive to reporters. That’s just the beginning. 46. How Tablets Can Make Computing More Accessible for Everyone It's easy for many to think of digital accessibility features as sort of an add-on, a set of features that live off to the side, there for only a small group of people. But that isn't the case. According to the CDC, 61 million Americans — and roughly one in four adults — live with a disability of some sort. 47. 4 Apps to Help Your Nonprofit With COVID-19 Challenges It's without a doubt that your nonprofit has seen some challenges because of COVID. 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Visit the /Learn Repo

PAPERLESS POST

paperlesspost.com

51-200 employees

Since 2009

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PAPERLESS POST

EVERGREEN INDEX #8212

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PAPERLESS POST

paperlesspost.com

51-200 employees

Since 2009

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PAPERLESS POST

EVERGREEN INDEX #8212

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