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October 23, 2017

8 Tips for Planning an Unforgettable Holiday Party For Work

Filed under: Christmas & Holiday Party Tips — PDWriter @ 4:47 pm

planning a holiday party for work

It’s likely that you’ve attended a holiday office party that doesn’t fill you with the holiday spirit – in fact, it may have been so dull that most employees wished they could just sit back down at their desks and resume their workday. Fortunately, your office doesn’t need to suffer the same fate.

If you’ve been tasked with planning a holiday party for work, look to this helpful list of tips and tricks to help you create a fun and memorable event that people will be talking about for years to come.

Send Out Invitations

Get your staff excited for the office holiday party by sending out invitations well in advance. Early invites mean that employees can block time on their calendars and begin looking forward to the impending festivities.

Pick a Theme

Nothing help set the mood of the party (and direct your efforts) like picking a theme. And don’t make the theme “holidays” – get creative with it! Plan an ugly sweater party, complete with costumes or games, or turn your office into a winter wonderland with fake snow and wintery decorations.

Don’t Make Your Employees Bring Anything

More than anything, your holiday office party should be about celebrating your employees’ hard work. So make it about them: get a catering company or restaurant to handle the food and drinks so that your team can sit back and enjoy themselves.

Commemorative Photos

Set up a small area of the office — complete with silly props and clothing — where your employees can take a photo of the occasion. The snaps will look great on your social media or recruitment pages.

Make It Interesting With Door Prizes

If your budget allows for it, get a few great door prizes that you can hand out over the course of the party. You could also have a few thematic games with prizes for the winners.

Give Your Employees a Keepsake

Prepare a small gift for each employee, as well as a custom greeting card. Fill the card with compliments, thanks, and a few words of encouragement – your employees will love feeling appreciated for all their hard work.

Remember That It’s a Holiday Party

Do your best to make the holiday party inclusive – don’t make it Christmas themed if you have employees who practice other religions. Keep it broad by branding it as a holiday party, and sticking to a nondenominational theme.

Make It a Puppy Party

Yes, this is a real thing. Check your local listings for a company that will rent a swarm of adorable puppies for a few hours. Your employees will love to destress by playing with the special guests all evening.

No matter what you’ve got in mind for your upcoming holiday party, you can count on PaperDirect to help you plan a winning holiday party for work. Our entire line of paper products can help you spread good cheer to every corner of the office.

October 20, 2017

Enter to Win Holiday Cards from PaperDirect!

Filed under: Product Features — PDWriter @ 4:21 pm

paper direct holiday contest

The holidays are a magical time, filled with time spent with family, dinners around the fireplace, and letters from old friends. However, your bank account might not love the holidays quite as much – between the gifts and the parties, you may find yourself pushing the limits of your monthly budget.

This year, one lucky winner won’t have to worry about factoring holiday cards into their budget. You have the chance to win beautiful holiday cards for your business, friends, and family during PaperDirect’s Holiday Card Giveaway!

To enter, simply click the button below and fill your name and email in the form. Click “Submit”, and that’s it – you’re in the running to win up to $89.99 worth of holiday cards from PaperDirect!

enter to win

Don’t miss your chance to win – the contest ends on November 29th, 2017! Complete contest rules can be found here.  Good luck, and happy holidays from all of us at PaperDirect.

 

October 16, 2017

6 Cool Office Decor Ideas to Make Your Workspace Instagrammable

Filed under: Office Fun — PDWriter @ 11:49 am

cool office decor

Your workspace is a direct reflection of you. It is vibrant, exciting, and welcoming? Or, is your space bland and blah?

If you find yourself snapping tons of selfies at work for Instagram, pencil in a mini cubicle makeover using our cool office ideas so you can show the world more about you. After all, we could all use a little office refresh!

Uncommon Live Plants

If there’s tons of light or a windowsill in your office, add a living, breathing pet plant. Go for something that could work as a conversation starter, like a bold blue orchid, twisty bamboo, or a bug-eating Venus fly trap. Give that greenery a catchy name and introduce him on Instagram as your new office mate.

Expressive Cozy Pillows

Style your office chair, couch, or relaxation area with some emoji-face pillows. Each time you give a social media update, you can share your current mood by strategically placing the corresponding pillow in the frame. Clever and quirky!

Stress-Relieving Gadgets

From fidget spinners to squishy stress balls, it’s nice to have something for our fingers to fiddle with during a tense conference call. Earn bonus points for getting the marketing team to print your business logo on these gadgets so your company gets a free shout out each time your desk or office lands on Instagram.

Wacky Wall Art

Gone are the days of displaying mass-produced framed pictures. Skip the abstract landscapes and hang up something that brings you joy. Enlarge a family picture, show off your sketching skills, hang a quilt, display your own painting masterpiece, or frame that signed baseball jersey.

Creative Computer Accessories

Whether you channel your love of the 90s and cover your laptop with stickers, or feature a funny pet photo on your desktop, these details add extra interest to your Instagram updates. Update your background and accessories based on your mood to keep things interesting!

Awards and Accolades

Are you a little league Coach of the Year? Were you named the office Social Media Queen? Show off those award certificates with honor and pride on your desk or walls. They highlight your personality and will make you smile each time you see them, even in the background of your social posts.

Looking for more cool office ideas? Visit the PaperDirect blog to make your workplace rock! We can help you with everything from planning office parties and events to celebrating the accomplishments of your loyal employees.

October 12, 2017

#ThrowbackThursday: The 5 Best 90s School Supplies

Filed under: Helpful Resources — PDWriter @ 12:04 pm

90s school supplies

As most kids who grew up in the 90s know, school supply shopping wasn’t just throwing random supplies into a cart and calling it a day. Instead, choosing supplies was a feat that required finding the coolest binders, the best pens and pencils, and all the latest gadgets to show off your style.

To pay tribute to those bygone days and all those neon supplies, here are some of the world’s best school supplies from the 1990s.

A Pencil Grip

Because those patented number two pencils were just too squirrely to handle with your bare hands, the 1990s saw the invention of the ergonomic pencil grip, a totally-not-useless addition to every 90s kid’s backpack. Hip kids had a plethora of colors to choose from for appropriate coordination with their outfit or binders.

A Trapper Keeper

No matter where you lived, at school the coolest accessory to own, hands down, was the Trapper Keeper. It wasn’t just a binder; it was a personal expression of your individuality. From the pattern you picked to the stickers you plastered across the front and back, the Trapper Keeper was a scholastic necessity.

Standalone Erasers

When you needed to get rid of those obnoxious pencil marks, but you preferred to just smear low-grade rubber across the page instead of erasing them, you reached for one of your decorative erasers. Of course, you never actually used your favorites, just kept them in your pencil bag to show off your style!

Push-Up Pens

Using two different writing utensils was something your boring old parents did. In the 1990s, it was all about using cigar-sized pens that had five or six different colors right inside of them. Who cares that they never worked longer than five minutes? They were must-have items.

Five Star Notebooks

If Trapper Keepers were for the kids, then Five Star notebooks were for the serious academics. Equally important was having a notebook in every color of the rainbow to distinguish between your subjects.

Recapture Some Childhood With PaperDirect

Just because you’re spending at an office desk instead of a tiny, fiberboard desk doesn’t mean you have to go through life without a touch of whimsy. With a little help from PaperDirect and our complete line of business stationery, you can make sure that you’ve got the right paper products for every mood, even if your Trapper Keeper days are behind you.

October 9, 2017

What to Write In A Boss’s Day Card

Filed under: Recognition & Motivation Ideas — PDWriter @ 10:21 am

what to write in boss day card

Boss’s Day is coming! This year, it’s celebrated on Monday, October 16, and if you don’t want to be the odd employee out, it’s time to start thinking about how you’re going to show your appreciation for all that your supervisor does for you and the company.

While gift giving is common in some companies, we suggest giving a heartfelt greeting card and saving the gift for the holidays. Knowing what to write in a Boss’s Day card can be a little tough as mushy prose is super awkward and just signing your name is a little cold. So, let’s find that happy medium that your boss will think is just right!

The Opening Greeting

Somewhere on the card, place your boss’s name. You might open the card and hand-write “Dear (Their Name)” above the pre-written greeting card text. Or, include a message, starting with their name, on the left side of the card in the blank space. First names are fine if you use them in everyday office conversation.

The Main Message

OK, this is where things can get as elaborate or as simple as you’d like. First, start off by wishing them a Happy Boss’s Day! Then, in a sentence or two, say what you like about your professional relationship. You might mention their mentoring skills or perpetual patience. If that feels sufficient, wrap up the card with your closing and signature.

If you’ve had a memorable experience within the past year, this is a good time to acknowledge it. Are you a new employee? Thank the boss for their extra attention and guidance during your transition. Or, did you finish a big project together? Talk about how your collaboration made it all possible.

Have you worked with your boss for ages and have grown a friendship outside the office? It might be nice to include a few lines about how much you value your friendship and look forward to the future together, tackling whatever comes your way in and out of the office.

The Closing Signature

Remember, this card is going to your boss. Skip the sappy “Yours Truly” or “With Love”, unless the head of the office happens to be your spouse or child! Instead, keep it professional and simple by closing with “Sincerely”, “Thank You” or even “Warm Wishes”.

If you haven’t picked up a Boss’s Day card yet, browse Paper Direct’s online store. With a few clicks, the card will be on its way to your office. Then, grab your favorite pen and write a short, but meaningful message in honor of Boss’s Day. Your supervisor is sure to love your appreciation!

October 5, 2017

3 Spooky Ideas for Halloween Office Decorations

Filed under: Event Planning Tips — PDWriter @ 12:53 pm

halloween office decoration ideas

Whether your office space is modern, retro, traditional, or high-tech, you can transform it into an enchantingly eerie environment with these top Halloween office decorations ideas. Instead of popping a pumpkin and paper skeleton here and there, you can best bedeck the entire office by choosing an overall theme. These three themes are some of the most spooktacular Halloween office decorations ideas out there.

Spooky Spider Den

Spiders and the tangled webs they weave make for a fast, easy and super-stunning Halloween theme. You can create spiders of various sizes out of numerous items, provided you have a solid item to serve as the body, eight items for legs and a can of black spray paint. Try empty boxes with cardboard tube legs, or Styrofoam balls stuck with eight pencils or pens.

Rows of skittering rubber spiders can add a frightening touch door jambs, window sills, and counter edges. Just stick them on with double-sided tape. Faux spider webs are inexpensive and easy to drape over doorways, windows, and hallway openings. Invest in a larger spider web as the central focal point, or create a groovy one out of a cut-up trash bag.

Spider snacks can consist of goodies shaped to look like spiders. An easy one is spider cupcakes, featuring an unfrosted chocolate cupcake on a white plate, and eight legs drawn on the plate with icing. Flatbread sandwiches can likewise serve as a spider body, with mini carrots sticking out around the sides for legs. Use a couple of radishes for eyes.

Make sure to top off the spooky spider theme with spider sticky notes and spider stationery for all your reminder notes, office memos, and announcements during the Halloween season.

Ghosts and Goblins

If spiders tend to freak out your coworkers, you can always opt for something a bit tamer, like ghosts and goblins. Ghosts can be quickly created by drawing eyes and a mouth on a white sheet, cheesecloth, or gauzy fabric and then positioning the fabric over lamps, filing cabinets, or other office items.

Create goblins out of cardboard cut-outs you can place strategically around the office. They can make a dashing statement peeking over cubicle walls, on the sides of office trash cans, and even positioned near the main company sign in the lobby.

Ghost snacks can be as simple as peeling a banana and then adding chocolate chip eyes and mouth, stuck in place with a dab of peanut butter. Drawing a face on the outside wrapper of string cheese makes another tasty ghost treat, or you can always go for a ghost-shaped pizza.

Ghost and goblin stationery needs to be an office staple with this theme, with options that include border paper, vinyl banners, and postcards for your office announcements and other communication.

Office Haunted House

Perhaps the most versatile theme, the office haunted house lets you combine the ghosts, goblins, and spiders with anything else you may find in your typical haunted house. Try spooky silhouette cut-outs on the windows. Pepper the hallways with a few plastic skeletons and black cats. You can even create miniature haunted houses to place strategically around the workspace or erect a haunted house computer.

Spooky snacks that align with the haunted house theme again give you a range of options. Sugar cookies shaped like cats, bats, witches, and ghosts are an option, as are graveyard cupcakes, featuring a vertical fig newton iced with R.I.P. as the gravestone.

The field is likewise wide open for Halloween stationery that supports your haunted house theme. Send out announcements on pumpkin border paper. Use candy corn border paper for your office memos. Hook up a banner with a haunted hill background.

These three Halloween office decorations ideas can certainly enliven the office and get everyone in the mood for the sensationally spooky season. Don’t forget to visit PaperDirect for all your Halloween paper needs leading up to the haunted day!

October 4, 2017

5 Tips for Standing Out at Your First Job Interview

Filed under: Business Marketing Ideas — PDWriter @ 2:19 pm

girl at first job interview tips

You’ve received some training, you’ve sent out your resume, and now — at long last — you’re finally headed toward your first job interview. If your palms are starting to sweat and your shoulders tense up at the thought, don’t worry. You are not alone! Interviewing for any job, let alone your first one, is a nerve-wracking experience.

Fortunately, there are a few things you can do to make sure the interview goes smoothly. Follow these first job interview tips to get an edge over the competition.

Prep Physically

Remember that when you step into the room with your potential employer, it’s not just your mind that needs to be working well. Make sure that you’re prepping your body correctly. Get a good night’s sleep the night before and eat a filling breakfast the morning of your interview. If you have time, do some yoga or hit the gym before your interview to boost confidence and get those endorphins going. There’s no sense being tired and hungry when you’re trying to impress your potential employers.

Dress for the Occasion

Think about the job you’re applying for and how you might dress for it on a day-to-day basis, then outfit yourself a step above that. If you’re trying for a manual labor job, go with business casual, like a formal button down shirt paired with slacks or a skirt. If you’re interviewing for an office position where the dress is business casual, consider wearing a suit or a professional dress.

Whatever you wear, make sure that your clothes are clean and as wrinkle-free as possible. Avoid flashy colors or bold fashion statements – there’ll be plenty of time to express your true fashion-forward self once you get the job.

Do Your Homework

Spend at least an hour researching the company at which you’re going to interview. Read articles about them, review who the decision makers are at the company, and try to find out what former employees are saying. A simple Google search of the company’s name should yield several results to peruse before you walk in the door. Glassdoor is also a useful resource for employee opinions and interview experiences.

When you’re informed, you can speak easily and handle any topic that comes your way, and your interviewers will be impressed with the effort you put in to learn about their company.

Project Confidence and Good Humor

This one is straightforward, but it can be an easy one to overlook when you’re walking into your first job interview. You might be nervous, but if you hold your shoulders back, look your interviewer in the eyes, give them a firm handshake, and keep a smile on your face, you’ll go a long way toward masking your anxiety.

You never know – a little feigned physical confidence may even inspire some inner confidence, too!

Send a Note Afterward

No matter how you think the interview went, you can only help yourself by taking the time to pick up a pen and write a short thank you note to your interviewer. A friendly note thanking them for their time might make all the difference between landing the job and being beat by the competition.

Follow these tips, and your first job interview is going to be a breeze. Don’t forget to prep in advance by doing some research, finding a professional outfit, eating a filling meal, and ordering thank you notes from PaperDirect to send after your interview. Now, go get ‘em!

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