Wish you were here? There’s a good reason no one sends postcards any more

As one British seafront shop owner admits he now only sells one postcard a month, has the price of stamps killed off this glorious tradition? I hope so, says Flic Everett

Postcards were once a signifier of status – as long as they came from abroad (AFP/Getty)

When I was a child, we used to go to Llandudno on holiday, and almost every shop had a rotating postcard display outside. They ranged from “saucy” imitators of Donald McGill – showing blonde bimbos with breasts like torpedos falling out of skimpy nighties to landscapes in heightened, uncanny-valley colours – to comedy: there was always an entirely black one captioned “Conwy at night”. How we didn’t laugh.

So it’s no wonder that the holiday postcard is in its death throes, tossing out only the occasional image of beleaguered seaside donkeys or head-scarfed 1950s battleaxes as it struggles.

Now, tourist shop owner Daniel Lumb, who runs the No 1 Rock and Gift Shop in Bridlington, has admitted that for tourists, sending postcards is “a thing of the past”, adding that he’s lucky to sell one postcard a month. He didn’t add “…and that’s to the over-90s”, but it’s probably true.