When is Stationery Stationary?
Do we sense a controversy simmering? Seems there is quite a bit of uncertainty regarding how to spell one of the most basic terms on our site, stationery…or is it stationary? We’ve done some research and come to our own conclusions but would love to hear you weigh-in as well.
We have to thank Mike over at DesktopSupplies.com for bringing the issue to our attention. To summarize, the evidence suggests that when people are searching for printed paper products online such as birthday party invitations, birth announcements, holiday cards and personalized stationery, they are frequently using “stationary” as part of their search term. As Mike duly references in his post, stationary is defined as: “standing still; not moving.” He goes so far as to say that people have written in to correct the spelling of “stationery” on their site to “stationary.”
This obviously creates quite an issue for us because we’re in the camp that believes we sell stationery. However, many use what we’d politely call the “alternate” spelling to find our cards. Naturally, we’ve ruled out building new site utilizing the word “stationary,” confusing people with more than one spelling or sending out a mass e-mail to all English speaking people correcting them of their ways. But…we’re open to suggestions.
Tags: announcements, Etiquette, grammar, holiday cards, invitations, spelling, stationary, Stationery
