Valentine's Day

Always observed on February 14

Facts

2013 Product News 

Valentine's Day Greeting Cards 

• Hallmark offers more than 1,400 Valentine's Day greeting cards, including 99-cent value cards, Shoebox humor cards, Mahogany valentines for African-American consumers, and Hallmark Sinceramente designs with Spanish and bilingual messages designed for Hispanic consumers.
• Hallmark Gold Crown® stores offer the widest variety of unique and innovative cards including:
  • Hallmark Signature Collection cards for Valentine's Day are truly unique, just like a signature. The exquisite textures, premium quality paper, fun embellishments, and relevant messages are sure to help Hallmark Signature Collection cards become holiday favorites.
  • Adult Card Presenter Collection: Presenters (upscale envelopes) enhance the value, prestige and emotion of delivering a Hallmark valentine. Elegant and beautiful designs highly crafted with gems, attachments and a unique clasp enrich the experience of shopping for and hand-delivering a romantic card. Presenters include a Valentine's Day card that complements the tone and design of the card presenter.
  • Child Card Presenter Collection: Kids can feel the love with these AWESOMELY presented cards! Cards feature cute critters covered in fun textures with valentine messages tucked inside. After you remove the valentine, keep this little friend around to store favorite little things.
  • Justin Bieber Greetings: Hallmark wants to give Beliebers an early Valentine's Day gift - a collection of greeting cards featuring the shining star. Complete with fun photos and bright colors, Hallmark Justin Bieber cards are sure to bring Valentine's Day cheer to mailboxes everywhere.
  • Personalized Valentine in a Keepsake Box: Intricate, 3-dimensional designs presented in a giftable box. Features a removable card upon which the sender can express their love of and appreciation for the recipient. These cards show appreciation on a deeper and more meaningful level-getting to the core of what the sender uniquely values about the recipient and giving the recipient a glimpse of the impact they've made on their life.
  • Big Valentine Wishes: Oversized die-cut characters make an appearance for Valentine's Day- this time showing love in a BIG way just for kids.
  • Between You & Me: These cards are celebrating 25 years of helping people express relevant and meaningful messages from a personal and heartfelt point-of-view. Cards deliver high emotional value with heart-tugging sentiments for the closest of relationships.
• Personalized Valentine's Day greeting cards are available on Hallmark.com. The sender can create the perfect Valentine's Day card by personalizing the text and adding photographs. Hallmark.com will then stamp and send the card.
• New this Valentine's Day on Hallmark.com, Storytelling Trifold photo cards. For those who like to use multiple photos to tell a story, these accordion-folded cards provide lots of design and layout options.
• Hallmark.com also offers personalized classroom valentines, which feature the sender's name and/or recipient's name, as well as photos.
• Hallmark Go Cards - Free app for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. Stay in touch on the go. Consumers can select, personalize and send a paper greeting card from an iPhone anytime, and from anywhere. Edit messages, add photos and import contacts, write with a finger on the screen of the device to add a signature, then press send and for $3.49 a paper card will be delivered to the recipient.

Valentine's Day Gifts 

• Hallmark Gold Crown stores offer a variety of Valentine's Day gifts including dancing plush pigs, talking plush dogs and Hallmark Confections premium chocolates. Valentine gifts such as photo frames, gift books, storybooks, music boxes, pendants, light-hearted gifts and mugs also are available at Hallmark Gold Crown stores.
• Saying "I love you" or "I appreciate you" isn't always easy, but with new Blooming Expressions, it's easier when you say it with a flower! The stunning red and pink blooms are showcased in a beautiful vase-press a button and watch the blooms unfold to reveal a heartfelt sentiment inside. The vase features a ribbon, and petals reveal a special message with a heart or butterfly inside. Hallmark Gold Crown stores will feature new musical designs. As the bud opens, beautiful music is synchronized with the opening.
• Hallmark offers an everyday gift line, Storybook and Story Buddies, during the Valentine's Day season. Story Buddies are loveable plush characters that can respond with several different adorable phrases when they hear their stories read to them, when they listen to their read-along CDs or when you play with them on their app or on-line.
  • New just in time for Valentine's Day, our newest Interactive Story Buddy girl! Posey is a bright, cheerful, adventurous girl who loves a good adventure where she can use her imagination. Bundle includes a story buddy, a storybook "Posey and The Princess Castle", a read-along audio CD and free access to digital story time on Hallmark.com. Two other storybooks are also available, "Posey Saves the Day" and "Posey and the Purrfect Song."
• Until We Hug Again^TM Plush - Save $10 and share the love of a hug when a loved one can't be there with these recordable plush toys - a brown and blue bear, and a pink bunny.
• Perfect for Valentine's Day, five of Hallmark's classic Recordable Storybook titles are available including "Guess How Much I Love You," "That's What Grandmas Do," "Wherever You Are My Love Will Find You," "Love You Forever," and "All the Ways I Love You."
• Between You & Me Sentiment Blocks are lasting reminders of love, appreciation and caring of our closest relationships. Five different messages available.
• Hallmark Gold Crown stores also have exclusive plush animals, including:
  • Cupig - A techno plush pig with wings who shuffles, shakes his belly and sings a parody of "The Cupid Shuffle." Also available is a book titled "Cupig's Shuffle."
  • Love Ya Pup - A techno plush pup, whose ears flap and he says "Who do I love? You-ooooooooohhhh!" To accompany the pup, "The Doggone Best-Ever Valentine's Day Activity Book." From mazes and coloring pages to fill-in-the-blanks and word searches, these fun activities will have them begging for more.
• Other Valentine's Day gift items include mugs, treasure boxes, stationary, jewelry, chocolates and candy, plush and gift books.
• Valentine partyware for home, school and office plus stickers and a variety of gift bags, wrap, tissue and add-ons makes one-stop valentine shopping easy.

Holiday History

According to Roman legend, during the third century, Valentinus was imprisoned for his Christian beliefs and sentenced to death. While jailed, according to legend, Valentinus restored the sight of his jailer’s blind daughter. The night before he died, Valentinus wrote a farewell note to the girl, which he signed, “From Your Valentine.” His sentence was carried out the next day, Feb. 14, 269 A.D.

Hundreds of years later in fifth century Rome, people honored Juno, the pagan goddess of love and marriage, on Feb. 14. During the celebration, men would draw women’s names and court them for marriage.

Around 498 A.D., Pope Gelasius declared Feb. 14 as St. Valentine’s Day to honor the martyr Valentinus and to end the pagan celebration.

In 1849, Esther Howland of Worcester, Mass., published the first American valentine.

In Stores

Available at Hallmark Gold Crown® stores nationwide. Use the store locator on Hallmark.com to find the nearest Hallmark Gold Crown store.