John Sands

John Sands had incorporated the earlier playing card manufacturing businesses of Hudson Industries Pty Ltd in 1972 and Valentine Publishing Co in 1989. John Sands was bought by American Greetings in 1996, and it is presumed the playing card business closed sometime around then. Their main line now is greeting cards.

Above: John Sands aces of spades following from Hudson / Valentines. Dunlop advertising pack, 1993. King of spades from publicity brochure. John Sands courts, as per Hudson/Valentine with purple added, in Jumbo index and normal sizes. Adelaide Casino pack, 1992.

Above: special joker for Batman deck (1989) and Koala / Kangaroo picture backs by Steve Parish, a wildlife photographer (who later published his own decks printed in China). His Sands decks have the ‘anon’ ace of spades shown above.

• Advertising Brochure

  

  Above: brochure that's in the shape of a large greeting card, about 160 x 255mm, and opens up like a card. The Sands contact info has been added on top of the name of Valentine Greetings (which can be read underneath), so dates from the time Sands took over Valentine, c.1989.

  Below: the back of the brochure, showing cards from the Valentines era.

  

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: all images courtesy John Daniels and Ken Lodge.

By Simon Wintle

Member since February 01, 1996

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Curator and editor of the World of Playing Cards since 1996. He is a former committee member of the IPCS and was graphics editor of The Playing-Card journal for many years. He has lived at various times in Chile, England and Wales and is currently living in Extremadura, Spain. Simon's first limited edition pack of playing cards was a replica of a seventeenth century traditional English pack, which he produced from woodblocks and stencils.