MyPunchblog

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

Now that we are halfway through the month of March, the days are getting longer and spring is just around the corner. What a perfect time for the start of National Spring Fever Week! How are you celebrating spring? It’s a great time to do some spring cleaning or plan a weekend getaway!

Today is also the start of National Wildlife Week and American Chocolate Week. We love chocolate at Punchbowl and really like the idea of hosting an iron chef party where the main ingredient is chocolate!

This week also includes two events that surely signify spring is almost here…St. Patrick’s Day and the start of March Madness! Whether you’re hosting an informal St. Patty’s Day dinner or are heading to the bars to celebrate and watch college hoops, we have everything you need to get started. Start planning your party!

This week’s other reasons to celebrate include:

• March 15: National Pears Helene Day
• March 16: National Artichoke Hearts Day
• March 17: St. Patrick’s Day
• March 18: Oatmeal Cookie Day
• March 19: National Chocolate Caramel Day
• March 20: Snowman Burning Day
• March 21: National French Bread Day

Want to be the first to know about our Reasons to Celebrate? You can now sign up to receive a daily email with the day’s Reasons to Celebrate! Just sign in to your MyPunchbowl account, go to the “Settings” tab, and check the box to receive the “Daily Reasons to Celebrate updates” under “Emails from MyPunchbowl.”

Have a great week!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

As you’ve probably noticed by now, there is a fun, quirky reason to celebrate for every day of the year. Sometimes there’s even more than one! There are a few ways you can learn about upcoming Reasons to Celebrate:

• Visit MyPunchbowl Reasons to Celebrate daily to learn the day’s celebration (then share it with friends via Twitter, Facebook and email).
• Become a fan of MyPunchbowl on Facebook to participate in active discussions about each day’s Reason to Celebrate (below).
• Add a widget to your blog to share the Reasons to Celebrate with your readers.
• Subscribe to our blog where we will give you a weekly update of upcoming holidays so you can plan ahead for the necessary celebrations (ie make sure you have a healthy supply of cheese doodles or schedule a margarita night with the girls)!

As we enter the month of March, there are a few monthly celebrations to share. March is National Peanut Month, National Craft Month, and International Ideas Month. Can you think of any ways to combine all three? Have any ideas for crafts made out of peanut butter?

This week also marks Celebrate Your Name Week and National Cheerleading Week.

This week’s daily celebrations cover a range of topics:

• March 1: National Peanut Butter Lover’s Day
• March 2: National Banana Creme Pie Day
• March 3: National Anthem Day
• March 4: Learn What Your Name Means Day
• March 5: National Cheese Doodle Day
• March 6: National White Chocolate Cheescake Day
• March 7: Academy Awards

What are you looking forward to this week? How do you plan to celebrate? Let us know!

This post was written by Matt Douglas, Founder & CEO, @mattdouglas

Well, it’s Groundhog Day (again), and this year is a special one for the Punchbowlers. As usual, Groundhog Day is a company holiday — so we all get the day off. But this year we organized a volunteer day (for the record, completely optional for employees and guilt-free). In the afternoon this Groundhog Day, we’ll be painting a few rooms at a local homeless shelter. We’ve been calling it “Phil’s Philanthropy Day” after the venerable Punxsutawney Phil. After waking up early to watch the grand prognostication, I can’t think of any better way to spend the afternoon.

And that’s not all….

This year I’m very excited to report that Punchbowl announced an official partnership with Groundhog.org and the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club. This is a partnership that makes me happy on a number of levels. First, it’s great exposure for Punchbowl, with an audience that matches our target demographic. And second, it’s been a long-standing goal of mine to find an official way to be involved in the Groundhog Day festivities. Here’s a quick snippet from the blog post I wrote on my start-up CEO blog about this partnership announcement:

For 2010, I wanted to do something special for Groundhog Day– so on a whim, I picked up the phone and called the folks who developed Groundhog.org. I told them that I wanted to partner with the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club and create an eCards site. After a little negotiation, we signed an agreement with Groundhog.org to become the exclusive provider of Groundhog Day eCards. This morning, we made the official Groundhog Day press announcement.

And last but not least, my wife and I are planning our 14th annual Groundhog Day party for this coming Saturday. This year’s theme is Disco, and with the combination of disco party supplies, unique party favors, disco costumes, and a 70s play list, we have planned an awesome party. We’re expecting about 30-35 people this year. Of course, we’ve used MyPunchbowl to plan the entire event from start to finish, and it’s been a great experience.

Groundhog Day is all about community, revelry, and celebration of the ordinary. So whether you take a moment to turn your attention to Gobblers Knob or you send someone a free Groundhog Day eCard, please remember the infamous words of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club:

“There are many important events in life — and Groundhog Day is not one of them.”

Happy Groundhog Day!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

Since MyPunchbowl launched Reasons to Celebrate last July, we’ve been sharing these quirky daily holidays with our followers on Facebook and Twitter. Our friends tell their friends about the day’s reason to celebrate — whether it’s National Coffee Day or National Bubble Bath Day — and before you know it we have fifteen people discussing their favorite pies on our Facebook page (seriously, National Pie Day was this past Saturday, January 23).

I wanted to let you know that we just launched a new FREE widget for your blog so that you can keep your readers in the know about the daily reasons to celebrate. With days like National Cupcake Day, Peanut Butter Lover’s Day, and National Go Barefoot Day, there’s an amusing new reason to celebrate every day of the year.

The widget contains unique tidbits about the day’s Reason to Celebrate and gives your readers the ability to look ahead at upcoming holidays. It is also available in two sizes - check it out on our blog to the right.

Add the Reasons to Celebrate widget to your blog and let us know what you think!

This post was written by Matt Douglas, Founder & CEO, @mattdouglas

As 2009 comes to a close, we wanted to do something special to say thank you for a great year. So here’s the deal: If you haven’t created a MyPunchbowl user account yet, we would like to offer you a FREE Premium upgrade when you create an account  — but you have to sign up before the end of the year. 

Do you know someone who would love a free MyPunchbowl Premium account? Tell them about MyPunchbowl using our handy tell-a-friend page.

Here’s the official media alert with details: 

Punchbowl Software, Inc., developers of the start to finish party planning site MyPunchbowl.com, today announced that anyone who creates a new user account before 11:59pm PST on December 31, 2009 will receive a FREE MyPunchbowl Premium account upgrade. Valued at $29.95 (1 year subscription), Punchbowl will give away up to 10,000 Premium accounts by the end of the year. MyPunchbowl Premium provides users unlimited access to invitation and eCard designs as well as the ability to send advertising-free eCards and invites for one year. “Our site traffic has doubled in the last three months,” said Matt Douglas, CEO of MyPunchbowl. “This is our small way of saying thank you for a fantastic year.”

To claim your FREE Premium account, sign up for MyPunchbowl before the end of 2009. 

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

Do you believe Christmas is this week? If you’re like me (and most people), you probably still have a few more gifts to buy. Most likely for those people on your list that are the hardest to shop for!

If you’re still trying to find the perfect gift - and don’t want to fight the masses at the stores - we have a terrific, unique gift idea for you. Over a thousand actually…

Earlier this year we introduced MyPunchbowl Experiences, an extraordinary selection of experience gifts that engage the recipient’s personality and passions. Ranging from indoor skydiving, first flight lesson, helicopter tour to model for a day, wine making, glass blowing, or a private safari, the possibilities, like the memories they create are endless.

With so many experiences from which to choose in categories such as Wine & Gourmet, Sport & Adventure, and Arts & Culture, there is something for every age and every budget.

To celebrate the holidays, we’re excited to offer $20 off any MyPunchbowl Experience purchase of $100 or more. Use the code “QUICK” at checkout. Browse experiences now.

Make sure to choose the Email or Print It Now delivery options - you’ll have a really cool, unique gift in time for Christmas that fits perfectly inside a cute card!

Happy shopping!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

It’s early December and according to my calendar it’s about time to send holiday cards to friends and family, or at least start thinking about it. Fortunately, MyPunchbowl gives you two great options to create customized holiday greetings this year.

Launched just over a year ago, our free eCards have become hugely popular for sending personalized holiday greetings. Once you browse the holiday designs and find a card you like, you can customize it a number of ways. You can change the background colors, add a family photo and/or video, type a note on the card, and even include a longer text update next to the card.

Send your holiday eCards to everyone on your list immediately or schedule the card to deliver at a later date/time (on Christmas Eve, perhaps?). You can also share eCards on Facebook and Twitter which is helpful when you don’t have everyone’s email addresses. Here are some of our holiday eCards:

If you still prefer to send your holiday greeting cards in the mail, we have an option for you as well: custom printed holiday cards from the MyPunchbowl Custom Print Shop. Choose from hundreds of designs then create your custom printed holiday cards by adding a photo and special message.

Want your printed cards quickly? You can receive them in as few as three days! Browse printed holiday card designs now.

With hundreds of free eCards and custom printed holiday cards, we hope making your holiday cards this year is fun (and easy)!

Happy holidays!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

A few months back MyPunchbowl launched a new personalized party product on our site – MyPunchbowl Personalized Soda. Personalized soda comes in many classic flavors such as Root Beer and Cream Soda, among others. To personalize your soda, choose your flavor, upload your own photo for the front of the label, then add a personalized message for the back of the label. Pretty cool, right? Check out the soda that our CEO, Matt Douglas created.

For the holidays, our partners at Jones Soda have made some special holiday-inspired flavors available for you to customize for your holiday parties. Evergreen Apple, Snowdrift Soda, Reindeer Root Beer, and Holiday Cheer are the new flavors for this holiday season (just look for the holly icon at the top of the bottle to identify holiday flavors!).

MyPunchbowl Personalized Soda makes a great addition to any party but with these holiday flavors you can definitely add a little something special to your Christmas or holiday party this year. Order your personalized soda soon as these special holiday flavors are only available for a limited time!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

A few weeks ago we launched a fun new section of our site called Reasons to Celebrate. In the few weeks since our launch we’ve already gotten some great feedback about the site. Bloggers have written about some of the quirky reasons to celebrate in July, including the math holiday, Yellow Pig Day (7/17).

People are also talking on Twitter and Facebook about some of these crazy days. Last Friday there was a great conversation on our Facebook page in response to Mutt’s Day (8/31). Check it out:

And there are plenty of great reasons to celebrate to look forward to in August: National Root Beer Float Day (8/6), S’mores Day (8/10), National Creamsicle Day (8/14), and National Banana Split Day (8/25). Good luck getting through August without gaining a few pounds!

Want in on the fun? Get daily updates on the day’s Reason to Celebrate by becoming a fan of MyPunchbowl on Facebook or following us on Twitter.

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

Do you love to devour unique tidbits of amusing information that may spark a fond memory or ignite engaging conversations with your friends? If so you will really enjoy the latest addition to MyPunchbowl.com, “Reasons to Celebrate.”

This new section identifies Reasons to Celebrate for 365 days of the year - often with more than one reason to celebrate for each day, week, and month. Social sharing capabilities allow you to share your favorite reasons to celebrate on Twitter, Facebook, and more. These quirky and interesting holidays make great fodder for Twitter, where people post all kinds of random information. You can follow the feeds on each Reasons to Celebrate page to see what your friends are tweeting.

The month of July is jam packed with many engaging reasons to celebrate including: National Ice Cream Day, National Cousins’ Day, National Parents’ Day, National Hammock Day (which may force the workaholic to actually plan time to relax), and even National Hot Dog Day! What better reason to light up the grill, invite the neighbors over, and host a hot dog roast!

And don’t forget today’s reason to celebrate, National Gummi Worm Day!

The Reasons to Celebrate may not only amuse you, but might actually give you an excuse to host a party. Either way, we hope you’ll enjoy these days as much as we do and spread the word about your favorite Reasons to Celebrate.