QSL Card

Now if you want some cheap QSL cards go to VISTAPRINT and design your own for nothing!

I have wanted to have some new QSL cards printed for years now, but the old suppliers are not there any more. To order some now you usually have to order from the Ukraine or Norway.

I got an offer from VISTAPRINT to make 100 postcards free, so I designed them on-line and then took up another offer of printing 250 cards for only £7.00 in full colour!

I got my first QSL cards back in 1969 when I joined the RSGB as Short Wave Listener A6412. I had some glossy cards made that cost a fortune at the time. When I got my Amateur Radio licence, George, G3ZQS designed and made me some QSL cards. They were a bit boring! After that, I used postcards in full colour of Bolton town centre and had a stamp made with my callsign.

This was an interesting story... It was about 1975 and Bolton had twinned with two other towns in Europe. At the time I was a committee member of the Bolton and District Amateur Radio Society and we had organised events that involved linking with Le-Mans in France and Paderborn in Germany. One event was a net on 80 metres run by G3XUM. We asked Bolton Council if they would print some QSL cards for us to use. After months of phone calls and letters eventually they decided to print some...in fact 10,000 of them!! We had boxes and boxes of QSL cards that we couldn't get rid of!

I guess nowadays QSL cards are not that important any more, you can send an e-QSL instead. I have to say though that receiving a real QSL card through the post for a DX contact still gives me a buzz, and yes, I still collect QSL cards. They are something special that has come from that town, city or country, something personal.

That is why I decided to print some more, I just love having them!