Eco-Friendly Christmas Cards: Eight Places to Buy Eco-Friendly Cards Online

It's almost that time again - time to pull out your address book and start writing Christmas cards. This year, as you send Christmas cards to your family, friends, neighbors, and clients, send an eco-friendly card. Many cards can be purchased online and are printed on recycled paper.

1. Watabaran.org- The word "Watabaran" means "environmental sustainability" in Nepalese. This unique card company creates eco-friendly cards for businesses and individuals from handmade recycled paper. Very unique, these eco-friendly cards sometimes come cut as Christmas trees or in other shapes, and even have a handmade, custom envelope that comes with them. Watabaran does not use chemicals like chlorine to create its paper, so the paper you get is always recycled, chemical-free, and handmade. In addition, Watabaran is a fair trade merchant - although Watabaran is Swedish-owned, they are based in Nepal and pay their Nepalese workers fair wages.

2. The Gallery Collection - The Gallery Collection has 163 different greeting cards, including Christmas cards, produced in wind-powered paper mills. All of their greeting card envelopes are likewise created in eco-friendly plants that use renewable energy sources.

3. Doodle Greetings - Doodle Greetings makes eco-friendly Christmas cards from 100% recycled paper - and it's paper you might have seen before, because the paper they use has been recycled primarily from copy paper and computer paper. In other words, the papers you toss in the recycle bin in the office today may end up back on your desk at Christmas as an eco-friendly Christmas card. Not only are Doodle Greetings' cards made from recycled paper, the production of the paper does not use bleach or another de-inking chemical, so no toxic by-products are created.

4. Pleasantrees - Pleasantrees is a business-to-business greeting card company whose cards are all made with at least 30% recycled paper. Pleasantrees also has a partnership with American Forests to sponsor three trees for every order placed through their company.

5. ModDog - While ModDog does not focus exclusively on greeting cards, they do offer pet-oriented, eco-friendly Christmas cards printed on recycled paper.

6. CafePress.com - The cards at CafePress.com, including the Christmas cards, are printed on paper that is 50% recycled. Like ModDog, CafePress.com is not specifically a greeting card company, but has a variety of eco-friendly Christmas cards available.

7. Artline Greetings - For a more sophisticated Christmas card look, check out the eco-friendly Christmas cards at Artline Greetings. All of their recycled cards are made from 30% recycled paper. Some of their cards carry messages specifically targeted to green-minded individuals.

8. Or... send an e-card! - The ultimate recyclable card is the one that arrives in your email inbox, and never appears in paper. Many e-card sites, such as Hallmark's, have a variety of free e-cards. You can also become a member of these sites for a monthly fee and send an unlimited number of e-cards. Many e-cards are animated and have cute storylines that your readers will enjoy.