A single shop built around paper.

Paper Source, which English Wikipedia describes as an American stationery and gift retailer based in Chicago, began as one shop in the city. The Los Angeles Times, reporting on the company in September 2013, gave its founding year as 1983, and Retail Dive wrote in May 2021 that Susan Lindstrom founded it that year as a single store in Chicago. English Wikipedia, citing a 2017 Chicago Sun-Times article, says Lindstrom started the business after a trip to Japan introduced her to refined stationery, and, citing the company’s own About page, that the first store opened in Chicago’s River North neighbourhood to show handcrafted papers from around the world.

The range that grew from that shop is broader than paper alone. Drawing on the company’s About page, English Wikipedia lists papers, custom invitations and announcements, gifts, greeting cards, gift wrap, paper craft kits, party supplies, and personalised stationery and stamps. When the Los Angeles Times covered it in 2013, it described Paper Source as a Chicago-based chain selling paper goods, gifts and crafting supplies in many US states and the District of Columbia.

The stores also taught paper craft. People reported in March 2018 that Meghan Markle, before her marriage into the British royal family, had worked as a calligraphy instructor at the Paper Source branch in Beverly Hills, and English Wikipedia dates that job to 2004 and 2005. English Wikipedia also says Lindstrom retired from her role as the company’s chief creative officer in 2009.

From founder to private equity, and through Chapter 11.

Outside investors arrived in 2007. Retail Dive reported that Lindstrom sold a majority stake that year to Brentwood Associates, the Southern California private equity firm, and the Los Angeles Times likewise wrote that Brentwood had contributed capital in 2007. English Wikipedia names Sally Pofcher as the chief executive appointed at that point. On 24 September 2013 the Los Angeles Times reported that Brentwood had sold Paper Source to the investment firm Investcorp, without disclosing terms.

Under Investcorp the company changed management again. Crain’s Chicago Business reported in September 2015 that Paper Source had a new chief executive, Winnie Park, and new premises; English Wikipedia describes those premises as a warehouse facility in Forest Park, Illinois, which it lists alongside a Chicago office as the company’s headquarters.

In March 2020 Paper Source announced, in a press release distributed through PR Newswire, that it was taking over a group of stores from the stationery retailer Papyrus, whose operator was then in bankruptcy. Retail Dive later noted that the deal came just as COVID-19 spread in the United States and that store closures followed. In March 2021 Paper Source filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, as Bloomberg reported on 2 March 2021 and Publishers Weekly confirmed. Retail Dive quoted chief financial officer Ronald Kruczynski as saying that before the pandemic the company had been “enjoying rapid expansion and sustained sales growth”.

The sale came two months later. Retail Dive reported on 11 May 2021 that Paper Source had named Elliott Investment Management, which also owns Barnes & Noble and the British bookseller Waterstones, as the successful bidder for its business, with an affiliate of Apollo as the back-up bidder, and that a federal bankruptcy court was due to consider the sale on 13 May. Publishers Weekly, on 12 May 2021, wrote that Elliott had agreed to buy Paper Source’s assets and operations, that the two retailers would be run separately, and that James Daunt, chief executive of Barnes & Noble, would oversee both; Daunt called Paper Source “a wonderful brand”, and the magazine reported that the announcement pointed to opportunities for retail partnerships between the two businesses. English Wikipedia says Daunt appointed Jenica Myszkowski, previously chief operating officer, as chief executive in June 2021, and it lists Barnes & Noble as the company’s owner.

Design and documentation.

Greeting cards and paper goods are a business of small, frequent purchases tied to particular moments: birthdays, weddings, holidays, condolences and thanks. A card or a sheet of gift wrap is usually bought, written in and handed over within days, so the brand behind it has to be recognisable on a crowded rack or a shop shelf rather than over a long relationship with the buyer.

The companies behind these brands range from family publishers and specialist stationery shops to chains, wholesalers and newer online services, and a single name may move between owners, formats and channels over time. Some design and print their own ranges; others sell work by outside artists or buy in finished goods. That makes the plain questions worth asking: who started the brand, who owns it now, who designs its cards, and where they are printed. The guides in this group look at card and stationery names from across that range.

Each guide separates what independent sources record — founding, ownership changes, restructurings and where products are made — from what a company says about itself, and marks plainly what rests only on the company’s own word.

A shop, a wholesaler and a design studio.

Paper Source sells to other retailers as well as through its own shops. Retail Dive wrote in May 2021 that the company had a substantial wholesale business and designed a share of the products it sold, and Publishers Weekly named that wholesale arm as Waste Not Paper by Paper Source, one of the businesses included in Elliott’s purchase alongside the stores and the company’s online shop.

The company’s product range, as English Wikipedia lists it from the company’s About page, runs from papers and personalised stamps to custom invitations and announcements, a service that connects the stores to weddings, births and other occasions.

For a design guide, Paper Source shows how a single Chicago paper shop grew into a stationery chain across many US states, passed through private equity ownership and a 2021 Chapter 11 case, and came to sit beside a bookseller under the same owner. Compare Clairefontaine, the French paper and notebook maker, and Papyrus, the card and stationery brand whose stores Paper Source took over in 2020. For this guide we use kraft brown, ink slate and card stock cream with a serif, an unofficial interpretation; no product or logo is reproduced.

Keep Paper Source’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.