To celebrate our children’s brand YKRA KIDS we have created our own pocket calendar for you!

It was one of the most popular advertising media during socialism, yet few people use it today. Many collectors view these small pieces of paper for advertising purposes as age documents and relics that tell a lot of exciting things. It is no coincidence that there is almost as much tradition behind the production and collection of card calendars as for postcards.

History of the card calendar

Perhaps few people know, but the history of card calendars dates back more than a hundred years, to the late 1800s. Early calendars, of course, looked completely different from today’s advertising media. They were originally created for non-marketing purposes and contained only neutral graphics in addition to days and name days, possibly without illustration. At that time, they were still called wallet calendars.

The purpose of the wallet calendars was roughly the same as the appointment diaries and other portable calendars used today. They were used for advertising purposes only roughly from the first third of the 1900s.

At first, card calendars popularised clothing stores, newspapers, and pharmacies, but in serious collections we can also find pieces with historical themes. Both during the First World War and in the following period, it was typical, for example, to endow card calendars with political and social messages and to use them for a kind of propaganda purposes.

The period from which we can meet more and more advertisements began in the thirties, including brands we know even today. It was around this time that Orion, Nivea, and Dreher's first calendar ads appeared, many of them are now treated as iconic, historical pieces of advertising.

From the 1950s, with the arrival of the deficit economy, they were replaced by advertisements by state-owned companies and propaganda graphics.

Around 1945, the Kossuth printing house and the Offset and playing card factory made the card calendars for the state. In this period of about twenty years, the advertisements of the State Insurance Company, BÁV, BÉH, MOKÉP and other state organizations dominated, with propaganda promoting pioneering and socialist values ​​going hand in hand.

In terms of advertising use, the real boom came with the early 1970s. From then on, card calendars appeared in ever-increasing numbers, in ever-wider categories, and it was at this time that most serious collectors began to build their collections from this extremely interesting unique advertising medium.

Here are our favourite pocket calendars from the 60s: