Moonpig is an internet-based business whose head offices are situated in London and Guernsey. The company's business model is mainly selling personalised greeting cards, flowers and gifts. The website was launched in July 2000, and in 2007 the company was responsible for 90 percent of the online greeting card market in the United Kingdom, with nearly six million cards shipped.
Company profile
According to founder Nick Jenkins, "Moonpig" was his nickname at school in Newport, Shropshire, hence the name of the brand. Visitors to the website can choose from a large selection of card designs and enter their own text and photos to personalise them. Visitors can also personalise a number of gifts. The original launch of Moonpig in 2000 coincided with the collapse of the dot-com bubble, which made progress difficult at first, but Jenkins raised further investment from private investors and venture capital, and the advent of broadband and digital cameras together with news spreading by word-of-mouth meant sales steadily increased, with the first profits being made in 2005. A television advertising campaign began in the United Kingdom in November 2006. 2 years and 4 months later, Moonpig received more internet traffic than other flower and gift companies in the UK. By summer 2009, the company had sold cards to 2.57 million customers and its profit record was seen by The Times as "a typical curve for a successful start-up — a big, £1 million loss establishing it in its first year, negligible losses edging into negligible earnings over the next six years, and thereafter a seven-figure profit". The company was initially based in Chelsea, but is now based in Farringdon, with their cards being printed in Guernsey. The business expanded into the Australian market in 2004 and, in late 2009, the business expanded its offering to include a range of flowers and custom mug designs. In spring 2010, Moonpig launched in the United States. In July 2011, Moonpig was bought by Photobox Group, which also owns Photobox, for £120m in a cash and shares transaction. Photobox has subsequently been sold to a private equity firm.
Security
In August 2013, a private developer discovered a vulnerability in the Moonpig API that made it possible for outsiders to retrieve the personal information of all three million of its users, and informed Moonpig. Moonpig did nothing about it until the developer publicly announced the problem in January 2015, whereupon Moonpig disabled the API and its mobile apps pending an investigation. Moonpig issued a statement saying that "all password and payment information is and has always been safe".
