March 2016, blue envelope and this:
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As far as packaging of cards go, I very much prefer slightly heavier paper cut to hold a card in slots that lighter paper with glue of some form on it. Problem with the glue is that getting it all off the card can be tricky sometimes - best case you end up with a ball of glue that gets binned, worst case you have to use cleaning things to get the glue off the card before you use it (or live with a small square of fluff on it) - and it’s an added extra something that doesn’t even really need to be there (cut slots work, yo).
The ridiculous Curve packaging IIRC was for a special version of the Curve card, and pretty clearly the idea was to encourage people to share it with their friends or on social media to spread the word about the brand, so was more advertising than anything else. From a considering waste point of view, am glad it’s not their everyday thing.
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When I originally got my Starling card I thought the packaging was unnecessary, I was more excited about activating it in the app than looking at the illusion on the packaging.
I like that blue card one posted above from monzo!
Totally agree about the comments with the glue, yuck.
Environmental impact is very important, also the less fancy the packaging the cheaper to produce.
I believe you can still have something eye catching that people will post online without it having to be OTT.
Maybe monzo could go back down to a5 rather than a4?
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Fintechs should challenge not only old banking ways but environmental impact caused by their activities.
There are two things which are necessary to post a card to a customer: a card itself and an envelope. That’s it! Don’t post anything else!
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The Transferwise Boarderless account packaging is nice, you see it at the start of this video:
Not sure if it comes in another envelope on top of that but to me it looks like the letter is the envelope?
It does come in another envelope 
There was a good opportunity to avoid paper waste though 
Trasferwise Borderless account is just great!
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@simonb Kind of related but more out if interest does Monzo use a renewable energy supplier for it’s offices?
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I’d assume they use Bulb?
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Didn’t even know they did business plans.
That is a great question and also one that I don’t know the answer to! 
No worries, just thought it’s a nice + if it’s the case, I can’t imagine many of the other banks are.
The packaging used for the starling card was cool but it wasn’t necessary when it would just end up being recycled.
Monzo and from what I remember Monese were much simplistic and less paper involved.
Starling wasn’t cool. It was mixed card/plastic and will have undoubtedly ended up in landfill being too difficult to recycle. More energy to create, and heavier, so more energy to transport in the postal system. Absolutely not cool.
They’ve done the right thing: Made the actual card the instagramable wow factor and made the packaging recyclable.
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That and the fact that the central ‘effect’ appears to have been an eye, which I always thought was unusual. It had Big Brother-esque connotations.
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This is Revolution 
Not needed for that packaging as it just goes in the recycling box.
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Starling have the same packaging. Think a thread was brought up briefly on their community before about potentially allowing people to send these back to be recycled or reused but staff didn’t respond.
It is very cool, but I think a little unnecessary- at least, for subsequent card replacements imo. The wow factor could be kept for new customers, us oldies don’t need the fancy stuff 
I lost my card once and had my stuff stolen another time so that’s three of these packs from Starling + two from Revolut that I’ve chucked out.
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Starling don’t do this now, they use a simple paper card with the card inside. At least that’s how I received my teal card.
My Starling came like this ages ago but I’m left handed so when I opened it the card just dropped out 
That’s good news, the packaging was a nice touch when I first got the card but so wasted for the next ones. Was probably costing them a lot more too
@Dunsford I’m trying to imagine how that would work in my head. Does it not open up the same way?
Has anyone seen the packaging for Curve recently (with the plastic circle to keep your other cards in).
Talk about over the top…