Every month, Teagan Franz counts down the days until a colorful envelope arrives through her letterbox.
Last month, it was red. Inside was a handwritten letter, a tarot card featuring the Greek goddess Artemis, a piece of card scented with homemade essential oils, toad stool stickers, and a DIY craft activity titled “shrine to your inner child,” all beautifully decorated in a vintage scrapbook style.
Franz is a subscriber to Raindrops on Roses, a monthly spiritual wellness-themed snail mail club created by Madalin Giorgetta, a 37-year-old nutritionist and former fitness influencer based in Melbourne. Each letter costs $16 AUD ($11.47).
Proudly offline snail mail clubs like Giorgetta’s are growing fast. Subscribers pay around $10 a month to receive a mailer on a theme of the sender’s choosing, from cooking to poetry to fantasy worlds. Typically, the letters contain fun paper goodies like journal prompts and original art prints.
In the past 12 months, Google Trends data shows that searches for “snail mail club” increased by 700%, while data shared by Pinterest with Business Insider showed a 245% spike in searches for “snail mail ideas” and 125% for “letter ideas” during the same time period.
Franz, who first discovered Giorgetta when she was an influencer, likes the physicality of receiving something handmade. She said it feels more meaningful than the digital self-care content that she used to read a lot of, which was easily forgotten.
“It’s really exciting because it’s a surprise each month,” Franz, a 28-year-old content creator and mom-of-two based in Western Australia, told Business Insider. “It’s actually so much fun. I don’t get a lot of mail that’s fun mail. Even birthday cards, that’s something that’s dead now. Everybody just sends a text.”
“Maddie puts so much beautiful effort into her mail club, and it’s a little love letter,” Franz added.
It’s true that you’re most likely to first encounter the trend online. But the Gen Z and millennial snail mail subscribers and creators who spoke to Business Insider said the clubs offer respite from social media feeds filled with impersonal, unchallenging “brainrot.” They fit into a wider movement of young adults picking up “analog” hobbies, like reading and knitting, and using retro tech like flip phones to add whimsy to their lives and feel more present and connected offline.
Giorgetta used to have one million followers on Instagram and would sell downloadable workout guides, which she eventually found dehumanizing. “You’re just constantly putting out content and never really connecting with anybody,” she said. The snail mail club that she started in January has around 150 subscribers feels far more intimate and creatively fulfilling to her.
“You really feel like, ‘Oh wow, I know this person’s name. I understand that they’re getting this delivered into their hands every month. It feels very personal,” Giorgetta, who subscribes to an analog-themed art snail mail club, said.
Offline activities and hobbies are trending
Each month, Giorgetta chooses a goddess to inspire the content of her mailers. It takes an “inordinate” amount of time to create the letters embellished with pearl and lace details, ribbons, as well as quirky extras like hand-drawn Victorian love tokens. She spends four days packing them. April was all about Artemis and childlike wonder, hence the inner child shrine that Franz received. Previous editions have centered Persephone, Aphrodite, and Athena.
“I think that people are really connecting with hands-on activities and hobbies in their life now,” Kaelyn Marie Williams, 29, an artist and costume designer based in Knoxville, Tennessee, said.
Williams started Swatched Ink Print Club last November. For $8 a month, her 550 subscribers receive a mailer themed around an era of fashion, such as Regency or Renaissance. They include a handmade guide on how to recreate a stitch from the era, an illustration of a woman modeling clothing, and a note from Williams about the artwork.
Williams noticed that her audience is mainly women artists and crafters aged between 20 and 40, as well as those with no crafting experience excited to learn a new tactile skill.
Snail mail clubs give a taste of IRL community
Although subscribers open their mail alone, some said these clubs provide a sense of community they felt was lacking.
In April 2025, Hannah Gustafson, 26, organized the first of a now-monthly farmers market called Tiny Farmers Market in Austin, Texas, as a last-ditch attempt to feel closer to neighbours in the area where she had lived for three years. She regularly posts on social media about the market that features live music, free drinks, and stalls from 30 vendors.
She would get messages from people around the world who were sad that they couldn’t join, which, in August 2025, inspired her to create The Tiny Post. The creators who spoke to Business Insider said they have posted their mail to people in the US, Ireland, France, Austria, Spain, Mexico, and Australia.
“We listen to really good music here. We eat really yummy jams and the vulnerability piece is really big for us, connecting with people and showing up as you are. And so I was like, what if I put that all in a letter and you could feel like you were actually a part of the market?” Gustafson said.
In eight months, she built a worldwide subscriber base of more than 5,000 people.
Members receive a heartfelt letter that reads like an open journal entry, a recipe card related to the market, an art print by Gustafson, a tarot card, a journal prompt and a Spotify playlist to set the mood, stickers, and a surprise paper goodie. “Last month was a little zine that they could make themselves,” she said.
Katie Shaffer, a 39-year-old diagnostic medical sonographer based in Houston, said that since signing up to The Tiny Post, her screen time is down 75%. Instead of doomscrolling for hours in a dark room, she spends her free time doing offline activities like crocheting and painting.
“It’s not an instant gratification from a notification. It’s sitting down and holding something tactile in my hands that makes me happy, brings me whimsy. It’s like magic,” Shaffer said.
February’s edition included a QR code for a Facebook page inviting subscribers to “find a penpal.” Now, Schaffer sends handwritten letters and watercolor paintings to eight penpals around the world.
“This is one of the best things I’ve ever spent money on and it costs what, less than $12. It’s so meaningful. She gave me my tiny community that I needed. I knew something had been missing, but I didn’t know what it was,” Shaffer said.
Ashley Webber, a 25-year-old senior court operations specialist who subscribes to Williams’ Swatched Ink Print Club, enjoys the building excitement of waiting for the letter to arrive. Watching videos of fellow subscribers opening their envelopes on social media makes her feel part of a community.
“I love that, because we all now have a small connection and similarity in what we enjoy,” Webber, who is based in Arizona, said. “In a world of same day delivery and instant downloads, it’s kind of refreshing to slow down and get excited for something really authentic,” she said.
Time will tell whether snail mail clubs and the interest in analog living will prove to be passing trends or a lasting cultural shift. But for now, they’re bringing subscribers a moment of childlike wonder in the real world, even if just for five minutes.
“I always think about the fact that you have to use both hands to open it. That sounds so stupid, but you quite literally have to put your phone down and open this thing,” Gustafson, the founder of The Tiny Post, said.
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