Punching out jokes with clever designs onto letter-pressed cards put Blue Barnhouse on the map. But the 10-year-old company which moved from Asheville to Wilmington last summer really hit the national marketplace when it signed on with stationery giant Papyrus last year. Now, Blue Barnhouse-designed cards and witticism can be bought at the Wilmington Target.

“I was worried about the quality and the fact that I would be undercutting my own price. That was the biggest worry,” said Brandon Mise, founding owner of Blue Barnhouse. In 2010 the company’s gross revenue was about $145,000 and in 2011 it was about $185,000.

“Then, I asked how much the average card made in a year,” he said. The answer was: enough.

By licensing 21 of its card designs to Papyrus and American Recycled Greetings, this year he projects Blue Barnhouse will double its revenue from about $100,000 to $200,000 from the royalties.

Not bad for a small business where most of the cards are still hand-fed into printing presses. One such press in the print shop is an 1897 Chandler and Price machine powered by a foot pedal.

Mise launched Blue Barnhouse in San Francisco in 2002 after apprenticing and working on letter press machines at the San Francisco Center for the Book while earning his Master’s degree in creative writing.

“It was the sort of place where when people needed letter press stuff they always referred me. So by the time I finished school, I didn’t really need to look for a job,” he said. “Coming back to North Carolina had a lot to do with starting my own studio and being able to afford to do it.”

In the beginning, the company primarily did custom letter-press design and production, but found that it was not very lucrative.

“Doing the weddings [and] the business cards, the amount of labor you’re putting in versus what you’re getting out of it is not a lot,” he said.

But, Blue Barnhouse got its first break when it was given a free booth at the popular annual arts and culture festival in Asheville, Bele Chere. Blue Barnhouse printed what would become its signature quirky greeting cards.

“People were laughing and they really loved our stuff,” he said. “[Then], we sent out 25 cards to 25 different stores all over the U.S. Within a month we were picked up by a sales rep in Los Angeles, which turned into a sales rep in San Francisco and the Pacific northwest and within a year we were in at least 100 stores.”

Now, Mise sees Blue Barnhouse as more of a greeting card company that happens to print all of its products on letter-press machines. It stocks about 400 different products at the company’s warehouse and releases new designs about three times a year. Print shop manager Emily Wismer, who also is Mise’s girlfriend, runs a custom design and printing company out of the shop called Lady Pilot Letterpress.

About 60 percent of Blue Barnhouse’s business comes from products the sales representatives sell to various stationery stores and clients. About 10 percent is from on-line sales. And, about 30 percent comes from stationery chain store, Paper Source.

Mise has set up the company’s new warehouse print shop, which is not open to the public unlike its former print shop and stationery store in Asheville. This way, the designers and printers can focus on the product not storefront walk-ins, he said.

Another reason Mise returned to his hometown was to enroll in UNCW’s film school. He plans to pursue independent filmmaking, something he had begun to try his hand at in Asheville. But, with the help of the print shop managers Emily Wismer and Steve Lusher and printer Andre Scott, Blue Barnhouse’s machines will keep running.