Iran Printers See Dwindling Demand For ‘Nuclear Scientist’ Business Cards

Previous customers remain unavailable for inquiries into the phenomenon.

Tehran, December 2 – Entrepreneurs in this city’s document production and processing industry have noticed a sharp dropoff in the number of customers who seek to advertise expertise in the field of atomic weapons development, a trade group survey has determined.

The Islamic Republic’s Association of Printing and Engraving Professionals conducted its annual membership survey this week to help gauge market trends and facilitate members’ understanding of that market to help them increase profitability and exploit emerging opportunities, as well as to identify pitfalls. One datum in the survey responses pointed to an important shift in the medium small business section of the market: the number of customers ordering the words “nuclear scientist” has fallen to zero.

“It’s not an earth-shattering revelation,” acknowledged association president Ali Azadeh. “Still, it marks a departure from several surveys ago, when brandishing one’s credentials as having anything at all to do with our country’s pursuit of fearsome strategic weapons was a matter of personal and professional pride. Something has changed in the industry, perhaps something subtle, that we believe would be to our collective benefit to identify.”

“Unfortunately,” continued Azadeh, “some of the most important people we could ask appear unavailable. Like they’ve dropped off the face of the planet. Some of the folks who just a few years ago, and as far back as twenty years ago, the industry veterans will tell you, were boasting left and right of their important role in the nuclear program have now fallen into total silence. Everyone wanted the cachet of that title. But not anymore, for some reason. It’s improbable that every single nuclear scientist in Iran happens to have all the business cards he needs for all this time. No one in our association can recall receiving a ‘nuclear scientist’ business card order for at least two years, in fact. Just yesterday I tried to call one of my own loyal customers in this respect, Dr. Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, and I haven’t been able to reach him to pick his brain on the phenomenon.”

“We probably need more data,” suggested Natanz-area print shop owner Javad Rivjad. “I’m also hearing whisperings of a similar slowdown in demand for business cards and letterhead stationery from clients who until comparatively recently would advertise their contributions to our country’s ballistic missile technology. On the other hand, we do anticipate a new order for business cards for the incoming chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and probably from his replacement a short time after that.”

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