Hallmark holiday

• hallmark holiday

From the Hallmark Cards greeting card company.

Hallmark holiday (plural Hallmark holidays)

1. (derogatory, US) An ostensible holiday, or, by extension, any occasion, invented or popularized for profit.
   • 1999, Karen Rauch Carter, Jeff Fessler, Move Your Stuff, Change Your Life: How to Use Feng Shui to Get Love, Money, Respect, and Happiness, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 88:

     See? Valentine's Day is not just a Hallmark holiday after all.

   • 2001, Dave Eggers, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Vintage Books, →ISBN, page 224:

     […] that the whole funeral and gravestone thing was just a racket, was this ridiculous tradition, rooted in commerce, a Hallmark holiday sort of thing, […]

   • 2008, Holly Chamberlin, Tuscan Holiday, Kensington Publishing Corp., →ISBN, page 8:

     Honestly, it didn't much matter to me that Marina had forgotten Mother's Day, though I did feel bad on my mother's behalf. As any parent can tell you, what hurts far more than no card on a Hallmark holiday are the casual slights, the eye rolls your child thinks you don't see, the muttered "whatevers," the unasked-for-and-unwanted criticism of your clothing, your speech habits, your existence.