We believe the business card this is on is from the 1980's. We want to use it new retro styled cards but can't seem to match the font. 

Hard to judge without context. Was that really used as text or more like a logo? Because it has all the hallmarks of a custom hand-drawn logo. 

I thought that was well but its pretty close to birds of paradise font. As far as we know it wasn't hand drawn, it is the name of the company which makes it a combination of the two ways you asked about it's use. It was a word mark logo.

4 hours ago, DarkDot said:

its pretty close to birds of paradise font

Which, in turn, is just a version of Ballantines.

Other similar designs include Commercial Script (better match for |b|), Snell Roundhand, Filmotype Yale (best |K|, but too light, unfortunately).

Inglesa is an high contrast modern version of this popular genre of lettering.

thank you, we are going to work with the filmotype yale because we feel the K is the defining feature.