Junk Mail a Little Greener?

by erica ~ July 23, 2008

I have recently become an advocate of going green (as much as I can) and I like hearing about companies that are taking the “green initiative.” I’ve written about Sun Chips and their recent green efforts and well as Hollywood’s recent involvement in the Green Network. This week I came across this New York Times article that explores another interesting ‘green’ concept that concerns direct mail marketing.

Across the board, I think we can all agree that we receive way too much junk mail whether it’s email spam or snail mail. According to the US Postal Service, every dollar spent on direct mail returns almost $12 in sales, which is clearly beneficial to the direct mailers and their clients.

A new marketing group called Green Marketing Coalition is taking a stand in reducing the amount of direct mailers people receive. They’ve created guidelines for direct mailers to follow in order to reduce their carbon footprint. “List hygiene,” which is cleaning out direct-mail lists to remove the names of dead people and others unlikely to respond; purchasing recycled paper; and proofing and editing materials using Adore PDF instead of hard files, are just some of the quite vague guidelines this group proposes. The Postal Service also has a few green tips for marketers, like letting people easily opt out of mailings, using water-based inks and recycled materials, and encouraging customers to recycle the mailing after reading it.

To some extent, I compare direct mailers to telemarketers. I’m not sure if telemarketers receive as much sales returns but all I know is that the ‘No Call List’ is one of the greatest inventions - now only if we could apply this genius invention to junk mail it would make the world a better place!

Erica Berkovich is an Associate Account Executive at Mediashop PR. She is currently pursuing a Masters degree in Corporate Communications at Baruch.