Do Not Mail Legislation - How Bad is it?

How bad is the DO NOT MAIL movement?

If the troubled economy is not bad enough the individual state governments are collectively determined to make it worse. Once again this year several state legislatures have proposed DO NOT MAIL legislation aimed at curtailing advertising mail to individuals.

Allow me to debunk at least some of the claims presented as the rationale for these potentially disastrous new laws.

First, the “Save Our Forests” claim that direct mail results in the devastation of America’s precious timberlands. In fact there is 12 million more acres of forestland today then 20 years ago, but don’t take my word for it, this comes from the U.S. Forest Service. The Society of American Foresters reports that the annual net growth of U.S. forests is 36 % higher than the annual volume of trees removed. To supplement the abundance of timber available for paper production the level of recycle activity has also increased to a point where 53.4% of paper products ARE recycled, that is not my number but the U.S Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). So those postcards, self mailers, catalogs and letters are doing nothing to damage the forests or the environment. By the way, as far as the landfills are concerned the EPA says that direct mail accounts for a mere 2.4% in weight of the total municipal solid waste generated annually.

The “annoyance” dodge. Of course the claim here is that direct mail is intrusive. Personally I say get a life, but professionally I understand the folly of my opinion. Thankfully, the mailing industry identified years ago that it did not want to be identified with or suffer the same fate as the now mostly defunct telephone marketers. A self initiated and self financed registry of folks that wanted to limit their exposure to unsolicited direct mail was created. Administered by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) the registry is made available to member data and list managers who are required to remove those people from their mailing lists. So with one action, registering your wish to be removed from such lists, individuals can significantly reduce the amount of unsolicited mail they receive.

And what about the “privacy” issue. Do people wish to remain anonymous? Surely it sounds that way. Once again, my personal opinion is at odds with my profession. If you don’t want anyone to know anything about you then always pay in cash, never answer a survey question, never register for anything, never use your correct address, or name for that matter and the world will pass you by. We live in an information age and as such data has become a valuable commodity. Think about it, direct mail is no longer about casting a broad net and seeing what you can catch in terms of sales and purchases. Rather, it is all about refining the data, knowing various criteria about individuals that allow in narrowing of the approach in terms of numbers and the increasing of the relevancy of the offers and approaches that are made. Here you should read, better data means less mail. Better data means more effectiveness from less pieces.

So what is the ‘bad’ side of the Do Not Mail legistation. “A Do Not Mail registry would attempt to solve a problem that does not exist and would have devastating consequences for every home, community, business that relies upon our Postal Service” said United States Senator Susan Collins. Why, especially in today’s fiscal climate, would our elected representatives want to seriously impact the 3.5 million Americans who have jobs directly or indirectly supported by advertising mail. The direct mail advertising industry generates $686 billion in sales, 300,000 businesses use direct mail to reach potential customers. A Do Not Mail registry would cost the US Postal Service between $4 and $10 billion annually. This lost revenue would have to be made up by seriously increased postage rates and service cutbacks that would affect each and every American.

Like so much that happens in our hallowed halls of government the Do Not Mail registry is ill conceived, unnecessary and potentially harmful to a broader segment of the population than it would ever shield from a piece of mail. Contact your representatives and tell them to vote against any Do Not Mail legislation.