Direct mail marketing will adjust to one less day of postal service, say marketers
By: Mark HaslanMarch 4th, 2010
Famously, bad weather can’t stop the mail – but significant profit losses can. Facing severe financial difficulty, the United States Postal Service has announced plans to eliminate a day of mail delivery. Though the move will present a challenge to the direct mail marketing industry, Advertising Age reports that many marketers are bracing themselves and preparing to adjust.
Total mail volume dropped by nine billion items last year compared to 2008, resulting in a total of 202 billion. As a result, the Post Office lost $2.8 billion. Advertising Age cited a study by the Postal Regulatory Commission finding that eliminating one day of mail delivery would save the USPS nearly $2 billion annually, while the Postal Service’s own study estimated savings of $3.5 billion each year.
U.S. Postmaster General John Potter announced earlier in the week that he would issue a formal request to the Regulatory Commission to reduce delivery to five days, eliminating Saturdays – already one of the lightest days of delivery. However, since delivering mail six days of the week is currently federal law, there must be a public hearings on the issue followed by Congressional approval.
The Direct Marketing Association reports that the loss of a day could affect more than $1 trillion worth of direct mail promotion and catalog mailing business, and the American Catalog Mailers Association claims that the more than 15,000 active catalog companies help produce more than $200 billion in sales. Jerry Cerasale, senior vice president of government affairs for the DMA, told Advertising Age that members of his organization differ in their reaction to the proposal, with some claiming it could "hurt their business model" and some confident in their ability to adjust.
Companies that send time-sensitive brochures or promotions to customers to coordinate them with in-store events are particularly concerned. "It doesn’t do any good to have something delivered two days after the sale is over," president-executive director of the American Catalog Mailers Association Hamilton Davison told Advertising Age.
Though some marketers have emphasized digital marketing as of late, experts agree there is no replacement for direct mail. More than half of respondents to a recent survey by outsourced marketing firm BluePoint Venture Marketing considered direct mail an effective marketing technique for generating leads. One CEO recently emphasized his company’s use of direct mail as an effective strategy in an article in PromotionWorld. The company? Search engine optimization firm Medium Blue.
Related posts:
