Tag: North America

The U.S. Postal Service is preparing to test new standards around letter-size booklets, also known as “slim jim” catalogs. As more catalogers may switch to the lower-priced format in light of the current rate increase, the agency fears these slim jims may jam the agency’s delivery bar code sorters.

The USPS, as a result, is cautioning catalogers who may be considering switching to a slim-jim format to put those plans on hold until the standards are set. Testing will begin in about six months and could result in revised specifications for such mail pieces.

Slim jims measure 6.125 inches by 11.5 inches. The USPS considers them folded self-mailers and booklets. If they weigh 3 ounces or less and are tabbed, they are the largest size qualifying for letter-rate postage, which is significantly lower than recently increased Standard Mail flats postage.

Under the postal rates that go into effect today, mailers could save about 10 cents per book in postage by switching from a Standard Mail flat size that weighs less than 3 ounces.

Slim jims also could be mailed under the Heavy Letter subclass, which includes catalogs weighing more than 3 ounces and up to 3.5 ounces that are placed in envelopes. This subclass of mail qualifies for a hybrid rate that is still significantly below the rates for Standard Mail flats.

Some mailers question whether or not the change could affect response rates negatively.

The USPS has said there are not many slim jims in the systems now, and when they do appear in USPS facilities, postal employees will put them through the more robust AFSM-100 flats sorter as opposed to the delivery bar code sorters, which handle letter mail. However, to get the lower rates, they will have to be able to go through the delivery bar code sorter machine.

A two cent postage increase and other postal restrictions now in effect, coupled with pending do-not-mail bills in state legislatures, probably has some businesses wondering about their future ability to promote. PostcardMania is not one of them, however, as its owner and CEO Joy Gendusa staunchly refuses to be intimidated by negative forecasts and instead peers over the heads of worriers toward the real issue — getting her clients to continue running through the economic gauntlet with their direct mail postcard campaigns.

According to a United States Postal Service study, postcards were found to have the highest read rates of all direct mail media, compared to other media such as letters, flyers and magazines. Considering consumers are hit with over 3,000 advertising messages on a daily basis, having the highest-read-rate percentage speaks for itself.

The United States Postal Service has new regulations regarding the size and cost of packages — cost that is more technical, based not only on weight, but shape as well.

Moreover, 11 states currently have do-not-mail bills in their state legislatures, including New York, Michigan, New Jersey and Texas. If these bills are passed, a company wanting to send un-requested mail to consumers would need to buy an updated copy of the state’s do-not-mail list and check it against their own mailing lists — adding unwanted workload to businesses that will curtail productivity in response to government red tape.

With the recent hike in postal rates, delivering direct mail via newspapers has become a popular way of getting catalogs into the hands of consumers.

With that in mind, the Tribune Company launched Direct Delivery +, a low-cost alternative available via the Chicago Tribune that allows catalogs to be delivered with the newspapers, writes DM News.

For 9 cents per catalog, a marketer provides the Chicago Tribune with their mail files, which are then matched against a list of paid newspaper subscribers at the sub-zip code level, looking for areas where there is a high percentage of matches between the brand marketer’s list and Tribune subscribers. Mailing via the USPS can cost as much as 20 cents per catalog.
The Tribune also offers lifestyle segmentation analyses of areas that are not necessarily on the cataloger’s mailing list to see if those areas are worth targeting.

The program is available only in Chicago, where the Chicago Tribune has more than 660,000 home-delivery subscribers on Sundays. The Tribune Company expects to roll out the program in other markets in 2008.