In a surprising move, the USPS announced the expansion of Simplified Addressing to business customers whereas it was only allowed for governmental agencies before. Simplified addressing is simply the ability to print a mailpiece with “Postal Customer” (or other approved address designation) and the city, state, and zip code that it is going to instead of supplying a full address. It has commonly been used by municipalities and other government organizations to mail to each postal customer on any given postal route without having to be individually addressed. This expansion went into effect on January 2 and is applicable for [intlink id=”65″ type=”page” anchor=”categories-of-mail”]flat-sized mailpieces[/intlink] and irregular parcels only (items such as tubes that cannot be processed on the USPS automation equipment).
The benefits of this is tremendous for businesses who use bulk mail for several reasons: 1) If you already do saturation mail to a town, you no longer have to purchase a resident list and have it addressed by your mail service provider, saving you time and money. If the mailings all went to the same town, all you would have to do is preprint the address designation (i.e. “Postal Customer”) and the city, state, and zip on the mailpiece. The mail preparer will still have to fill out the paperwork, sort by postal route, and mark each tray, but this is much less work overall. 2) You can target the mail to each resident, each business, or every postal customer as well as targeting the list to only certain postal routes in a city. 3) If you don’t currently advertise using saturation mail, this is a great opportunity as current postal rates for saturation flats are as low as 14.2 cents each – allowing you to mail a bigger piece vs. a letter for a lower postage cost!
Real-time examples of saturation mail would include a local bank offering a very large oversized postcard highlighting new rates available for every resident in a certain town. Local car dealerships can take advantage by mailing larger pieces to everyone within their town and the next one over for less postage cost than your standard letter. Non-profits can share their accomplishments and request more help to every resident in their town for less cost than ever before!
Call us today to discuss how simplified addressing can boost your advertising and save you money!
