November & December are the two biggest months for junk mail. According to the Privacy Council, the average person spends eight months of his or her life opening and discarding junk mail. What's more, an average family will throw away the equivalent of an entire tree from unread junk mail - and junk mail kills 100 million trees annually.
The Privacy Council was created to try to stem the flow of junk mail. For a $9 fee, home dwellers can sign up to remove the household from all the major marketing lists that are responsible for the majority of the junk mail. The $9 covers the expenses of mailing, faxing and calling all the major mailing, calling and marketing lists. For an additional $6 a month, the Privacy Council will continue to monitor the household to ensure it stays off the lists.
Currently the Privacy Council recommends users are taken off the lists and then manually sign up for the catalogs they want to receive. In the future the Privacy Council may offer a way to pick and choose which marketers can send you mail.
GreenDimes also offers a service that takes households off marketers' lists, but lets you choose which catalogs you no longer want to receive. GreenDimes claims its service is about 90% effective. For $20 a year, subscribers will be automatically taken off marketing lists that are responsible for sending most of the credit card applications and generic mailers. Users also get to choose which catalogs they don't want to get, monthly monitoring to ensure the name stays off the lists and the company will plant five trees on the subscribers benefit.
For the direct marketers that won't accept third-party requests for removal from lists, GreenDimes sends the subscriber a printed postcard with the postage that only needs to be signed and mailed in.
GreenDimes also offers a free service that, through its Web sites, requires you to choose which mailers you don't want to receive. You have to print out, sign and mail letters provided by the company.
A free movement led by ForestEthics, a non-profit, aims to create a do not mail registry to potentially send to Congress for legislation.
While a Do Not Mail registry seems like a logical piece of legislation, efforts in 19 states have already failed. The junk mail industry is a powerful group but the fact that bills have been introduced in 19 states, proves there's interest in this kind of initiative. It's likely that a statewide bill would pass before there's any movement on the federal front.
The way the registry would work is a household would continue to get direct mail from companies it has relationships with but the completely unsolicited mail would go away. Retailers and other companies would likely not be able to sell a households address to third parties. People can sign the petition on www.donotmail.org.
Fox Translator, December 3, 2008
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