Lucky Number 7! Top Seven Ways to DECREASE Direct Mail Production Costs
Posted on Tue, Jun 22, 2010
By Suzanne Kirkendall, Production Manager
Regardless of the state of the economy, direct marketers and their clients are always looking to save a buck. The production process is the most costly part of the direct mail process, and as a result offers the most opportunities to save money!
1. Try downsizing. Take a look at your current packages and consult your production team about alternate sizes for components – newsletters, calendars, brochures or other inserts, for example. Sometimes even a minor change in size may provide cost savings if it means running more efficiently on press equipment – a better fit on the press means less paper and less waste.
2. Change paper stock to help offset rising paper prices. Consider reducing paper weights – Instead of the usual 60# paper stock, try 55# paper for your letters, or for a two page letter or insert use 50#. For some inserts, you can even try a lower paper grade. Small changes can lower cost without lowering quality.
3. Use existing dies. Is a custom die cut necessary for a window envelope or address labels, or can you design around an existing die that you’ve used before, or a printer already has in inventory? You can save hundreds this way in die cut charges.
4. Gang run your printing. You can significantly lower your print costs if you can gang run whenever possible. For example, you may be printing for a large prospect mailing and you plan to use same or different versions of some components in subsequent appeals. Gang printing these components can save on costly set up charges and lower costs on your overall budget.
Are you printing OEs and BREs for an ongoing acknowledgement or renewal program, but can’t print for 6 months or a year? Often you can work out a lower negotiated price with a printer if you can commit to an annual volume.
5. Piggyback. For print jobs that might be cost prohibitive to smaller organization, piggyback with another of your production vendor’s clients print run and share the savings. Because of our large annual print volumes at AH&A we can offer savings to all of our clients.
6. Commingle. Maximize your postage discounts! One of the best ways to reduce you postage costs is through commingling. If you are not currently commingling your mail, it is simply the process of combining several mail streams from multiple mailers into one mailstream, which can result in big postage savings. If you’re not sure about your savings potential, a postage cost savings comparison can be provided by your mailshop.
7. UAAC or PCOA. Don’t waste money on undeliverable mail. NCOA (National Change of Address) is based on information submitted to the Post Office. But did you know that up to 40% of moves are not reported? The address you may have on file that has been processed through NCOA, may be valid, but the addressee my not reside at that location due to death, divorce, etc. Running your file against UAA (undeliverable-as-addressed) national databases such as UAAC or PCOA, you can suppress those UAA mailing records saving printing, mailing and postage for undeliverable mail! Charges apply only to matches found, and the savings far outweighs the cost per suppression.
As great as these suggestions are, there are still even more ways to save money on production costs! What are YOUR favorite cost cutting tips?