ByeBye Junk Mail

If you are like me, you receive more junk mail then 'regular' mail every year. There are a few steps we can take to decrease our junk mail. In return, we'll also be doing a good thing by helping save trees, waste, time, decrease pollution, and hopefully put a smile on our mail carrier's face :)

1. We can write "Please do not rent or sell my name" next to our name when we make a purchase or donation, order a product by mail, subscribe to a magazine, or make returns.
2. Call the customer service number of the company sending us unwanted mail and politely ask to be removed from its list.
3. Remove our name from several national mailing lists through the Direct Marketing Association's Mail Preference Service. We can register online and our request is honored for five years.
4. Contact major consumer credit bureaus to have our names removed from mailing lists used for credit offers.

FACTS

• Over 100 billion pieces of junk mail are sent annually.
• Even though 44% of all junk mail is discarded without being opened, people will still spend 8 months of their lives opening junk mail.
• Only 2% of junk mail gets a response.
• 100 million trees are needed to produce the annual supply of bulk mail—that's the equivalent of deforesting the entire Rocky Mountain National Park every four months.
• Over $350 million taxpayer dollars are spent annually to dispose of junk mail that does not get recycled.
• 5.8 million tons of catalogs and other direct-mail advertisements end up in landfills annually.
• The average person receives only 1.5 personal letters each week, compared to 10.8 pieces of junk mail—over 500 pieces of junk mail per person per year.

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Go Green :)

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