Stopping real, physical mail Spam

All the email systems I currently use are extremely effective at blocking spam. Less than 4 spam emails arrive in any of my mailboxes in a given week. It pains me to say this, but I now get more physical mail spam than virtual email spam!

So how do I stop this avalanche of physical spam?

A good place to start is through the non-profit site JunkBusters:

  1. Register your phone number(s) in the National Do-Not-Call Registry at http://donotcall.gov (for more information on the Registry, see our news page.)
  2. To reduce the amount of junk mail you get, tell companies ``don't rent or share my name.''
  3. You can ask the Direct Marketing Association to tell its members not to mail or call you.
  4. You can ask list vendors and credit reporting agencies not to sell your name.
  5. You can issue a ``Prohibitory order against sender'' to stop any junk mailer you object to.
  6. Junk faxes are illegal; you can tell the sender they are risking prosecution.
  7. Handling junk emailers generally requires very different tactics to mainstream marketers.

Unfortunately, it now costs a dollar to list yourself with the Direct Marketing Association stop list. It's not very much money, but the principle of the thing is offensive-- it feels like extortion; I have to pay people to get them to stop mailing me.

posted on Friday, November 17, 2006 3:12 PM by jatwood

Comments

# re: Stopping real, physical mail Spam

You can also drop the pre-paid return envelope in the mail. It doesn't really stop the spam from coming but it does make it twice as expensive to spam me.

I work for a company that develops CRM software for clients like Walmart and Target and I can tell you each mail campaign has significant costs. If everyone returned their pre-paid envelopes for a given campaign it may cause some middle manager to lose their job. Or at least filter those mailed down to the people of have opted IN for that kind of junk.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007 9:50 AM by Troy

# re: Stopping real, physical mail Spam

I do the same thing, only I stuff everything they sent me into the return envelope. I figure this makes it more difficult for automatic mail-opener machines to do their business.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007 10:05 AM by Philihp

# re: Stopping real, physical mail Spam

I swap the junk and post them all back to each other
Saturday, March 03, 2007 4:23 AM by sueper