Why You’re Still Getting So Many Catalogs

It’s the Digital Age, right? Nobody wants anything to do with print media, right? Catalogs are environmentally destructive, right?

You might agree with some or all of those assertions, but the folks in the catalog business will say that they keep mailing because catalogs work. According to this article in the Wall Street Journal, 17 billion catalogs were mailed last year in the US:

Among retailers who rely mainly on direct sales, 62% say their biggest revenue generator is a paper catalog, according to the latest survey by the Direct Marketing Association. Only a fifth of those retailers said they draw their biggest sales from their Web sites.

And the belief is that even many of the web sales were driven by catalogs:

… the post office recently hired a consultant to conduct a study that concluded that consumers who received catalogs from a retailer spent 28% more on that retailer's Web site than those who didn't get a catalog. "The more often you mail," the study said, "the more sales you could see."

But the numbers are falling at rates that have to have the direct marketers considering changes to their business plans. According to the DMA surveys, the percentage of catalogs that generate a sale declined from over 8% in 2003 to just under 2% in 2007. And while the catalogs generated 46% of direct marketers’ sales in 2008, compared to 36% online, the catalog number was down 5% from the previous year, while the online number was up 5%.

And of course, the USPS survey should be considered in light of the fact that they are far from neutral on the subject. With the amount of on-line billing and payment, and the almost complete disappearance of personal letters, the delivery of advertising is becoming a bigger and bigger portion of their business.

A big threat to both direct marketers and the USPS is the idea of a “Do Not Mail” list:

A San Francisco environmental group called Forest Ethics is circulating an online petition calling on government to set up a "Do Not Mail" list that commercial mailers would have to honor, modeled after the National Do Not Call Registry that allows consumers to block telemarketers' phone calls. By signing up, consumers would block unwanted junk mail, including catalogs. The group says it has gathered about 100,000 signatures.

I’m not sure as many people would sign up for Do Not Mail as have signed up for Do Not Call, an unwanted catalog in your mailbox is less intrusive and offensive than a phone call from a telemarketer who refuses to hang up no matter how many times you say, “Sorry, not interested.”

But any substantial drop in mailings would force the direct marketers to speed up the transition to online marketing, and could be disastrous for the USPS.