What is the difference?
What difference does it make if your coupon magazine is addressed to an individual home with the official US Postal indicia, or if it arrives in your mailbox wrapped in the REDPLUM packet of materials that arrive on Tuesdays.
If you look at the pile of grocery flyers and wraps you will see that none of them have an address on them. There is usually only one piece that has the postal indicia and address on it. I haven’t looked at mine for some time because most of the stuff ends up in the trash. It used to be a card that had the address and indicia, but just the fact that I don’t know shows you the impression it leaves with consumers.
Many years ago REACH Magazine tested this delivery method in several of our markets with very poor results. What I mean is that the redemptions for our clients declined significantly. We immediately went back to paying for our own postage, having a postal indicia and address on each magazine, and having our magazine stand alone by itself rather than being stuffed inside various other wraps and grocery flyers.
Why would a coupon magazine want to do this?
REDPLUM has worked it out so that they can charge the magazines that want to be wrapped up in the Redplum group of materials will end up paying significantly less for delivery than those that are delivered individually (having their own address and indicia). But, we’ve known for many years that this will not serve our customers (businesses advertising within REACH Magazine) well. It is better for them to spend a little more with us and have better results. That’s all there is to it.
This change has been made with one of our competitors, but they have not announced the change with their clients and I do not think it is appropriate for me to name names here.
How can you find out as a business owner?
There are a couple of things you can do. First you can ask your advertising sales rep for various magazines about their delivery methods. You have to ask them and look for a US postal indicia on the cover of the publication where the address box should be. If there is not one there, then that magazine is using REDPLUM or some other delivery method other than individually addressed and delivered by the US Post Office.
Side note from conversations I have had with postman
Another thing you might do is ask your postman what the post office looks like on Tuesday afternoons. You see, since all the items in these wraps and grocery flyers are not the same size, many times there are various sized items strewn on the floor throughout the branch post offices where they sort their mail and get ready for their deliveries. Once an oddly sized piece is separated from the wrap, there is really no way for them to figure out where it belongs. With hundreds of packets of materials with no address except the one item in the pile, there is just nothing they can do but get out the broom at the end of the day. So, not only do consumers not like receiving this pile each Tuesday in their mailboxes, but it can also be less than efficient in terms of delivery.
Here are a couple of examples. The first one is an address label glued on with computer coding for fast and easy delivery and sorting. This is from a magazine I receive personally. In this case, the label is glued to the magazine, but with REACH we have the postal indicia and the address and coding is ink jetted directly onto the blank area provided for the address. If there is no postal indicia or auto sort coded label, the item in your mailbox came as a group of items packaged together loosely. What’s the difference for your as a business owner, better results for your ad within the magazine come from individually addressed pieces. We’ve tested it and we know and we choose to do what is right for our clients even if it cost more.
To learn more about REACH Magazine, Dayton’s favorite coupon magazine, just email me or give me a call any time.
Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine in Dayton, Ohio • pdemott@reachusa.com • 937-478-6222
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