Save a Tree. Stop Mailing Me Junk. by Ken Crawford

Sometimes I don’t know what aggravates me more. Getting a phone call from a company that will help me save interest on my credit card…BTW, I don’t own one. Then there is all the junk paper mail I get in the mail box everyday. We constantly receive credit card offers, coupon magazines we did not request, all other kinds of special offers and on top of the 6 bills from my student loan folks. SIX bills for the same thing.

You know this stuff is not printed on recycled paper. It is estimated that about 100 MILLION trees are ground up for creating junk mail. Almost half of the junk mail is not even opened and just pitched into the garbage. Then consider that the junk mail paper is involved in creating half of the solid waste found in landfills, you begin to realize the enormous waste of natural resources, time and energy junk mail creates.

So what do we as concerned environmentally friendly people do to create less junk mail? Obviously we cannot head down to every business that sends this crap out and say, “Stop sending me crap!”. Personally I would not be that calm about it. But we can take steps to greatly reduce the amount of junk mail we receive.

Bulk Mail and First Class Mail – Cross out the address on first class mail and circle the postage on the envelope. Write “return to sender” and drop the mail back in the box for the post office to send back. Bulk mail is a little bit more difficult unless you see an “address correction requested” label on the mail. Simply circle the address correction requested and place it back in the box.

Credit Card Offers – Dial 1-888-567-8688 24 hours a day. You will need your address history for the last two years.

Coupon Fliers – Head over to DMA Choice and sign up to designate who can and cannot send you mail solicitations. You should keep track of what you do or don’t want for a week and then give the people at DMA the addresses of those you don’t wish to receive anymore.

The Federal Trade Commission also has some valuable information on other ways to stop unsolicited mail, telemarketing offers and unsolicited email. The FTC Consumer Alert is on their website.

For companies like my student loan people, that feel they need to send multiple bills for the same thing, I have just sent the mess back with a “nice” request. I really don’t think that their collections department will appreciate opening mail from me. Oh well.

Ken Crawford publishes The Green Apartment Blog, a blog about simple, green and vegetarian living on a smaller scale. Many people today find themselves living in apartments, condos and townhouses. Living green and sustainable can be accomplished by those of us living in the city.