For Monday, November 27

SPENDING DOUGH
I don't get the Little Caesars Pizza marketing people. I received what must be my 73rd flyer of the year from them.

They have to keep sending out flyers so that people can have their phone number handy. And, no, you can't find Little Caesars in the phone book...because they no longer advertise there. They must be the only pizza purveyor this side of Sicily to abandon that medium.

Ask yourself - what happens when you feel like a pizza? If you don't have a number memorized, you turn to the Yellow Pages.

But what if you're hankering for a Little Caesars? You end up seeing 417 ads from their competitors. And maybe you change your mind about who you're going to try.

And destroying forests with all their flyers isn't their only questionable marketing activity.

At least at my neighbourhood LC, they hire people to stand by the street with sandwich boards promoting their establishment. Morning, noon and night, there's someone standing in the rain, snow or blazing heat, draped in an ad.

What's must that cost?

MY 5 CENTS WORTH. AGAIN.
In my October 12th blog (www.intodaysmailbox.blogspot.com) I recounted how I'd received a mailing from UNICEF. A 5 Cent piece showed through the window, accompanied by a teaser reading, "This nickel could save a child's life!"

I said it then. I'll say it now – "So don't give it to me; use it to save some child's life."

I mention this because I received the same mailing last week. OK, we know what they were TRYING to say. But the fact of the matter is, they didn't say it.

It could be costing them response. It could be costing them donations. So it could be costing kids' lives.

There's another problem with an approach like this – if you make it seem like you can move mountains with pennies, a lot of people will cough up a measly $10 and think they're doing a world of good.

POLITICAL FREE RIDE
I received a message from my opposition Member of Parliament, sent in an envelope with no postage. Because he's an MP, he doesn't have to pay for postage when mailing constituents.

Fair enough – when it's a genuine message of interest to voters. But this one was nothing but pure political partisanship.

He sent a coupon that he wants me to mail back to Parliament – again, no postage will be paid by anyone – condemning what the government's doing (or not doing) about climate change.

Personally, I support his view. But I can't believe that politicians and their supporters get a free ride on the postage machine.

Maybe if they started paying the freight when promoting partisan views, the post office could send some of the extra money to organizations like UNICEF.

THE JINGLE RETURNS
Anyone who lives in BC's Lower Mainland can sing the TV jingle from the Vancouver General Hospital/University of BC Hospital lottery. It's simple but catchy: "You...could be...a milllion...aire."

Wisely, they included the lyrics and musical notes on the flyer they sent me last week. And to make doubly sure that I'd recall their TV spots, the outer cover also featured a photo of Wayne Cox, the on-camera personality who promotes the lottery.

So when I put it on my desk beside a heftier package from the Heart & Stroke lottery, there was no contest as to which one I was going to look into first...that of my musical friends.

Maybe I'll get to meet Wayne when they announce that the winner of this year's grand prize is...

Dr. Bob

For the Week Ended Nov. 16th

DRIVING ME CRAZY
If you read my November 1st post (on my then-daily blog, http://www.intodaysmailbox.blogspot.com) I mentioned how my auto club had sent me an enticing offer to JOIN the club.

I wanted the benefits they were offering to enrolling members but worried that I wouldn't be able to enjoy them because I already belong. Worse, at that point, it looked like I had another year to go on my membership because the expiry date on my card reads, "December 07".

But this past week, before I could phone them, I received a Renewal Notice! It turns out that, on the membership card, they write the month and day of expiry, not the year. So when they write, "December 07", they mean December 7th, not December 2007.

I immediately phoned the club and asked to be renewed at the special price. But as I feared, the lady who took my call told me that the $67.78 price for my wife and myself (less a $10 voucher so it's really just $57.78) was only available to new members; I'd have to renew at $97.56.

I argued, debated and pointed out the folly of their policy, all to no avail.

Fortunately the timing is such that I've been able to pull the same kind of shenanigans with them as they're trying to play with me. I've joined like I'm a new member and am letting my original membership lapse. I'll only be paying for a week or two of double membership.

I should be pleased, but I'm not. I feel like my friend has let me down for some stupid reason of policy or avarice. What's with these companies that treat nobodies better than their loyal customers?!

WHAT WOULD MAL SAY?
If you're new to DM, Mal Warwick is one of North America's leading DM experts. He believes in treating people with respect and care. And as I learned this week, that's not just something that he preaches to his fundraising clientele.

In one of his recent newsletters, he said that he had a limited supply of a book he'd written in 1999, "The 10 Most Important Things About Direct Mail Fundraising". If you were among the first to request it, he'd send it to you for free.

I requested it but, with his agency operating out of California and your scribe being in Canada, I didn't think I had much of a chance of landing a copy. But trust Mal. The week's mail brought the book. I wish he worked at my auto club.

KNOW WHO ELSE IS GOOD?
In my daily blog a few weeks ago, I'd extended kudos to Help The Aged. Here are a couple more for them...

I got my receipt in less than 3 weeks, along with a newsletter, a thank you letter and a hand-written note of thanks from a volunteer. Now, these guys know how to run an operation!

HEY, WHERE'S THE CREATIVE CRITIQUE?
If you were one of my daily blog readers, you might have been expecting me, today, to go on about the creative aspects of packages that I'd received during the past week.

But there was nothing from a creative standpoint that stood out as being particularly good or particularly bad. It was all pretty mainstream. And I figure – why bore you any more than I already have?

But visit this site on Monday, November 27th. I'm confident that, in the coming days, there will be copious quantities of great and terrible packages filling the mailbox of...

Dr. Bob

P.S. I simply MUST get out a new issue of my newsletter, Rants 'n Raves. If you haven't signed up for it yet, better do it fast if you want to catch the next issue. Email me at: b_knight@telus.net

My First Weekly

First, thanks for checking out my weekly blog! Come back every Monday to see what's new. Now before another day goes by, let's get started...

...to paraphrase Charles Dickens, it was the best of DM, it was the worst of DM.

DELIVERING THE MAIL
Canada Post (CPC) sent me a nifty folder as a householder. It shows a parcel wrapped in brown paper, partly torn to reveal a gift-wrapped present. Intriguing. The inside is colourful and gives you all the info you need to be a happy mailer this season.

In one of my daily posts (www.directmailtoday.blogspot.com) I'd criticized CPC for producing a piece that made it difficult to find where the French text was vs the English. No such problem this time.

One of the covers is in English and the other is in French. Just open the side with the language of your choice and you can continue reading in that language.

DON'T GET MAD AT MADD
Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) sent a fundraising package that contained a tea bag. The idea is to raise a toast to sober driving, but to do it with a cup of tea instead of alcohol.

And so that no one can accuse them of squandering donor dollars by giving away tea bags, they explain in the last line of the letter that, "The enclosed tea bag was generously donated by R.C. Bigelow, Inc."

I hope Bigelow was big enough to do more than merely donate the tea, and that they also coughed up some cash for MADD...because they're getting a sample of their product distributed free of charge. Plus their company is being associated with a respected organization.

GET MAD AT SASKATCHEWAN
I received an email from the government of Saskatchewan. That struck me as weird. But what was weirder – they addressed me as "Economic Development Leader."

What??

The Saskatchewan spam is all about their upcoming 2007 Business Retention and Expansion International Conference, which holds as much interest for me as learning how to operate a threshing machine. And I'm sure I speak for just about every other ad agency on their list.

That's right, they mailed it to a ton of ad agencies, of all people.

Even dumber than sending ad professionals such a misaddressed missive, they show the email address of everyone they spammed! There are more than 1000 names on the list. And all you have to do to spam each one of them is hit Reply All.

The prairie government is fortunate that other recipients deleted their spam as quickly as I did. If all of those spammees had gotten it into their heads to Reply All, my inbox would have been jammed for a week. And yours truly would have been doing more than complain about it in a blog.


ANIMAL MAGNETISM
I'm a sucker for animals and support my local SPCA. So it's no surprise that I was captivated by a 6" X 9" folder send by the national organization.

Making it even more powerful from my perspective, it was enclosed in clear plastic and, when unfolded, measured a desk-commanding 24" X 26". And as if that weren't enough, inside the folder were a newspaper clipping, a letter and an oversized post card.

The trouble for your animal-sensitive scribe is that the photos and story were too shocking and sad. I can't stand to look at photos of badly abused animals. As a result, after opening up the package, I quickly buried it.

I want to help the animals. But I don't want to give myself nightmares doing it. I wonder how many other animal lovers feel the same way as...

Dr. Bob