Why Many Companies Polybag Their Important Mail

When you invest the time and energy required to create a great direct mail piece, you want to make sure that it not only makes it to the mailbox of your targeted audience but also stands out when it gets there.

Polybagging is a great way to do just that.

Polybagging is the process of putting your mailer in a polythene bag. Polybags can either be transparent, so that you can see the front and back covers of your mailer through the bag, or have words and images printed on them so that the bag itself becomes an eye-catching part of your direct mail piece.

Polybag mailing offers a host of advantages, including:

• Increased protection from weather or mail handling
• The ability to make a stronger psychological impact on your customers and prospects
• An additional printing surface that can be used to highlight your brand
• The ability to include extra add-ons that increase the package’s value (and could potentially reduce your overall mailing costs)
• An effective way to mail flat mailpieces like magazines

Let’s look at each of these in a little more detail and find out why polybagging is not only a more protective but also one of the most attractive and cost-effective ways to send direct mail pieces that stand out and get noticed.

Polybags Provide Protection

Polybagging adds an extra layer of protection for your direct mail piece that helps ensure it will arrive at its target destination in peak condition.

Polybags are heat sealed to prevent any dirt or moisture from seeping into the mailer, which is particularly helpful if you’re mailing to residential addresses, where your piece could end up waiting in a less-than-waterproof mailbox for hours.

In fact, polybags are such a reliable way to protect direct mail pieces that many international mailings are always polybagged in order to protect them against the rigours of long-haul transportation.

If you plan on investing in an excellent design and premium paper stocks for a high-end catalogue or magazine mailing, then a polybag is a perfect way to protect the physical integrity of your piece and ensure that it looks and feels just as luxurious when it’s opened as it did when it was printed.

Polybags Are Lightweight and Cost-Effective

In addition to being one of the most protective options, polybags are also one of the lightest.

The lightweight plastic used to make polybags actually weighs less than the paper required to create envelopes, meaning that the overall weight of your direct mail piece will be less with a polybag than it would be if you used a standard paper envelope. This can impact postage.

The savings in weight also translates into savings in cost, and potentially a big one. Weight is one of the biggest factors in determining how much it costs to mail something, so the lighter you can make your piece, the more you’ll save on some mailings.

When you’re mailing to a large list, those savings start to add up quickly. For instance, the weight of one catalogue packaged in an envelope will only be slightly higher than the same catalogue packaged in a polybag. But when you multiply that weight difference by the hundreds or thousands of copies you need to send, the difference becomes substantial, as do the postage savings.

Polybags Are Well Perceived

One of the most important factors in direct mail is the perception of value that your piece creates in the minds of your prospects and customers.

Polybags have an advantage here, for a reason that most people might not notice at first.

Opening up a polybag to find a well-made print piece feels quite similar to unwrapping a present and finding something you wanted within. This similarity — and the positive feelings it stirs up in your prospects or customers — gives you two subconscious advantages.

First, since people are accustomed to receiving gifts from their friends and loved ones, when your brand provides them with a similar sensation it can immediately position you as someone they like and trust.

Second, the things we receive as gifts are often things we want and deem valuable. When your customer feels similar gift-getting emotions when they open your polybag, they’re much more likely to assume that the mailer inside will also be valuable to them.

Easy-to-Include Add-Ons

Another way that polybags increase the perceived value of a mailer is by allowing you to package multiple pages or add-ons inside one direct mail bag.

By including extra material in the form of subscription reminders, surveys, contest forms or other inclusions, you increase the perceived value of the overall package.

Plus, packaging all of these add-ons into one bag and sending it as a single package, rather than paying to mail each piece as its own individual mailer, could end up saving you money by reducing your overall project and postage cost.

Wrapping Up

Polybags are a perfect way to not only protect your most valuable direct mail pieces but also to help them stand out and seem more valuable in the eyes of your audience.

Our direct mail lettershop offers polybagging and polywrapping of flats and printed materials, including brochures, magazines, catalogues and product literature in any required quantity.

For more information about polybagging and other direct mail services, please call Troi Mailing Services in Toronto at 1-866-486-9350 or contact us here.

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