National Advertising Agency Saves Nonprofit Client
Thousands in Postage Costs

Background

In 2006, a national advertising agency selected Tri-Win to print and mail approximately 300,000 insert mailers monthly for its nonprofit client. The mailers were being sent to the nonprofit’s donor constituents located around the United States, and represented a primary fundraising channel. The agency opted to use a #10 window envelope with six inserts. By 2011, the nonprofit had increased the number of monthly mailers from 300,000 to 500,000.

Business Challenges

The nonprofit sector is highly competitive, particularly since various agencies market to the same household demographics. While direct mail is one of the most popular marketing tools for fundraising, the sheer volume of mailers sent can represent a large portion of the nonprofit’s marketing budget. And because the client’s donor constituents were located around the nation, the monthly postage costs were a large expense.

Tri-Win’s Role

The advertising agency selected Tri-Win to print and mail the nonprofit’s fundraising campaign materials. By 2010, the nonprofit was mailing 500,000 pieces per month—a significant increase from the original 300,000 mailers per month. Because postage variables such as shipping location and method affect the overall price, Tri-Win researched and analyzed potential ways to save on postage costs.

For the first four years, the nonprofit was using a mailing option that offered speedy delivery, but had a high cost. As the number of mailers increased, it made sense to switch a portion of the total number of mailers (in this case 400,000 of the 500,000 pieces) to a distribution method called co-palletization (co-pal). With co-pal, the monthly donor requests could be dropped much further along into the postal delivery stream, thus saving the post office personnel several steps. Co-pal is a process similar to people sharing a taxi: if two people ride from one location to another, the cost is cut in half since they share the taxi fare. With co-pal, the non-profit group was sharing the cost of a truck with other mailers to get its mail deeper into the postal mail delivery system. This streamlining allowed Tri-Win to offer a significant postage savings for the client.

Results

With the change in mail distribution method, the nonprofit realized an immediate savings of $2,500 per month on average, equating to $30,000 annually. For any entity in the nonprofit sector, this savings represents a tremendous opportunity to allocate resources to other areas and boost the productivity of the nonprofit’s mission.

And the win for the nonprofit was a win for the advertising agency. It’s always a great cause when helping a client endears a vendor—and makes the relationship even more valuable.

Learn more about the ways agencies, nonprofits, and other businesses can leverage Tri-Win’s facilities and expertise to potentially realize significant savings on postage costs. Contact Scott Swanner at 214.826.2244 X 223 or swanner@tri-win.com.