The IPM received the very sad news that Alan Crossman had passed away at his home in Bedford.

Alan was one of the early pioneers in Door-to-Door marketing with Circular Distributors and then Marketforce in the days when just a few companies had delivery teams across the UK delivering to millions of households on weekly frequencies, long before Free newspapers and demographic targeting came to dominate this service. His prominence within our industry was evidenced by his election to the IPM Board (ISP at it was then) and then acknowledged further by his appointment as a Fellow of the ISP. In the mid 90’s Alan then joined the wider promotional marketing services group Mailcom as Sales Director.

Alan was very well known throughout the industry professionally and socially. ISP Summer Lunches were all the better for Alan’s presence where he would ensure everyone had the best time they possibly could. He was a real character in the truest way always insightful and always a person you wanted to be around. On behalf of the IPM and its members we send our deepest condolences to his wife Sandy and his two son’s and daughters. Alan’s funeral took place on the 15^th of February in Bedford.

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As the weeks slip by, the consumer road map to recovery slowly becomes clearer.

More and more businesses are opening on a weekly basis and into July, we already know when as an example, the hospitality sector can kick start its season, albeit with restrictions in place.

Leisure centres, zoos/wildlife parks, theme parks for a nation perhaps planning more for staycation rather than European travel, will all again become options.

Businesses should therefore be planning their promotional messages to existing and prospective customers and users now to ensure they hit the ground running.

All of these business sectors (and more) are existing users of door drops as an intrusive and engaging medium, so for a possibly digitally fatigued public, a bright, colourful, well targeted leaflet with incentives landing on the doormat could be very welcome by its recipients.

Royal Mail door to door have in response overhauled their entire booking process, updated and improved their incentive schemes and are already open for business.

Key changes to the process are best summarised as :

Minimum spend – There is now no minimum spend and clients can book just one postal sector if required, with the charge per thousand calculated according to rate card, details upon application.

Booking lead times – Subject to agreement by Royal Mail, bookings can now be made with one week’s notice with no additional charge and the surcharge on two-week bookings will be waived.

Seasonal incentives (the summer incentive is available NOW) – The minimum incremental spend threshold has been removed and all incremental volume in excess of previous year’s activity will now be subject to a 20% discount. Customers booking in specific weeks within July and August for the first time, will have a discounted rate applied to their entire volume.

Late Sales – The service is now extended to new users on their first activity. In addition to the discounted rate a new user already accesses, postal sectors may be booked through Late Sales, with a further discount applied.

Long term lapsed or potential large users – To enable long-term lapsed or potential large volume customers to trial the Door to Door service and prove the effectiveness of the channel versus other media, heavily discounted rates are available.

Incentive for growth schemes – The minimum incremental requirement has been reduced to 100,000 items.

Existing clients and new users should seek experienced guidance of how to maximise the potential value these opportunities present.

Approved resellers of the Royal Mail D2D service such as ourselves are perfectly placed to provide guidance on how to navigate the planning and booking process to help clients achieve promotional objectives using door drops.

We can be contacted at www.letterboxconsultancy.com or on 01992 637333 to discuss this package in more detail.

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