How to Cope with Higher Paper Prices
Start Your Year-end Appeal Early to Avoid Paper Industry Woes
Dear Certified Mail Expert,
I've heard the price of paper has gone up recently. Are you seeing printers pass that cost on to customers like our nonprofit? Given this situation, what can we do to ensure our year-end mailing is timely and cost-effective?
Signed,
Worried in Washington
Dear Worried in Washington,
Unfortunately, paper is increasing in price due to supply issues, and yes, printers are passing those costs on. Printing is generally a low-margin business, so these vendors don't have much room to absorb added paper costs.
For most of our clients, we're seeing 5-15% increases in paper cost for a typical appeal package — a letter, #10 outer envelope, and #9 reply envelope. The greatest increase in price is in envelopes, and certain envelope sizes have become difficult for printers to source in bulk.
But with some planning and creativity, you may not see much or any hit to your budget. Follow these tips to ensure your year-end mailing is timely and cost-effective.
1. Clean Your Data Now
Merge those duplicates, combine those spouses into households, and fix or remove those bad addresses (follow these step-by-step instructions). Good data hygiene will ensure you don’t pay for more appeals than you have to. We recently cleaned a list and reduced it by 4% (164 addresses). That saved our client $128 in printing and postage, and it nearly offset the paper price change from last year. Your database cleansing may have even more savings.
2. Plan Ahead
If you have a relationship with a printer, start a conversation with them now about your year-end plans and what you may need to change. They may recommend that you pre-purchase paper and/or envelopes (they may use the industry jargon “allocate”). They also may suggest starting production three weeks earlier. They have a ton of industry knowledge – leverage it!
3. Prepare to Flex
Last giving season, Abeja planned ahead for our clients. But to paraphrase Molke the Elder, no plan survives first contact with the paper industry. We had to be flexible and react quickly.
Similarly, be prepared to let go of your preferred closed-faced envelopes and switch to a light blue double-window, for example. Assume that you can’t get the precise #70 recycled stock you’ve always used.
You can’t control the price of paper or the availability of envelopes. But you can give your nonprofit more peace of mind by keeping your database clean, engaging printers sooner, and adapting quickly.
Remember, an appeal out the door and raising money is better than a perfect appeal.
