Advertisements surround us. They interrupt us while driving, watching our favorite shows, and scrolling through social media feeds. Out of all the unwanted ads, junk mail gets to me most. Partly because the catalogs, credit card offers, and correspondence for past residents are frustrating. But mostly, it’s because of the environmental toll of unnecessary paper production during our climate crisis. I can’t think of a better time to stop junk mail once and for all.
SJSU’s Center of Development of Recycling says an American adult receives 41 pounds of junk mail yearly. That’s like cutting down between 80 and 100 million trees a year. What’s worse is that roughly half of our junk mail goes into the landfill unopened. If you find these stats daunting, remember daily individual actions can help fight paper waste and protect the environment.
Let’s get started with simplifying that cluttered mailbox:
Cancel catalogs
Through CatalogChoice, a non-profit online service, you can cancel specific catalogs and mail you no longer want to receive. They have a massive database of catalogs from merchants like clothing brands and credit cards and secure processes. While the service is free, they accept donations of any size. CatalogChoice is part of a civic engagement Stop Junk Mail campaign by one of my favorite environmental organizations, The Story of Stuff Project.
Unsubscribe from credit card and insurance company offers
The Fair Credit Reporting Act lets credit bureaus give our information to creditors or insurance companies for advertising—but opting out is a choice. Through https://www.optoutprescreen.com/, you can say no to receiving prescreened offers from credit card and insurance companies for five years or permanently.
Opt-out of direct mail
Visit DMAchoice.org to unsubscribe from catalogs, magazine offers, and credit offers. The Data Marketing Association is one of the largest mailing list companies, providing consumer data to marketers. To cover all your bases, remove your name from ValPak’s and RedPlum’s lists as well, two other companies mainly responsible for sending mass coupons.
Most of us don’t receive directories anymore but for those who still bear this burden, visit yellowpagesoptout.com to cancel your phone book.
Stop receiving mail for someone else
The most effective way to stop receiving mail for someone who no longer lives at your address is to contact the sender directly. This method is slow, painful, and very time consuming, but the only one I’ve found to work. And yes, I’ve tried contacting USPS, talking to the mailman, and returning to the sender—none of these attempts have worked.
Decrease donation requests from charities
Many charities focused on environmental, poverty, or human rights issues desperately need funds. If you can, regularly donating to worthy causes truly makes a difference for those in need. The thing is, with donations come a lot of mail soliciting additional contributions.
When it comes to unwanted mail and charities, your best bet is to:
Immediately after a donation requesting that they don’t provide your contact information to any other organization
Email or call them and ask to decrease the frequency of their donation requests
Sign up for paperless billing across all your bills
Bills aren’t junk mail, but they do produce a lot of unnecessary paper waste. In the US alone, pulp and paper are one of the largest polluters, releasing over 100 million kg of toxic pollution every year. By signing up for paperless billing with our like credit card, medical, energy, and water companies, we’ll cut our carbon footprint and possibly get a discount for doing so.
Know that after taking all these steps to stop junk mail for good, it’ll take some time for these actions to carry into effect, so be patient. If you don’t have the time to reduce junk mail, you can use a service like PaperKarma to do it for you. PaperKarma comes highly recommended for stopping unsolicited mail and reducing your carbon footprint. They’ll automatically unsubscribe you from thousands of verified mailers—all you have to do is snap a photo of the mail you receive with their app.