the junk mail war is on...

I've been growing quite tired of receiving 3-4 catalogs, 3 credit card offers, and coupon circulars in the mail nearly every day. That is an amazing amount of wasted paper because they automatically go in the trash! I finally decided the other day that I'm done with it all and I declared war!

What I've started doing is immediately calling the 1-800 number on the back of every catalog and removing our names from their list. I also called the 1-800 number on the back of the credit card offers and opted out of receiving any pre-screened offers in the mail. One of the things that bugs me the most is the coupons and I had a hard time finding the source, so I did some investigating and found one company. Check out Valassis' website and put your name on their do-not-mail list. It still takes a few weeks for it to happen, but at least you can cut down on wasted paper and wasted time throwing that junk away.

I also just found a site called Pro Quo that actually takes your name off of a lot of lists. It also gives you forms and numbers to call to get off of lists they don't have access to. It looks pretty good, but I haven't done anything with it yet. They promise that you'll be down to almost no junk mail in 3 months! Sounds pretty good to me!

I know it might seem like a winless battle, but if everyone would spend a few minutes each day unsubscribing from all the junk mail they get in their boxes that day, we might just save quite a bit of paper and energy. Plus you might just find that you're less tempted to buy all the junk advertised!