In this second film about environmental marketing standard PAS 2020, Robert Keitch from the DMA looks at what this new voluntary code of practice means for the direct mail industry.
Here he looks at what the PAS document can offer direct marketing practitioners looking to create an environmentally sound and sustainable direct mail campaign.
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A good chunk of what’s contained within PAS 2020 has focused on what we would term traditional channels such as direct mail, inserts, unaddressed mail. And that’s for the very obvious reason that we today face a problem with waste at the consumer household level. It’s something that unless we change our behaviour, start to learn new ways of dealing with waste we are going to have a major problem.
For the first time the industry has a clear, unambiguous answer to the question ‘What is it that we have to do to be more environmentally sensitive?’ The PAS document follows the process, mirrors a direct mail campaign so that the industry practitioner can look at the document, can look at their processes and figure out what are the best ways to eliminate waste out of each stage of the campaign. So ultimately what the practitioners will end up with is a process for producing more environmentally sensitive direct marketing materials and communications. So it goes right from the design stages, the use of data, the use of inks, printing technologies and materials within that and gives them clear, unambiguous guidance as to what are considered to be the most environmentally sensitive approaches.
I think the big opportunity is for those promoting brands that understand the environment is a strategic asset. PAS 2020 gives them a device for the first time of where they can cogently communicate with their audience and telling them that they adhere to the very finest environmental principles in what they do. That gives those organisations that have seen and recognised that opportunity a commercial advantage.