USPS Earned Value Promotion Good for Many Nonprofits

January 15, 2019

Many nonprofits have found significant value by participating in USPS Earned Value Promotions.  The 2019 version continues, with slight variation, those held in previous years, but not 2018.  The idea is to promote the use of Business Rely Mail, Courtesy Reply Mail and Share Mail that are sent inside outbound mail to encourage either responses or sending on a mailpiece to a friend or colleague with Share Mail.

Nonprofit mailers are well aware of the use of BRM and CRM, and some have begun to enhance their mailing lists by using Share Mail in fundraising.  The official USPS description is as follows:

2019 Earned Value Promotion Requirements

• Promotion Period: April 1 – June 30, 2019
• Registration Period: February 15 – March 31, 2019
• The 2019 Earned Value Reply Mail Promotion is intended to help slow the decline of First-Class Mail including Business Reply Mail (BRM) and Courtesy Reply Mail (CRM) pieces. As technology continues to disrupt mail volume, the Postal Service would like to encourage mailers to continue distributing BRM, CRM, and Share Mail pieces. Mailers who register their Mailer ID (MID) information and use eligible Intelligent Mail barcodes on their BRM, CRM, and Share Mail pieces may receive a postage credit for each mailpiece that is placed in the mailstream by the recipient and scanned during the promotion period.

More detailed requirements are provided by USPS here: Earned Value Promotion 2019.

Participation in the program should take some of the sting out of the upcoming 10 percent increase in single-piece First-Class postage.  It makes one wonder, however, whether the 10 percent increase will help accelerate the decline of First-Class mail more than the promotion helps to slow it.  By repeating this promotion, USPS acknowledges that single-piece First Class BRM, CRM, and Share Mail are price sensitive.