I caught this article in AdAge today:
The U.S. Postal Service last week canceled an old law that forbade businesses from placing ads or logos on any type of currency -- including postage -- relinquishing to marketers once-hallowed ground unsullied by commercialism. HP postage stamps feature images of the HP logo as well as its founders and the garage in which they started the company.The effort is part of the USPS' push to stem a loss of income as consumers increasingly turn from so-called snail mail to Internet correspondence. First-class mailings have plunged since the mid-1990s from almost 55 billion pieces mailed in 1998 to just over 43 billion last year.
This isn't that surprising since personalized stamps are already allowed. Stamps.com, Zazzle and Encidia, the three USPS-approved vendors, have sold 17 million personalized postage "units." You have to buy stamps in sheets of 20 and the prices range from $0.90 to $0.65 per stamp, depending on the number of sheets. More than 500 sheets (10,000 stamps) and you can negotiate a better discount.
Most photo-sharing services like Flickr, Webshots, Shutterfly and Snapfish have partnerships with one of these three vendors making all your online photos a couple clicks away from stamp material.
Personalized stamps are still a surprise to most people. It's a great way to capture a moment and share it with friends and family in -- almost -- real-time. Of course, there are some creative advocacy and fundraising uses for personalized stamps too. Try these on:
- With your next letter writing campaign, urge supporters to use a photo of themselves or of the campaign message ("Save Darfur") as a stamp;
- Give your newlywed friends or family a stack of stamps with photos from their wedding, which happened...the night before;
- Send thank you cards to their major donors and high targets with stamps of the donors with a celebrity guest or political candidate;
- Send a stamp of a political candidate on the direct mail for fundraising; and
- If you are a real estate agent, place available houses on a stamps.
It's funny. This technological evolution provides new value and importance to written letters, rather than email. Businesses that rely on mail will make easy use of this. Robert De Niro might sell his mug for use on American Express literature, which comes every darn month to my place. I can already see Ronald McDonald and The King waving to us on promotional literature.
You bet there is some short-term fun-factor in using personalized stamps now, to add some flavor to your existing campaigns. Try it on for size because you don't really have anything to lose.
