University of North Carolina, Greensboro
IN-1: Innovation 1

In an effort to increase the sustainability of UNCG Postal Services we began filtering junk mail for students with the launch of our dynamic mail program. This is a complimentary service designed to save our students time and contribute to the sustainability of UNCG.

We began by notifying on-campus and local off-campus partners that we would no longer accept bulk mail advertisements (“box stuffers”), greatly reducing the number of items produced each semester. During a typical semester we handled approximately 20,000 of these advertisements. By eliminating this service these items are no longer produced.

In addition, transitioning to the new “at UNCG” address format has greatly reduced the amount of junk mail we receive each day to about 5% of total mail received. This is because the most widely-used mailing lists were tied to the static box numbers that no longer exist on campus. The personalized nature of the new address format makes it difficult for direct mailers to perform “business as usual.” Furthermore, Postal Services will be working through the Direct Marketing Association's Mail Preference Service to opt out of receiving unsolicited commercial mail to reduce most of the remaining unsolicited mail.

Any junk mail that does arrive at UNCG is now automatically recycled, guaranteeing that it does not end up in a landfill. Studies show the average adult American receives as much as 41 pounds of junk mail per year, so this filtering has a significant impact on our sustainability. This type of service is found in many premium pay-for-mail services, but by making it complimentary and applying it to all student mail we are working hard to have a sustainable impact at UNCG. The program started in May with summer school in a beta test and fully rolled out in August 2013.