Direct Mail

With advertising budgets tight, savvy small-business owners are searching for cost-effective ways to pitch potential customers.With the right list of prospective buyers, direct mail is one of the best ways to tout your products or services. In fact, U.S. businesses spend more money each year on direct-mail advertising than on magazine, radio or television ads, according to surveys in the direct marketing industry."With direct mail, you can zero in on a limited group in a geographical area and design a tailor-made message," said Jules Field, publisher of Pool & Spa News, which is affiliated with Baker Advertising & Mailing in Los Angeles.

Once as much of a test of a civilian government's effectiveness as collecting the garbage and keeping the peace in the streets, the delivery of packages and letters via a government postal service has undergone tremendous changes since the days when Benjamin Franklin got the unenviable task of being the nation's first postmaster general. In the United States, it became evident nearly a century ago that there was money to be made by delivering packages more quickly and reliably than the U.S. Postal Service.

The Reeves Co., Baltimore's ninth-biggest advertising agency, has bought a northern Virginia direct mail firm to help it branch out into one of the industry's fastest growing segments.Reeves said its acquisition of Phillip Ramsey & Associates of Falls Church closed earlier this month, but wasn't announced until yesterday. Terms were not disclosed.Reeves was already No. 111 on Advertising Age's list of the top 500 direct mail advertising firms in the nation, company president Rebecca Reeves said, and hopes to crack the top 100 by the end of the year.

A new round of spending by Penn National Gaming and MGM Resorts International has pushed the ad war in the referendum over expanded gambling into record territory, eclipsing the $34 million raised for the 2006 governor's race. In a filing posted Tuesday with the State Board of Elections, the ballot committee financed by Penn National reported that its outlay for the effort to defeat Question 7 has reached $21.6 million — $18 million of which has been spent. Meanwhile, a pro-expansion committee reported that it has spent $17.7 million.

Well, Baltimore's native son of direct mail is at it again.Mal Warwick has written yet another book, this one titled "How to Write Successful Fundraising Letters."This gem of a book is a no-nonsense guide to everything you want to know about direct mail fund-raising. Unlike far too many books of this ilk on the market today, this one is a nuts and bolts, soup to nuts exploration of the topic, written and self-published by one of the masters of nonprofit direct mail fund-raising.Warwick's name is well known in Maryland.

Amid the landslide of catalogs and Christmas cards in the December mail, an envelope catches your eye: a guardian angel in purple ink spreading her considerable wings over two purple children. The inscription says, "There's an angel inside just for you!"You're skeptical. You're curious. You open it.You take the brass-colored angel pin from the letter inside and read about Kevin, the toddler severely burned by a space heater in his dilapidated home on a Northern Cheyenne reservation.And, maybe, moved by the holiday spirit and a little copywriting magic, you check the box marked "Yes!

NEW YORK -- Philip Morris Cos. once spent its advertising dollars on billboard space as wide and open as Marlboro country.That's coming to an end. Billboards and ads featuring the Marlboro Man and Joe Camel are banned in a proposed $368.5 billion settlement of health-related lawsuits. Cigarette makers also will spend $500 million a year on anti-smoking ads and create text-only black-and-white ads for magazines with 15 percent youth readership under the plan.Philip Morris, RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp.

In two articles last month about a Maryland law limiting mail solicitation by lawyers, quotes about a marketing letter and the new law were incorrectly attributed to attorney David Lutz. The comments were made by Lutz' law partner, David Fischer.The Sun regrets the errors.Craig Garfield's postage bill plummeted about $500 this month. And he's plenty angry about it.Garfield, a Baltimore lawyer who specializes in serious traffic cases, is one of about two dozen local attorneys who owe their thriving practices, in part, to an aggressive marketing strategy: direct mail.

Susie Marshall Sharp, 88, who was the first woman to serve as chief justice of a state's Supreme Court in the United States, died Friday in Raleigh, N.C.Alice Ehrenfeld Weil, 70, the highest-ranking American woman to serve at the United Nations, died Wednesday of cancer in New York. As assistant secretary general at the United Nations, she supervised security and maintenance of U.N. centers worldwide from 1984 until her retirement in 1986.Jim Atwater, 68, former writer and editor for Time magazine and dean of the University of Missouri School of Journalism, died Friday of cancer in Columbia, Mo.Wes Farrell, 56, a 1960s pop songwriter whose hits included "Hang On Sloopy," died Thursday of cancer in Miami.

The chief executive of Vertis Communications, a Baltimore advertising and marketing company, assured analysts yesterday that its turnaround initiatives are showing progress after reporting that its second-quarter loss nearly quadrupled and revenue declined. In a news release late Thursday, Vertis said it lost $19.7 million in the three months that ended June 30. That compared with a loss of $5 million in the second quarter last year. Vertis, a privately held company, announced financial results because its debt is publicly traded.

As he campaigned in the most closely watched congressional race in Maryland, state Sen. Rob Garagiola had an advantage his fellow Democratic candidates envied: the support of the politically powerful labor movement. More than a stamp of approval, endorsements from unions that represent teachers, health care workers and government employees also brought an army of volunteers to a campaign with the aim of getting voters to the polls. But despite labor's support, the Germantown attorney lost to John Delaney in Maryland's 6th Congressional District by 25 percentage points in Tuesday's primary election.

A political action committee supporting Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney will spend $464,000 on television advertising in Maryland, the first instance of a major third-party television buy in the state and the first ads supporting any candidate in the race for the GOP nomination.Restore Our Future PAC spokeswoman Brittany Gross said the ad will appear statewide in Maryland. The ad, titled "Values," has run in other states and criticizes former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum for his voting record in Congress, including to raise the nation's debt ceiling.

A man who police said was motivated by a dispute over his estranged wife walked into a direct-mail company Friday in eastern Baltimore County and fatally shot the owner, according to a colleague of the dead man who was a few feet away when the gunman opened fire. As employees fled through a side door, Dennis Leon McLaughlin, 45, walked out the building's main entrance, put the gun to his temple and fired, another witness said. McLaughlin was pronounced dead an hour later at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center.

The chief executive of Vertis Communications, a Baltimore advertising and marketing company, assured analysts yesterday that its turnaround initiatives are showing progress after reporting that its second-quarter loss nearly quadrupled and revenue declined. In a news release late Thursday, Vertis said it lost $19.7 million in the three months that ended June 30. That compared with a loss of $5 million in the second quarter last year. Vertis, a privately held company, announced financial results because its debt is publicly traded.

Most Howard County Council candidates are hoping to raise between $35,000 and $50,000 for this year's election, but several have barely begun, according to state campaign finance reports. With more than five months remaining before the campaign's official start in July, school board member Courtney Watson, a Democrat, is leading the field of council candidates with $36,043 in the bank Jan. 11, the end of the yearlong reporting period. Watson is running in District 1, covering the northeastern county, for the seat now held by Republican Christopher J. Merdon.

BY THE USUAL standards, the top news story of 2004 would be either the war in Iraq or the American election campaign. Off most people's radar screens, however, was a hidden story: How 2004 was the first presidential election framed by the new and alternative media -- cable TV, talk radio, the Internet and political direct mail. American politics will never be the same because of this development, so it's highly significant. Most politically savvy people are aware of particular aspects of this development, but they haven't added up the individual pieces to get the Big Picture.

BY THE USUAL standards, the top news story of 2004 would be either the war in Iraq or the American election campaign. Off most people's radar screens, however, was a hidden story: How 2004 was the first presidential election framed by the new and alternative media -- cable TV, talk radio, the Internet and political direct mail. American politics will never be the same because of this development, so it's highly significant. Most politically savvy people are aware of particular aspects of this development, but they haven't added up the individual pieces to get the Big Picture.

A political action committee supporting Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney will spend $464,000 on television advertising in Maryland, the first instance of a major third-party television buy in the state and the first ads supporting any candidate in the race for the GOP nomination.Restore Our Future PAC spokeswoman Brittany Gross said the ad will appear statewide in Maryland. The ad, titled "Values," has run in other states and criticizes former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum for his voting record in Congress, including to raise the nation's debt ceiling.

WASHINGTON - The four Democratic candidates who dropped out of the race in recent weeks all spent heavily in January's early primaries, but none more so than the upstart candidates Howard Dean and Gen. Wesley K. Clark. Each man embraced the Internet as a fund-raising tool and brought in millions. The two then spent heavily on advertising to introduce themselves to voters and to try to win primaries in targeted states. Though both were unsuccessful, it was not for a lack of spending. Dean, the former governor of Vermont, ran through $10.9 million in January, and his campaign spent $42.6 million overall through Jan. 31, campaign finance reports show.

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