ELMA study: European drop mail market, recovering after recession

The European Letterbox Marketing Association (ELMA) has unveilled its third pan-European census of doordrop media covering 22 markets and 180m households. The research found that the door drop market in Europe continued to recover from the recession with an increase of 2.2 per cent to 115 billion items in 2012. However pressure on costs resulted in media spend falling marginally to €3.9bn; a decrease of 0.7 per cent compared to 2011. 

Croatia was the only country to see an increase in the average number of door drops from seven to eight per week. The large economies of France, Germany and UK (244m items) all increased use of door drop, balancing the stabilization and slight decline of volumes in the CEE and Scandinavian markets. UK households receive five door drops per week, while Romanian ones only receive 2 per week.

The largest volumes by country in 2012 continued to be Germany (23bn), France (21bn), Italy (12bn) and The Netherlands (11bn). Romania ranked 20th in top, with 800M.

ELMA also looked at spend on door drop as a percentage of total advertising spend. The Nordic region, on the whole, allocates more spending to door drops with Denmark (15%), followed by Finland (11%), France (9.6%) and Norway (8.1%). The lowest advertising spend on door drops is in the UK (1.5 per cent), followed by Poland (1.8 per cent) and Germany (two per cent). In Romania, 8% of the total marketing budget was allocated to drop mail.

 The ELMA census confirms that the door drop sector in Europe has recovered from the recession but is experiencing pressure on price despite a welcome increase in volume.

Recent research from Experian showed that 52% household decision makers said door drops were the most important source of research about their purchases, followed by the internet at 24%, shows that door drop remains one of the most effective tools for marketers. It is our job to re-educate marketeers across Europe of the effectiveness and cost benefit of using door drops.”

 Mark Davies,

President ELMA & General Manager TNT Post DoorDrop Media UK 

When it comes of Romanian market and ELMA’s study results, Marian Seitan, General Manager Inbox Marketing (ELMA member) said: 

Romanian drop mail market underwent, during the last few years, a significant growth process when it comes of services’ quality, largely due to adopting geographic data and GIS technologies as operational work instruments. According to independent measurements, Inbox Marketing is over the European average when it comes of the quality level in drop mail, which helped us to reach to a market quota of 60% in Romania. This was possible after an investment of around euro 350,000 in a geographical data base and an operational system based on it