To the Royal Mail Strike: ‘On yer bike…’

Is the silly season still with us? I’m beginning to wonder, what with strike action at Royal Mail affecting deliveries around the country. After finally seeing a welcome uplift in DM activity in recent weeks, comes not only a spate of regional mail delivery disruptions but the threat of a national strike next month.

Perfect timing, huh? And all happening right when direct mail’s just starting to get its Mojo back after months of recession-bred doldrums.

As reported on Marketing Direct, big mailers like insurance giant BT and More Than are already feeling the effects of Royal Mail industrial action. As the second and fifteen biggest UK direct marketers, respectively, you can be certain that if the ‘big end’ of DM is seeing response rates dip, others are also suffering. The market’s already shaky enough without the entire mail channel’s reliability being called into question during the lead-up to Christmas campaign season.

So put October 9th in your diary and keep your worry beads handy, for that’s when the Communications Workers Union will announce whether there’s to be a national mail strike. We’ll all need Sherpa guides to help scale the mountains of undelivered mail accumulating over Swindon way, otherwise.