Direct mail guide

Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM): a plain-English guide for small business

Every Door Direct Mail is a USPS service that lets a local business mail a postcard to every address on a mail carrier's route without buying a mailing list or printing a single name. If you can point at a neighborhood on a map, you can mail it. This guide covers how EDDM works, what it really costs, and where a shared postcard is the better buy.

What EDDM actually is

Standard direct mail is addressed: you supply names and addresses and pay per piece. EDDM is unaddressed saturation mail. You choose USPS carrier routes — each is roughly 400 to 800 households — and every mailbox on those routes receives your postcard, marked simply for the local resident. There is no list to rent, no data to clean, and no address-quality risk.

How the process works

1. Map your routes. Use the USPS EDDM tool to select ZIP codes and carrier routes around your storefront or service area, and check the household counts.

2. Design to spec. EDDM Retail pieces must exceed the standard letter size — a common choice is 6.5″ × 9″ or larger, up to 12″ × 15″. Bigger pieces cost more to print but survive the mail stack better.

3. Bundle and pay. Pieces are banded in bundles of 50 to 100 with USPS facing slips, paperwork is filed, and postage is paid per piece.

4. Drop at the post office. EDDM Retail is dropped at the post office serving the routes you selected; EDDM BMEU allows bulk entry through a mail service provider.

What EDDM costs

Postage alone runs a little over twenty cents per piece, and printing a large-format postcard typically adds fifteen to forty cents depending on quantity and stock. Realistically, budget forty to seventy cents per household all in — so a 5,000-home mailing on your own is roughly $2,000 to $3,500, plus design time and the afternoon spent bundling.

Why EDDM works for local businesses

Saturation mail is the only channel where a small business reliably reaches every household in a specific geography. No algorithm decides who sees it, there is no bidding war on impressions, and the piece sits on a kitchen counter instead of scrolling past. It works especially well for home services, restaurants, dental and medical practices, gyms, seasonal promotions, and grand openings — anything where the buying decision is made close to home.

Where EDDM falls short

You cannot target by income, age, homeownership, or past purchase — a route is a route. You also cannot mail to a hand-picked list, and the minimum practical spend is high because you are paying for every door whether or not they are a prospect. And because the piece arrives alone, you carry the entire cost of the drop yourself.

The shared-postcard alternative

A cooperative postcard splits one saturation mailing across several local advertisers. The County Connection Card is a 9″ × 12″ postcard mailed to 5,000 mailboxes in Champaign and Coles County, with each business buying a portion of the card. You get the same every-door reach for a fraction of a solo EDDM drop — ad spots start at $250 — and printing, bundling, paperwork, and the post office run are handled for you. Design help is available for $50 if you do not have artwork, and you approve a digital proof before anything mails.

Which should you choose?

Run your own EDDM campaign when you need the whole piece to yourself — a multi-offer menu, a catalog-style piece, or a message that needs full creative control — and you have a few thousand dollars per drop. Choose a shared postcard when you want the reach of saturation mail on a small business budget, want to test direct mail before committing, or would rather not manage print specs and postal paperwork.