Lettershop services include data processing, personalization, folding, assembly, inserting, packaging, sorting, and mailing.
To ensure all your mail processing needs are met, you require access to a modern facility with the capacity and technology to streamline the production of your campaign, as well as an experienced team that specializes in managing the little details with a deep understanding and relationship with the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). Those providing lettershop services can streamline projects, enabling direct mail campaigns to be developed and mailed quickly and efficiently. Design Distributors has the technology and expertise to execute a wide array of specialized services, all under one roof.
This family business began in 1966 as an envelope printing company. Current owner Adam Avrick expanded into the direct mail and lettershop market in the late 1980s, setting the foundation for its legacy.
Data is a vital component of any direct mail campaign. That’s why Design Distributors has a state-of-the-art data center capable of handling all forms of data processing. We can create custom data programming to handle lists, allocate personalization tokens, and get you the best postal pricing available.
Say you’re a nonprofit organization sending out donation letters and you want to customize the copy to represent the previous amount each person donated. If they donated $10, your request can ask for the same amount and then show what a 1.5- ($15), 2- ($20), or 2.5- ($25) times increase would be and how it would help the organization. Our systems can store this information and use it to better personalize your mail pieces.
Or perhaps your company is looking to get the lowest price for an order. Our programmers will perform postal optimation reviews that can determine if commingling, drop shipping or co-palletization will get you the best postal rate and in home dates..
Design Distributors ensures all data is protected and secure. We’re SSAE 16 certified, HIPAA compliant, and SOC 2, type 2 certified with HiTrust mapping.
With the HP PageWide Web Press T240 HD, everything can be personalized to the customer: The colors, graphics, text, and more. Variable data printing can transform any campaign into a highly targeted and customized success. We also offer laser and inkjet personalization. Variable copy can be applied to envelopes during insertion using inkjet printers and added to labels using lasering.
Design Distributors offers continuous cutting, which converts rolls into sheets that can then be run through other processes. Once your product is printed, it can be folded into multiple shapes: Trifold, bifold, oblong or custom folds and formats.
Spot gluing, an alternative to wafer sealing, applies precise dots of adhesives to specific areas of packaging, ensuring the interior contents remain untouched. We’re able to cross-web glue, so customers can include private information on a self-mailer, which is more affordable than a letter package.
An eight-head cold glue application, Moll glue fold mailing machine, and the Ga-Vehren automatic glue affixing are among our many specialized gluing equipment. Our Label-aire machine is flexible, giving us the ability to affix labels after we fold and add personalization.
Design Distributors can also affix stamps, cards, and Post-its. Adding these to letter packages can convey direct, one-to-one communication, making the piece feel more personal. A study, titled “Post-It Note Persuasion: A Sticky Influence,” found a larger percentage of people will respond when a survey or letter is affixed with a Post-it note.
The final stage of the production process includes various binding and finishing solutions for manuals, brochures, reports, and pamphlets to ensure your campaign has a customized, polished look.
Some mail pieces need a personal touch. Many dimensional packages can’t be completed by machines, so our experienced team hand assembles them. For example, if a company wants to send perfume samples with a self-mailer, brochure or letter, the mail piece would be printed and hand-inserted into a padded envelope.
Design Distributors also handles jumbo packages up to 9” x 12”—a size many other lettershops are simply unable to manage.
Many mail packages involve inserting, whether it be the addition of bumper stickers or reply cards. Because your company doesn’t want mismatched names on envelopes and letters, our machines do match inserting. Camera systems are mounted to inserters and verify, for example, the name on the letter matches that of the reply card and teaser copy on the envelope. Each piece has a barcode that’s scanned as it moves through and matched with others.
Read-write inserting ensures the name on the letter matches the name added to the envelope, while read-read-write inserting scans two personalized pieces and adds the same personalization token to the envelope. These capabilities ensure a fast and accurate process.
Getting your mail into homes is mission critical. That’s why cultivating a consistent and trustworthy relationship with the USPS is always top-of-mind. Our onsite post office enables us to mail right out of the plant, streamlining logistics processes which result in expeditious deliveries.
Our Postal Optimization and Mail Consolidation Program saves customers time and money. Since it’s onsite, clients can take advantage of drop shipping, which often offers postal savings. We also provide commingling services, which combines mail to qualify for even more discounts. Because of our great relations with the USPS, our commingling service picks up packages daily. This program also includes tracking services, enabling clients to monitor packages from creation to mailbox.