Monday, October 22, 2007

Get a jump on the junk

from the NY Times as seen in The Grist:

Unclog your mailbox

Soon 'twill be the season for the annual mailbox clog, when retailers begin their more-than-earnest marketing push for holiday shopping. Lately I've been calling individual companies requesting that I be removed from their mailing list, getting into each phone queue with varying degrees of hassle. Now there is a service called Catalog Choice that will do it for you. It's simple: register with your name, address, and e-mail, then start typing in the names of catalogs you want to get rid of in your mailbox. Catalog Choice takes care of the rest.

Catalogs promote greed and the desire for more in such a quiet way. Looking is harmless, we say. But even Jesus realized this was dangerous when he said we should cut out our eyes if they cause us to sin. Most of us can do with so much less of what we already have. Keep your eyes; get rid of the catalogs; save the trees.

19 billion catalogs are mailed each year, made out of 53 million trees. That's 358 catalogs for one tree. Personally, I'd rather have the tree.

2 comments:

Jan said...

I am so grateful you wrote about this, esp. about the promotion of greed. Thank you, thank you. I need this AND the link!

Cynthia said...

The more folks who know, the better.