It's in the mail

Entrepreneur, Feb, 1997 by Heather Page, Debra Phillips

Which mail order categories are performing the best? Following are Sroge's picks:

1. Computers and related accessories. Sales of computer products and services to businesses are growing about 33 percent faster than their consumer counterparts, says Sroge. Attracted by the convenience and low prices leaders such as Dell, Gateway 2000 and MicroWarehouse offer, more businesses are mining to mail order companies to satisfy their expansive information technology needs. What do they want most? Networking, data communication and software products, says Sroge.

2. Home improvement/decor. Catalogs like Hold Everything, The Bombay Company and Domestications that cater to consumers' obsession with fixing up their homes are building a solid niche, says Sroge.

3. Casual apparel. "Relaxed [office] dress codes are stimulating the market for casual apparel," says Sroge. Leading the way are mail order companies L.L. Bean, Land's End and J. Crew. Sroge says mail order entrepreneurs supplying consumers with comfortable, affordable and versatile clothing should experience strong growth.

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The latest mail order software

Want to make sure the check's really in the mail? Check out the newest mail order software.

* Mailer's 4: This Windows-based mail-sorting software from Mailer's Software has several interesting features. First and foremost, it saves you postage and printing costs by cleaning up your mailing lists. It also helps with telemarketing by checking each phone number for a valid area cod plus prefix combination then updating it. There's also a Demographic Profiler that lets you analyze he customers on your list. A 30-day trial of the program can be ordered by phone at (800) 800-MAIL or on the Web site at www.800mail.com. A one-year subscription is $995.

* Pitney Bowes SmartMailer 2.0: SmartMailer is a mailing management and postal processing application for reducing mailing costs. The program is available is DOS and Windows versions and can be combined with the AddressRight System (a computer/printer combination) for perfect address printing. The CD-ROM includes the National Address Database, which contains all "deliverable" addresses in the United States along with their ZIP 4 codes. SmartMailer 2.0 starts at $995. Call Pitney Bowes at (800) MR-BOWES and ask for program 8539, or visit www.pitneybowes.com.

* D&B MarketPlace: If you want to target your business to the right audience, D&B MarketPlace may be the answer. Based on data from Dun & Bradstreet, this CD-ROM lists more than 10 million businesses, including addresses, phone numbers and other key marketing information. It runs under either Macintosh or Windows. The list price is $849. To test D&B MarketPlace, visit www.mktplace. com, or call (800) 590-0065.

* Smart Marketing Suite: Group 1 Software's Smart Marketing Suite standardizes and corrects U.S. addresses and validates ZIP codes against the U.S. Postal Service National Database for greatest postal discounts. The system also presorts, prints and barcodes directly from your own database. An integrated interface lets you process multiple tasks with just one job setup. Everything from address correction to presorting and label printing are handled efficiently. The program comes on a CD-ROM and works under Windows 3.1 or Windows 95. The list price is $1,369; for information, go to www.g1.com, or call (800) 368-5806.