Summing up the congress FEPE President Thomas Schwarz (Mayer-kuvert-network) remarked that despite the continuing economic difficulties and the challenges presented by the shift to digital communication, the envelope industry had reason to be positive. “Initiatives such as Keep me posted in the UK and RelatioMail in Belgium prove that envelopes and paper communication still have a part to play in today’s world, and what’s more consumers agree too!”

David Gold from Royal Mail group in the UK presented the “Keep Me Posted” campaign: “With 81% of adults wanting to choose how they receive information, giving consumers choice in how they are communicated with rather than pushing their customers online by default is not only right thing to do, but better for their business ” he concluded.

As the paper and envelope industries struggle with falling paper mail volumes in the face of digitalization Philippe Coppé from bpost in Belgium introduced an innovative idea to slow the decline in administrative documents: Working with major companies, bpost has developed “RelatioMail”, a project to add value to administrative documents, such as bills. So far several major utility companies have adapted their invoices using this new approach, with impressive results.

Russell Croisdale from UK based Encore envelopes further elaborated on this theme by presenting facts of figures from the past 5 years and a forecast for the future. Despite several years of falling mail volumes this decline is slowing down overall.