Direct-mail glossary

EDDM (Every Door Direct Mail)

Every Door Direct Mail, saturation mailing

EDDM is a USPS program that lets you mail a piece to every residential and/or business address on one or more postal carrier routes, without needing a named mailing list or a bulk-mail permit.

Why it matters

For a small business owner trying to reach an entire neighborhood — a new dental practice, an HVAC company entering a zip code, a med spa opening near a shopping center — EDDM removes a major barrier: you don't need a list of names and addresses. You simply choose the carrier routes that cover your target area on the USPS EDDM mapping tool, drop off your mail pieces at the local post office, and the carrier delivers one to every door on that route. EDDM pieces mail at Marketing Mail flat rates, which are cheaper than First-Class postage. The tradeoff is delivery time (typically 7–21 days rather than 2–5) and no mail forwarding or return service for undeliverable pieces. EDDM also has minimum size requirements — pieces must be at least 6.25" on the long side — so the standard 4×6 postcard does not qualify; 6×9 and 6×11 postcards do.

CardCadence

How CardCadence handles it

CardCadence does not offer EDDM. Every CardCadence postcard is addressed to a specific address and mails First-Class. That costs more per piece than EDDM's Marketing Mail flat rate, and it is a deliberate trade: your card lands in about 2–5 days instead of up to three weeks, USPS forwards it free for 12 months if the resident has moved, and because each piece is addressed, a QR scan tells you exactly which card and which household responded. EDDM cannot tell you that. If what you actually want is neighborhood coverage rather than EDDM specifically, CardCadence does that with addressed mail: draw a ZIP, radius, or custom area in the app and it builds a list of every address inside it, addressed to "Current Resident" where no name is known. Print, postage, and delivery are one all-in price — $0.75 per 4×6, $0.80 per 6×9, $1.13 per 6×11 — with no bulk-mail permit and no trip to the post office. The 4×6 is included here because, unlike EDDM, addressed First-Class mail has no minimum-size rule.

Related terms

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CardCadence handles the printing, postage, and mailing from $0.75 per postcard — no subscription required.

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