Managing Mail

One of the quickest ways to reduce the mess in your home is to reduce the amount of stuff you bring into it. This applies to all of that stuff you bring in. Each inch of your home is valuable real estate. I try to remember that the more I have, the more I have to clean and take care of.

It seems that one of the most common messes that many have problems dealing with is the daily mail. Usually the mail can not be kept from being brought into the house. It may not seem like much when you get it out of the mail box each day, but the piles and the time it takes to sort through all of those little handfuls add up very quickly if you don’t manage it daily. If you handle it immediately after bringing it into the house instead of setting it on the counter or desk you will spend a few moments and the mess will forever disappear.

The Tools

There are two tools you will need to do this easily. The first is a recycle bin. The second is a good paper shredder.

You can get paper shredders fairly inexpensively, but this is one place I recommend you do invest from the start. I don’t expect you to get the big industrial model, but I do recommend you do go to an office supply store and purchase a mid to upper range business appropriate model. I skimped on two shredders including an inexpensive crosscutting one, before I purchased one of the more expensive ones. The first shredders didn’t cut up the credit cards that I fed them, and they didn’t last nearly as long as I had hoped. I spent almost just as much buying those two as I did on the one I have now. It has lasted a long time and has definitely earned its keep. Every now or then I treat it to a lubricating sheet that I purchased at the office supply store and it seems to work as good as the first day I brought it home.

Unless you are really into paper mache, I recommend that you select one that makes small pieces instead of strips. The smaller the pieces the shredder makes means not only the better your security, but also the less often the shredder needs to be emptied and the less space that those pieces take cumulatively. This means less mess and less time. Also a bonus, these types of cross cutting shredders are usually built to accept more pages at once and can handle credit cards more easily. If you do decide to take on the composting challenge, your shredder will give you plenty of fodder to add to the compost and the smaller pieces will break down more quickly than strips

The Process

When you bring in the day’s mail, you are going to need a spot to make four temporary stacks.

1. The first stack is for items to be recycled.
2. The second stack is for things to be shred.
3. The third is for your bills.
4. The forth is for any magazines and items that you want to read and follow up on or enter into your calendar.

You can make post it notes or tape labels to your mail area that will help you remember these piles until you get the hang of it.

Some things are very quickly identified as junk mail that can be recycled. Put them in the first stack. But you are not ready to go to the recycle bin yet.

Set any magazines and catalogs that you want to keep aside into the fourth pile. Set any that you do not intend to read into the recycle pile.

This should leave you with only various envelopes in your hand. Open each envelope one at a time. If it is a bill, you only need the actual bill and maybe the return envelope. The outer envelope and all of the little additions and sales fliers can be put into the recycle stack. Occasionally there will be something that you want to keep such as a free movie certificate from a cable service or a newsletter that has tidbits or recipes that you enjoy reading. These can be placed into the to be read pile with your magazines and catalogs.

After you have gone through all of the bills, you should be left with a stack of envelopes that are usually credit card offers and solicitation letters. As you open these everything should go in the shred pile or in the recycle pile.

If you receive a personal letter or invitation, the outer envelope can go into the recycle pile. (You may want to transfer the return address into your address book.) Then the letter can be put into the to be read stack.

Immediately shred the shred pile. If you let this stuff stack up, you are likely to cause your shredder to overheat and quit on you during a shredding marathon. It is much kinder to go ahead and do it now. Why let clutter that you know you do not need pile up?

Find a specific home for all of your bills and add the bills from today there now. Better yet, can you go ahead and make the payment now? Either way, you will not have to worry about misplacing a bill again. Those late fees are killers.

Look through the forth stack. Pull out anything that has a date in it that needs to be recorded, such as an invitation, and quickly jot the date into your calendar. Chances are after you’ve transferred the information the item can be added to your recycle stack or shredded.

Take the recycle pile to the bin immediately.

This leaves only the materials you saved to read or look through. Make a specific spot to put these. I tend to take these to my kitchen and read while I am making dinner, then I take them with me if it is a TV night and read them during commercials. Anything I am done with at the end of the night I put into the recycle bin before I go to bed. Anything I haven’t read or want to keep longer, which is usually not very much, I put into a basket on my desk or in a designated spot on my kitchen counter to start again the next day.

Further Considerations

There is something very important I want you to keep in mind when you are making homes for all of your items. Store things near where you use them. I can not stress this enough. In my last home I had my shredder in a corner of my kitchen counter and kept my bills on a designated shelf in one of the upper kitchen cabinets. This may seem silly, but it made very quick work of going through the mail. I opened the mail and sorted it on my kitchen counter. Then I shred the shred pile and stashed the bills without moving more than a few feet.  It is not important how silly an item’s home may seem, only how that home adds functionally and practically. If it reduces mess, is convenient, and saves your time then you have found the right home for an item.

Be proactive. First, do you really need the actual newspaper? Most are available online. We have saved a considerable amount of money by selecting local and national news sources that we can check for free at the same time we check our e-mail. Best of all, I read an actual book with my morning coffee instead. Something I love, but over the years found less and less time to do. Second, do reduce the amount of junk mail you receive.

If you currently have a mail management problem, find a shoe box or basket to put older mail items in whenever you come across them. Bonus assignment – do a scavenger hunt for all old mail to add to this box. I recommend that you keep this basket near where you intend to do the mail each day. Add a little extra old mail to the daily mail you handle each and every day and it will not be so hard to whittle down. When the old mail basket is empty, get rid of the basket or you will get in the habit of just dumping today’s mail into it.

There is one more very important thing I want to mention. Be safe with your shredder. Make sure to pull up your sleeves and watch loose clothing. If you do have young children in your home, take even more precautions with your paper shredder. Find a home for it that is well out of their reach. Even so, keep the power button turned to off and even then keep the shredder unplugged.

Your Mail

Do you have a lot of old mail laying around?  Do you already have a system in place?  Share your stories and tips in the comments.  When conversations get going in the comments, we all learn from each other.