What the research keeps telling us about mail

From Rich Boland, Client Services, Precision Group

What the research keeps telling us about mail

Ask any client whether direct mail still works and you tend to get one of two answers. Interestingly recent research has taken to calling it physical mail…as opposed to what? Metaphysical? So, I am sticking with the well-worn direct mail label. The first is a confident “no, that channel has been taken over by email and other digital.” The second is a quieter “I’m not sure…just as long as it works…does it still work?”

This article is for the second group. It is also for the first, provided they are willing to look at the evidence. Because when you line up what Australians actually do when mail arrives, a very different story appears, and it keeps appearing year after year.

This is not based on one surprising survey. It is the same answer arriving three times, from three studies, across six years: Accenture’s work for Australia Post in 2020 (2,015 consumers), the Visual Media Association’s Open Up to Mail research in 2025 (more than 5,000), and the VMA’s latest 2026 study, Trusted Channels in a Complex World. When a finding is repeated, it’s worth a closer look.

Direct mail gets opened, read and kept

Start with the most basic question: does anyone still read it? Duh, yes. Accenture found 81% of Australians open and read their mail immediately, against 63% for email, and 74% give mail their complete attention versus 61% for email.

Six years on, the 2026 research lands in exactly the same place: 84% always or often open and read addressed mail, and 68% always do. Think about how things have changed in the last six years…the pandemic, change in Federal Government, marches, cost of living spiraling, uncertainty, our unfair share of natural disasters, social media age restrictions and The Matildas being marvellous. A lot of big, transformational things have happened, but not in the acceptance of direct mail as a trusted channel. It’s still outperforming others.

More than eight in ten Australians keep a dedicated spot in the home for mail, and 84% say having hard copies of important information is valuable. The 2026 data from the Visual Media Association agrees, 88% keep direct mail for future reference at least some of the time. A letter read and kept on the kitchen bench has a working life an email rarely gets close to, especially when the same 2026 research puts email’s adjusted open rate at around 22%. On that basis, roughly four in five marketing emails are never opened at all.

It doesn’t just get read. It gets shared and better still, gets remembered

Mail travels around the house. 56% of Australians always share mail with other people in the home, against 42% for email. For anyone selling a “household decision” such as energy, insurance, family services, local government etc. that second reader matters. And they arrive with an implied recommendation from whoever opened it first. Not at all bad.

It also sticks. 54% say they always remember the information contained in mail. After all, being read is one thing; being remembered a week later is what actually moves a campaign.

The generational surprise and the honest version of it

Here is where the studies are worth reading side by side rather than blended together.

The 2020 Accenture work found something unexpected: younger Australians valued mail more than older ones. 62% of 18-to-34-year-olds said they felt important receiving mail, against 35% of over-35s, and 56% of digital natives trusted mail, against 30% of older consumers.

The 2026 research updates that. Mail is now valued strongly across every generation, with older Australians placing the highest importance on it (73%). But Gen Z has not gone anywhere. Among that group, mail commands more attention (59%) than email (32%), and is almost twice as likely as email to be seen as important.

Whilst the generational ranking shifts between the two studies (authors and methodologies), the headline does not. The notion that young Australians are lost to digital and indifferent to the letterbox has been wrong for years, and it is still wrong. The most plausible reason we can think of is scarcity. A generation raised on infinite scroll treats an envelope as an unusual event. Different gets noticed and that’s pretty important.

Why the letterbox is trustworthy

Trust is where the case has hardened fastest, because our digital environment has grown worse. The 2025 Open Up to Mail research found nine in ten Australians now report digital fatigue. Small wonder when Australia ranks 13th globally for breached online accounts, inboxes fill with phishing, and social feeds have become unreliable narrators.

Against that backdrop, mail remains credible. The 2026 report asked which channel feels safest for important information. Australians rank mail first at 43%, comfortably ahead of email at 27% (with more than 50% having had a scam or phishing scare). A letter cannot be spoofed with a dodgy link. And the channels compound: 44% of Australians are more likely to trust a local business they have seen in the letterbox as well as online. Supporting what we have always known adding the direct channel measurably lifts trust.

Mail reaches more people than you think

There is also a reach argument that has nothing to do with preference and everything to do with arithmetic. Around 7 million Australians struggle to afford home internet. Every household, however, has a letterbox and roughly 90% of Australians check theirs weekly.

For health services, charities, government, financial services and grocery retailers, that equity of reach alone justifies mail. For commercial brands, the same gap shows up as the audience’s digital under-delivers against include older customers, regional customers, and the long tail of households who simply do not engage online.

And it drives the action clients are chasing

None of this would matter if mail did not move people. It does. Nine in ten Australians have discovered new deals, products or services through the mailbox, and three in four have taken some form of action as a result. The 2026 research confirms the behaviour: 56% say direct mail is likely to make them act, rising to 73% among Baby Boomers. For a channel routinely dismissed because the postage costs are always rising, that is a lot of measurable action.

Different AND relevant

The most quietly radical finding across all three studies is also the least dramatic…Australians are not asking anyone to choose. 94% simply want the choice of how they receive important information, and 78% want direct mail included in important government communications, on its own or alongside digital.

So, the takeaway is not “mail instead of email.” It is mail where mail earns its place…the trusted, the messages you genuinely need someone to see, believe, keep and act on.

In marketing terms, the letterbox has quietly become both things a channel must be to be worth the spend. Different, because it stands out, and relevant, because three studies and six years of evidence say audiences still want it.

Related reading

• Precision Group mailing house services
• Mail in 2026: what Australians do when mail arrives
• Open Up to Mail initiative (openuptomail.com.au)
• Trusted Channels in a Complex World.

Sources

Visual Media Association, Trusted Channels in a Complex World: The Critical Role of Mail in Essential Communications, research by Vypr, 2026.

Visual Media Association, Open Up to Mail, research by The Source on 5,000+ Australians and 1,000+ New Zealanders, 2024–2025 — openuptomail.com.au.

Accenture for Australia Post, Mail’s Role in the Digital Age, 2020.

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash