You can have us include a personalized greeting (e.g. "Dear John and Mary") as part of each letter, and we can do a variety of other types of merges as well.
Basic Mail Merge
The most common type of mail merge involves including a greeting at the top of the letter. You don't need any advanced computer knowledge to do so – only the following simple steps:
Include the line "Dear Greeting," somewhere in the top third of your letter (above the fold). You can phrase this line however you want. e.g. "Hey Greeting!"
In your mailing list, include a "Greeting" field or column. The greeting should just include the person's name (not the word "Dear" or the comma).
Choose the "Dear {Greeting}" mail merge option when you place your order.
That's it. There's no need to set up a mail merge in your word processing program – our software takes care of the merge and ensures everything stays lined up. You can even send your letter as a PDF.
A basic mail merge costs an extra $5.00 plus $0.10/letter, which covers the extra processing time on the printer and the labor involved with keeping everything in order.
Advanced Mail Merge
We can also work with you to send more complex mail merges. Some types of merges will cost more than others, but we'll generally try to accommodate any request. Here are some examples:
- A different opening paragraph per recipient.
- A personal note in a handwriting font under the signature.
- Last month's (or year-to-date) donations, and/or each recipient's pledge.
- Include the person's name in the middle of a paragraph.
- An appeal for a specific amount per recipient based on past giving.
Advanced mail merges are priced based on the number of elements being merged per sheet and the amount of setup required. Let us know what you have in mind and we'll be able to give you an estimate along with tips on how to keep the price low.
Pre-Merged Files
We strongly advise against sending us pre-merged files (i.e. a file that has one page for every recipient). We sort the envelopes in a particular way that won't necessarily line up with your mailing list, so we need to do the mail merge on our end in order to ensure that everything stays lined up. This also ensures the mailing list used for the envelopes hasn't changed since the letters were merged.
Most of the time, it's best to send us a file that just has a placeholder for anything that needs to be merged. For example, if we're printing a "Dear <Greeting>" line for you, just type that into the document, and we'll replace it on our end. When you submit your order, let us know how many placeholders are in your letter so we can find them all.
If you need to make significant changes to each recipient's letter, such that mail merging on our end isn't possible, please get in touch with us before you customize the letters, and we'll work with you to set it up in a way that will let us print it for you.
See Also
Please check out our personalization page for other options to personalize your letter, many of which can be done at no extra charge.