Since January 2004, I've collected and saved every letter sent to my household or my business by a financial institution of which I have no customer affiliation.  I suspect that what is sent to me is fairly typical of what most households receive, and as such my observations about trends and quantity may be representative of what the general public experiences. 

The first quarter tends to be very active for direct mail marketers of financial products.  From January through March, 22 institutions contacted me 140 times.  That's about 2 letters on average every day the mail arrived.

Can community and regional institutions compete with this competition? Can they afford not to?

In the table below, you'll recognize most of the names.  If these successful and well respected institutions are using this much direct mail, it's because the medium gets results.  

First Qtr 2006	Janaury	February	March	Total
Advanta	5	2	1	8
AIG	1			1
American Express	6	4	1	11
Ameriquest	2	1	1	4
Bank Of America	2			2
Baxter Credit Union		2		2
Capital One	8	2	1	11
Champion Mortgage	2	1	1	4
Chase	24	7	7	38
Citibank	8	3		11
Community Trust Credit Union		1		1
Discover		2	3	5
Edward Jones	2			2
GE Money			1	1
IndyMac Bank	2			2
Lake Forest Bank		2	1	3
MBNA	2	6	4	12
NorthSide Community Bank			1	1
Universal Savings Bank	1		3	4
US Bank	2			2
Wachovia		1		1
Washington Mutual	5	2	1	8
Wells Fargo	2		2	4
Wholesale Home Lenders	2			2
Total Letters Received				140

The products pitched were:

Product	Offers
Auto Loan	1
Business Checking Account	1
CD	1
Checking Account	4
Credit Card	100
Home Equity Loan	9
Insurance products	1
Line of Credit	6
Money Market Account	2
Mortgage	11
Personal Loan	4