To save money on buying envelopes, take any pre-addressed envelopes that come in the mail that aren't going to be used and put white labels over the address. Make sure not to use envelopes that are obviously not suited to your purpose. Even the envelopes with the see through windows can be used. Just put the white label over the window part. We haven't purchased envelopes in ages!
By Ron from Cortez, CO
This page contains the following solutions.
I don't get junk postal mail anymore but I do receive bills that always have return payment envelopes. I pay my bills by phone or online now and just hate the idea of throwing those envelopes away.
While I know that a lot of us use those return envelopes we get in our junk mail and simply place a white label over the printed address, I have been advised by my friend at the post office here to ALSO make sure that any and all barcodes be completely covered by a white label.
I am a mother and a full time student working towards my college degree. I have financial limitations and constraints and I was always looking for practical ways to save money and recycle at the same time.
My favorite way to make lists is to recycle used envelopes. I just turn them over and write my list on the back. The size is great, easy to manage and take with me!
When you receive some snail mail from a friend, cut off their return address and save it. Use it on the next item you mail to them. Just tape it to the package or envelope.
I save the envelopes that come with the credit card offers I receive almost daily. I use these for paying bills that I normally drop off myself, the dentist, for example, is just right up the street.
If you have been lucky enough to receive those beautiful Christmas cards, don't be so quick to throw away the envelopes. In my life the number of cards I receive varies from year to year, as well as how many cards I mail.
Recycling is really easy since everything is commingled together into one container at the convenient site. However, I don't put loose paper in the recycling bin.
I pay many bills online. Instead of throwing away the window envelopes from bills, I cut out addresses or use labels to cover the window. I don't have to buy envelopes and I am not adding paper to the garbage.
I remember seeing this when I had my regular job with a school district. One of the Pre-K teachers had small bulletin board pictures and game pieces for her class stored in a large brown envelope.
Save those unused envelopes with windows that sometimes come with bills. You can use them for your own personal mail by writing the address on a 3x3 inch post-it note (under or over the sticky area) and placing it in the envelope so the address is showing in the window.
ThriftyFun is one of the longest running frugal living communities on the Internet. These are archives of older discussions.
I like to re-use envelopes. I use a letter opener thing I got from an insurance company (a scissors will work) to neatly open the mail.
Reuse junk mail return envelopes as mailing envelopes. If envelope has a bar code at the bottom, you can run a black marker through the bar code
After opening mail, keep envelopes to write shopping list or to do list. Then you can recycle.
