Hi, reporters! Did you know you can buy a mail route?
I learned about this during my fellowship at ProPublica, but I’m guessing it’s actually a very old technique. Apparently you can pay the postal service to have a postman hand out a card to everyone on his route.
You can even take a look at the routes in your community and narrow down by residential or business – even age or income! Honestly, it was interesting even just seeing the mail routes in an area.
This tool is from the USPS – the US’s federal postal service. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find out much about other countries, but they hopefully have something similar.
Some engagement reporting guides recommend “snail mail” for rural areas or neighborhoods that aren’t as Internet-connected. It could also be a new way to source a geography-specific story, like construction, crime, traffic, schools, so on. Try it out!