Bruno, I fight junk mail relentlessly, and have had decent results. All you have to do is call the company and tell them to remove you from their lists. This works for catalogs, credit cards, banks (mortgage crap), and other large companies. Almost 100% of the time, the junk mailers will LOVE to take you off their lists. There must be some law saying they can't mail you anymore if you request removal (yet sometimes "removal" is only "supression for a year or two"). One credit card company I requested removal from mailed me a form which would supress my personal information on the lists of three or four major credit companies (... not the three credit reporting agencies, I don't think...). It asked for WAY more personal information than I was comfortable with, but I recognized at least two of the company names, so I did it, and I think it's helped.

The free newspapers, cupon flyers, cupon books, and cards from local businesses are a little harder. The cupon flyers and free marketing newspapers generally have a well hidden number to call for placing ads. Try calling that (which is likely to be busy) and ask to be removed, and they may tell you that "you need to place a written removal request with the Direct Marketing Association (DMA)." They should provide a phone number to call and/or and address to mail the request. Some small businesses have told me they buy their lists straight from the DMA, so the written removal request should help remove many mailings. I've recently placed mine, so I can only hope that it works. One cupon mailer told me to contact my post office to request that marketing mail be stopped. The post office simply gave me the DMA contact information.

I do this not only to reclaim my privacy (which certain companies I deal with gladly sell to the DMA and other firms), but to also reduce wasted resources. My township no longer recycles junk mail (and was it ever recycled before or did they just put it in a dump?), so the 10 pound grocery bags full of junk mail that I have to throw out every few weeks just makes me cry. These removal request phone calls have aways been polite and I feel that they've helped. Good luck, I hope it works for you and everyone else who wants to help stop this relentless waste.

It's too bad the DMA has infinite cash to pay lobbyists to unceasingly convince the government that direct mailing is good and that consumers want it. If not for that, there'd certainly be a "Do Not Mail" list.