The Recyclist: You leave that 'door spam' at your own risk, pardner

There are many things I love about living in Long Beach.

The Aquarium of the Pacific. The Queen Mary. The fried chicken at Johnny Rebs'. But this -- my fancy new plastic placard -- ranks right up there.

It turns out that the city of Long Beach hates "door spam" as much as I do. You know, all the junk that people leave on your doorstep: the business cards, gardening fliers, real estate agents' calendars, restaurant menus and the like that are shoved into the door jamb, wrapped around the doorknob, shoved under the door or secured to my mailbox with a rubber band.

That stuff makes me furious.

It makes me long for the Wild West days when you could shoot someone for stepping foot on your property without your permission, and the long arm of the law would consider you justified. OK, maybe I'm exaggerating, but I hate arriving at my front door with my hands full -- supermarket shopping bags, my purse, a half-full coffee mug left over from the morning's commute -- only to find that I have to thwack my way through all that rubbish to get to the lock and then watch cards and leaflets flutter to the ground when the door opens. Then, after I put my stuff down on the table inside, I have to circle back to the front door to clean it all up. It's so bad in my neighborhood that my husband bought a small garbage pail and posted it near the front door for this purpose. (You know I don't want that clutter in my house!)

But no more. I was tooling around the city's website recently when I found this link alerting me to a free placard to hang on my doorknob. It carries a warning in English and Spanish that my home is off limits to this clutter, which just ends back in the city's garbage trucks. I was thrilled to find it but also a bit dubious. Would it work? Keep reading to find out ...

Bottom line: Overnight, the door clutter came to a virtual halt. Seriously.

Turns out that these signs are not just window dressing. The city has a little bite to back up its bark: Advertisers who ignore the sign can be reported to the city, and the city also encourages you to print a form letter and send it to advertisers alerting them that a line was crossed.

I've seen a few violations, including one from a real estate agent. I called the agent to complain that my sign was ignored. I fully expected a "Hey lady, what do you want me to do about it?" response. Instead, he apologized and asked me not to file a complaint with the city: "Please give me your address and I will come over there right now and remove it."

So this thing works.

But what do you think? Am I being too touchy about all this door spam, or do you hate it as well? And do you have a better method for fending it off?

-- Rene Lynch
twitter.com/renelynch

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Comments

[roy rogers]

outstanding!!!

[big mike]

Excellent idea! Especially seeing how well it works.

[Emily Green]

I love this! I have a large log basket on my Los Angeles porch to hold the unwanted offerings, and it fills every week between coupons, fliers and catalogs. So this stuff can really build up. What a nice edit by Long Beach of the waste-stream. But it may be even more wonderful in terms of morale value. Somehow the inability to stop strangers from dumping junk mail on your front porch is profoundly dispiriting -- People are basically trashing your house. Bravo Long Beach!

[Mitch]

"And do you have a better method for fending it off?"
The city should make signs that say you want Advertisments, not that you do NOT want Advertisments. That way I do not have to go out of my way to STOP this JUNK from being littered at my door

[Pam]

I love living in Long Beach too and now I'm gonna love it even more! I can't wait to get one of those signs for my front door. Thanks so much for the tip. Isn't Long Beach the coolest city in Southern California?! I sure think so!

[Garden lover]

Fabulous. Can I get this in Los Angeles?

[PatrickLBC]

These door hangers are a great idea, but they have a fatal flaw... The Spanish portion is printed in orange ink which fades to white after about a month in the sun. So the people who leave ads (most of whom are Spanish speakers) ignore my door hanger now. Also, I have reported several violating businesses to the city, but they continue to leave ads. This program is a good idea, but needs some refinement to actually work.

[DSH]

Brilliant!! I wonder if there is a similar program in place in Burbank. Few things irritate me as much at the end of a long day than coming home to find stuff wedged into my railings and door frames. Ugh!

[LB Resident Recycler]

Mine also faded, however it was the english message not the spanish. Anyway, I ordered a replacement, now printed in blue and green, and it has not faded and works great. Great job LB,

[kitchenbeard]

This would be very much appreciated in SF. How do we make this happen??

[Joseph Blain]

The door litter is especially infuriating when they manage to get inside and clutter up every front door in a gated security building. I once had to gather them up from where they had blown all over the courtyard ( and into the pool) and take them back to the Thai restaurant they were advertising. This program will be a huge help.

Ironically, the "Ads by Google" underneath this article are offering to sell me blank promotional door hangers.

[KS2 Problema]

I'm also from Long Beach and, when I had a house not quite a decade ago, the amount of the stuff was stunning. (My current place is less accessible and so somewhat less spam-bombed.) There was a law on the books, but the city didn't enforce it and seemed pretty hostile to having the issue called to their attention. I'm glad that that's apparently changed.

Another, really vexing annoyance are cards and brochures shoved under car windshield wipers and between the seal and the window of the doors. Near the coast, the overnight dew makes those glossy 4 color rave postcards stick to windows with the kind of tenacity that often forces the car owner to laboriously chip, curl or crumble them off with an industrial razor -- if he's lucky enough to have one.

[jay]

Love this idea! Asking for one now right now. Any chance this will work for my car too? I hate the fliers on my car even more, and I hate to think of the resources wasted in printing this spam.

[Cody]

I live in LB and people regularly ignore my door sign. While the problem of door spam doesn't raise my ire quite as high it's kind of annoying to have to clean up the mess that a bunch of other people leave on your door step.

[David]

What about the huge pad of junk that comes through the mail slot every Tuesday. Store "circulars" and "offers" in such huge amounts that one Tuesday they CLOGGED the mail slot!!! Get RID of this advertising JUNK. If stores want to offer discounts- take care of it at the register not by trashing up my doorstep!!!!

[dds]

Rene,

You made my day!

As an LBC resident, I can't tell you how much this article resonates with me. If I ever see you around town, at Cocoreno's or McKenna's your next drink is on me.

[oakley]

We have a lot less door spam since we moved to a tucked-away apartment unit in Los Alamitos. But we still get them occasionally. I personally will not do business with anyone who left us door spam. I wish I can get a door knob sign too.

[jc]

Really? This is what makes you furious? Annoyed, yes. But furious is a waste of emotion and energy. It's not that bad. If you had a small business you might feel differently - it's a way to get the word out. And if you were someone willing to bust your butt in the blazing sun to make a few bucks and this was the only job you could get you might be more accepting. It's life in the big city, folks. Get used to it. Just pick them up and throw them away.

[Frustrated in LA]

I wish Los Angeles took this as seriously as Long Beach does. I have waged a one man war on unwanted flyers after a home invasion robbery which started with a front door full of fliers made the house look empty (we never used that door). I researched the law, posted my own warning sign but still they come. Calls to the Police department and my local city council group falls on def ears ("Everyone has that problem" I'm told, as if, "what makes you so special?") The flyer posting company knows that the law is not enforced in LA and have gone as far as threatening me when I confront a poster. Take a lesson from Long Beach, Los Angeles and lets clean up this dangerous form of littering!

[b0rderlander]

"What about the huge pad of junk that comes through the mail slot every Tuesday. Store 'circulars' and 'offers' in such huge amounts that one Tuesday they CLOGGED the mail slot!!! Get RID of this advertising JUNK. If stores want to offer discounts- take care of it at the register not by trashing up my doorstep!!!!" - Dave

Here here! I totally agree with you, Dave. Does anyone know if the post office has something like a "No Ads Please" form I could fill out?

Also, when my kids come home from school, their backpacks are filled with advertisements from local businesses and community centers. With two children in elementary school, it's a huge waste of paper throughout the year. I'd like that to stop, too.

As for the door signs, we ordered ours 3 weeks ago and still haven't recieved it. I hope that the sign works for us once get it.

[SanGabriel]

I live in San Gabriel and have been wanting such a sign for years. Inspired by Long Beach, I just made my own simple version. Now if I could find some way to get the Post Office to quit delivering junk as well...

[G LB]

As a small business owner; one of the most effective ways for me to advertise is by leaving my menus on the doors of local residents. I do it on a schedule that I feel doesn't dis-respect the resident but I fully understand many people probably get a lot from well intentioned business owners and it is frustrating.
BUT also understand that would you rather get a little frustrated seeing some extra paper or seeing another Business closed in Long Beach. We small business owners are only trying to stay alive especially when PRINT papers are so expensive and ineffective to use. Thank go we stopped advertising in Newspapers we'd be out of business now..and our neighborhood would have one more place for lease.... How much crap is in one LA TIMES when you open it up... I buy a Paper to read news Not a whole Brochure of TARGET, WALMART, its a silly this article is in the LA times...

[G LB]

As a small business owner; one of the most effective ways for me to advertise is by leaving my menus on the doors of local residents. I do it on a schedule that I feel doesn't dis-respect the resident but I fully understand many people probably get a lot from well intentioned business owners and it is frustrating.
BUT also understand that would you rather get a little frustrated seeing some extra paper or seeing another Business closed in Long Beach. We small business owners are only trying to stay alive especially when PRINT papers are so expensive and ineffe ctive to use. Thank god we stopped advertising in Newspapers we'd be out of business now..and our neighborhood would have one more place for lease.... How much JUNK is in one LA TIMES when you open it up... I buy a Paper to read news Not a whole Brochure of TARGET, WALMART, its a silly this article is in the LA times...

[benj]

This is fun: when I get credit card offers, I like to take the entire contents, including the original torn-open envelope, and send it back to them in the business reply envelope. They have to pay someone to open it and they have to pay the postage. Have that, Crapital One!

[No Way]

To small business owner:

Did you ever hear of bulk mail?

Use it!