Passport Wine Club The wine merchant Geerlings & Wade, best known for its catalog and solo product offers, introduced the Passport Wine Club in the company's most recent mailing. The 6" x 9" package promotes a charter offer of $19.95 plus shipping and handling for two wine selections for the first month of membership. After the introductory period, membership continues at a rate of $24.95 per month
Passport Wine Club
The wine merchant Geerlings & Wade, best known for its catalog and solo product offers, introduced the Passport Wine Club in the company's most recent mailing. The 6" x 9" package promotes a
charter offer of $19.95 plus shipping and handling for two wine selections for the first month of membership. After the introductory period, membership continues at a rate of $24.95 per month plus shipping and handling. Recipients are given the option to receive two red wines, two white wines or one of each with every shipment. Affinity gifts are a prominent benefit of membership, and this program offers an insulated wine tote with shoulder strap, cheese board, cheese cutter and restaurant-style cork puller. In addition, members receive the club's Wine Authority newsletter and a binder. Two added incentives are included in the package. First is a freemium insert, the 2002 Vintage Guide, listing the company's year-to-year ratings for a variety of popular wines. Second is a reply form to enter a monthly sweepstakes for a 12-bottle case of wine.
Starbucks The newest mailing from Seattle-based coffee retailer Starbucks takes a cross-promotional turn to advertise its sponsorship of a commercial-free independent film series on the cable television
channel Bravo Network. The broadcast began March 1st with Friday night screenings of films that have won or were nominated for the Independent Spirit Awards, along with coverage of the 17th Annual awards show. Starbucks uses its 8" square self-mailer as "An Invitation to Attend a Film Festival in Your Living Room," which, not by coincidence, is also the perfect setting "to cozy up with a hot cup of our coffee." This is an intriguing alliance, as the independent film audience is likely a highly desirable "hip" market for the trendy coffee merchant. With the inclusion of a movie-listing insert and a coupon for $1 off a 12 oz. or larger bag of coffee, Starbucks reinforces its "At Grocery. At Home. At Last." motto by providing a logical way "to discover your coffee moment at home."
Working Assets Visa Fleet Bank has mailed a new effort for a credit card together with Working Assets, the politically progressive telecommunications company. Fleet's Working Assets Visa card is an atypical effort. 
Where traditional co-branded credit cards (e.g. MBNA's Sharper Image Platinum Plus Visa or Chase's Shell Platinum MasterCard) offer discounts or rebates, Fleet's new card is tied to Working Assets' fundraising arm and offers no tangible perks to the user. Instead, for each purchase made with the card, Fleet's Working Assets Visa donates 10¢ to the Working Assets donation pool (50 nonprofit groups benefit annually from this money). Financial incentives are not entirely ignored in the #10 package, however. A fixed introductory APR of 1.99% on purchases and balance transfers is given until October 1, 2002. After the introductory period, the APR is variable, currently set at 13.99%.
The direct mail pieces appearing in Mail Stream are tracked and analyzed by Paradysz Matera, New York, through its online competitive direct mail and e-mail tracking tool MarketRelevance located at http://www.MarketRelevance.com/newsletter.cfm.
