Sportsman’s Market Inc., a Batavia, OH-based cataloger and retailer, is losing its membership with the Direct Marketing Association for not signing the organization’s Privacy Promise.
Sportman’s Market founder and chairman Hal Shevers, who declined to comment on the specifics of the case, said in a prepared statement that the company “has not signed the Privacy Promise since our company policy has always been and continues to be that any customer privacy request is immediately honored.”
Bill Anderson, a spokesman for Shevers, said the cataloger has no plans to sign the Promise and had no reservations about losing its membership, but would not go into further details.
Sources said the cataloger is one of seven members apparently leaving the DMA over Privacy Promise. Six firms, including one bank and one other type of financial services company, are resigning and Sportsman Market is being expelled, the sources said.
However, it was unclear at press time which came first–Sportsman’s Market alleged expulsion or the expiration of its membership.
Shevers added in the statement that, “we have the highest standards in the industry and our company’s reputation speaks for itself.”
Pat Faley, the DMA’s vice president of ethics and consumer affairs declined to confirm the Sportsman’s Market case or offer insight into any of the other pending cases, but noted that the DMA board may expel “a handful” of members for non-compliance.
The association is working “down to the wire” with those members in question and an official announcement is expected to be released early next week, Faley said.
Faley outlined three reasons DMA members under scrutiny have declined to comply with the Promise. First, some believe that it is not an appropriate role for a trade association to mandate certain practices, such as the Promise. Second, technological system problems have prohibited timely compliance. Lastly, the requirements are overly burdensome.
The DMA has taken its position on privacy, Faley said, because a strong public statement from the industry in favor of consumer privacy protection is critical for the industry’s long-term survival. “Our board of directors is dedicated to taking a leadership role in this effort and we think they made the right decision to require an industry to accomplish certain basic fair information practices.”
Of the DMA’s 4,600 members, approximately half–consumer marketers–are required to comply with the Promise.
The Promise was made a requirement of membership July 1. It requires consumer marketers and their suppliers to disclose to customers when contact information about them may be shared with other marketers, to provide customers with opt-out capabilities and to honor those opt-out requests in house as well as through the DMA’s mail and telephone suppression services. An e-mail suppression service, E-MPS, will be available in January.
Sportsman’s Market, founded in 1960, features six catalogs at its Web site http://www.sportys.com. Sporty’s Pilot Shop, Pilot Shop-Europa, Tool Shop and Preferred Living as well as Wright Bros. Collection and Outdoor Leisure. It also details a “fly-in” retail store at the Clermont County Airport in Ohio.
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