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Category: Legal Issues

Extended Producer Responsibility: Our Legal Advisors Offer Guidance

The issue of extended producer responsibility is a growing concern for commercial mail producers, so our legal advisors from Brann & Issacson have offered our subscribers some guidance on the matter. California’s Packaging Extended Producer Responsibility Program: Why Commercial Printers and Mailers AreOfficially in the Conversation For years, environmental compliance lived comfortably upstream – brand owners worried about it, packaging…

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Information Decades Too Late – Analysis

On November 24, the Postal Service published Postmarks and Postal Possession, its final rule about postmarks and their meaning.  While the document seeks to clarify that postmarks don’t mean what many Americans might think, it’s fifty years too late in doing so.  Moreover, given its association with the Regional Transportation Initiative, it contaminates a simple statement with other more subjective…

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A New Legal Worry: Extended Producer Responsibility Laws

Commercial mail producers have another legal development warranting their attention. What is EPR? Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) is a policy approach that has gained traction in the last several years. It aims to shift responsibility for the recycling and related post-use costs of packaging and other recyclable goods onto “producers” – a definition that can reach brand-owner retailers. As of…

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PRC Estimates Value of USO and Monopolies

Every year in its annual report, the Postal Regulatory Commission provides its estimate of the value of the Postal Service’s monopolies over the delivery of some hard-copy mail and access to the mailbox.  At the same time, the PRC estimates the cost to the USPS for its Universal Service Obligation.  Both figures are for the prior full fiscal year.  On…

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Finger-pointing Follows Withdrawal of PCH NSA

As the saying goes, “Success has many parents while failure is an orphan.”  To a degree, this may apply to the stillborn negotiated service agreement with Publishers Clearing House that the Postal Service had filed last August 11.  That filing was different from other NSAs in that it was for market-dominant mail, not competitive products.  As the USPS stated in…

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Now Available On-Demand – Tax Deep Dive

On February 21, in their webinar, the “Bad News About Sales Tax: The Tax Man Cometh,”  lawyers Martin Eisenstein and Jamie Szal of Brann & Isaacson, the Mailers Hub-recommended law firm, cautioned close to 100 attendees – from direct mail producers and other companies – of the threat of state sales taxes and other taxes pose that they may unknowingly be exposed…

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Trademarks and Copyrights for Designers

This article was produced exclusively for Mailers Hub by Stacy O. Stitham and Adam Mooney of Brann & Isaacson. We could easily fill an entire volume about copyright law, with a second devoted to trademark topics.  With much less space and time at our disposal, we will focus on a few niche areas that may have particular relevance to a…

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