Meaning & use
bulk mail
Last updated
Meaning
noununcountable
Large quantities of mail sent at one time, usually for advertising, and often charged at a lower postal rate.
Grammar: Uncountable: talk about 'bulk mail' in general, not 'a bulk mail'.
Patterns
- send bulk mail
- receive bulk mail
- bulk mail rate
The charity sent bulk mail to thousands of homes asking for donations.
Our post office offers a cheaper rate for bulk mail.
Most of the envelopes in the bin were bulk mail from insurance companies.
Common combinations
- bulk mail rate
- Nonprofits can apply for a lower bulk mail rate.
- send bulk mail
- We send bulk mail to our customers twice a year.
- a piece of bulk mail
- She opened one piece of bulk mail and threw the rest away.
- bulk mail campaign
- The bulk mail campaign reached over 50,000 households.
Synonyms and how they differ
- junk mail
- Junk mail is the informal, disapproving term for unwanted advertising mail; bulk mail is the neutral business term for the same kind of mailing.
- direct mail
- Direct mail means advertising material sent by post to specific people; bulk mail focuses on the large quantity and the cheaper postage.
Word family
Commonly confused: bulk mail or email?
bulk mail vs email
Email is sent electronically; bulk mail is physical post.
Practice
The company sent ___ to every address in the county.
Choose one answer.
'Bulk mail' is uncountable, so it has no plural and no article before it in this general sense. 'A bulk mail' and 'bulk mails' wrongly treat it as a countable noun.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “bulk mail”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.