Posts Tagged ‘postcode’

The phrase ‘postcode lottery’ has been banded about for many years now, but it’s reaching epic proportions. How do we know? Well, one of our google alerts is set up to pick up whenever the word ‘postcode’ (natch) is used. Every day we trawl through a lot of irrelevant nonsense, and more and more of this nonsense is ‘postcode lottery’ related.

Some of them are too good not to share… so we’re gonna start sharing them.

Seen a good one? Tell us about it . And why not hashtag it while you’re at it? #notapostcodelottery

We heard the news today, oh boy… well, technically yesterday. And that news is that UK postcode data is going to be made free in 2010.

Which means no more foxing around trying to find someones actual postcode should you need it to, say, post them a letter. Hurrah.

The free the postcode team must be mighty pleased too, as they can put away their GPS and stop talking in code. Phew.

Read the full story here

Apparently it’s all part of a bigger plan to make more use of technology and the web to transform services. Well, whatever the real reason, we’re quite pleased. Why not celebrate with a postcode t-shirt?

Today’s post is about getting something out there, and kind of off our chests. When we started i love my postcode, the topic of postcode wars was one we considered very carefully. The reported ‘phenomenon’ of postcode wars in London in several media reports, which involves gangs or individuals using postal districts to decide who and who does not ‘get it’, seems here to stay. Were we really going to start a company that promotes wearing postcode t-shirts when, as the media would have us believe, kids are getting stabbed or beaten up based on being on the wrong side of the tracks?

Whichever way you look at it, postcode wars are ugly, unecessary and stupid. They are also nothing to do with i love my postcode.

ILMP is all about loving your postcode, your community, and the place where you live. It is emphatically not about hating other people’s postcodes, other people generally or behaving in a way that destroys communities, families or lives. We’re way too fluffy for any of that. I genuinely hope it’s pretty clear from our site, blog and products that ILMP is a positive company with good vibes about all of Londons postcodes – and we’re a million miles away from staking out territories, violence or gang mentality. In fact, I think we should claim postcodes and community pride back from gangs and violence. We should be proud to be proud of them, not skulk off full of fear.

Our brand is hopefully a positive one – we do not market to, try to reach or speak to those groups who would use postcodes in a violent or negative way.

But what do you think? Do you think what we’re doing is encouraging postcode violence? If so, what could we do to change that, or have a positive impact on London? Let us know what you think.

Looking to the future we’d love to use our profits to do good things for London’s communities and proactively help put an end to any talk of postcode wars. But for now, we’re about spreading the postcode love. Not hate.

Rachel

Postcode cat percival chills out on a parcel

So, as the busy season approaches, and we get ready for our 50% off sale, we’re wondering how best to get your postcode goodies out to you. Mike has come up with the genius suggestion of delivery by hand, by us, on bikes. For all London based orders, of course -I’m not cycling up to Derbyshire. Or France.

The postcode wheels

At the moment this is our best option, and since Mike is a serious cyclist we vote that he does most of it, while we stay at home listening to podcasts and making t-shirts. So, watch this space for the official launch of hand delivery season and get thekettle on!

We never thought we’d be posting a link to the FT Saturday mag, but that day has actually come. In last weekend’s mag they featured the creation of postcodes in the UK for their Defining Moment feature. And what a choice.

It told us some stuff we knew already.. like London was the first to get postcodes in 1857, thanks to Rowland Hill. Liverpool was next, and then the rest of the UK slowly followed suit.

But here’s what else we learned:

• It was not until October 1957 when postcodes were first used to enable mail-sorting by machine. Before then it was all by hand. Unthinkable!
• It all kicked off in Norwich, which pleases us, as that is where the ILMP idea was first spawned. We knew it!
• Croydon was the next city to introduce postcodes for machine sorting, but not until 1967… slow to catch on then.
• Not until 1974, did every address in Britain had a “postcode”.

Amazing stuff… anyway, geeky postcode blog post over and out!