Thought the letter was from a friend of my husband's but it was not  

I agree with you . It is one of the marketing tools. You opened it right? so it is an effective tool. anyway, i received one and it was a survey from a car dealership. I also opened it and just disregard afterwards.

So you think I was stupid? It had the man's home address you id---! It was hand written. It could have been from a friend of my husband but next time I will know better to tell you and give all the detail on the envelope in the next post. Do you think that I knew that the guy was so cheap and so evil that he would have put his home address, not his business address, not his business name, but his actual personal name and put a stamp on it, not run it through the postage meter?
What if it had been actually from a friend of my husband's and what if he was going to drop in some day? Think about that sm-- al =-!

I wasn't saying anything bad about you at all. You misunderstand me.

I was saying that it's a smart way to get people to read your mailings becuase they don't expect it to be an ad.

I don't understand why you are so angered by my response.

I live in Winnipeg, and that is a big city, but many of the people are former country folk and it is a good place for families, some are not that sophisticated, but I did not like people to think that I am a hick or something and that we could easily be duped. And what if there had been a real letter from a friend, announcing that he was coming to town, or dropping by, and because of this fake friend letter, we had shredded his? I mean there is more at stake then just saving ink from the printer.
Oh and the return address had his name and last name, not the So and So Furnace Company.

very valid points you bring forth! naaah, I dont care what his reason was, I think it is creepy! pretending to be a friend to get his foot in the door.. nope! not even a small comuunity?? must be a 'softsell' approach and that I find underhanded and Missleading! thay would Piff me off too!

This actually is one of the oldest advertising ploys.
As I stated in my response below yours, about 30 some years ago I worked for the same type bussiness and they hired teens to write out the envelopes for them. It works too as people are curious whose writing to them especially near the holidays.
HAPPY POSTINGS FROM GRANDPA BOB !!~

I never could write that neat when I was a teenager. I was thinking that if someone who knew my husband had written and he had forgotten about it, or maybe someone who knew a friend of his had written and something was wrong, then we would never know about it because it would have been shredded. So in actuality this is very dangerous.

Thank you for the BR, my friend. It would be interesting to note the address on that mail, and to check and see whether they have an office, don't you think?

I gave it to my husband and he read it. He told me it was just advertising. And the idea of thinking that it could have been from a friend. But what if it had been a real letter from a friend of his? I mean it did not have the name of the company on the envelope, if it had, I would have figured it was an advertisement. I hope you are not indicating that I was a stupid br*d for thinking it was from one of my husband's friends.

Oh heavens no! You could be a stupid broad for a great many really good reasons, but I would have to be labeled a stupid old fart for doing the very thing you did. That kind of cleverness would have caught me too.

I had never heard of a hand written ad like that before now. I just thought from the way you were describing it, that this was one of the more novel approaches to direct mail advertising I have heard in recent times.

This one had his personal name on it, with his personal home address and everything. That is what made me annoyed. If he had said So and So Furnace Company, then it would have been shredded right away. But of course, stupid me, I did not mention that when I wrote the post. Next time, I will know better.

They were advertising furnace cleaning and upgrading. The trouble is it was for a certain furnace company and he was probably a sub contractor. Now if I was sub contracting for a company, I would have put out printed fliers without the envelopes, or got someone to type them myself or had the envelopes printed.