Matt Stockburn already knew paper supplies were running short when the Toronto city clerk’s office, where he works as a manager, received a notice from its envelope supplier to expect shipment delays. 

Long-term disruptions to the pulp and paper industry coupled with more recent supply-chain issues triggered a global shortage of envelopes this year. It was a matter of time before an institution as reliant on paper correspondence as a municipal government would feel the effect.  “For the envelopes, it really wasn’t until June, when all of a sudden we seemed to be facing some shortages,” said Stockburn.

For the Toronto clerk’s office, a scarcity of #10 windowed envelopes—standard for business mail—put its legislative mandate to inform residents about city business that affects them at risk. To meet those obligations, it sends about 14,000 pieces of mail each month. More broadly, the supply shortfall raises questions about why many institutions still rely on snail mail to communicate critical information to the public and clients. 

The envelope shortage is really a paper shortage induced by a perfect storm that’s been building over the last few years. Paper mills were struggling well before the COVID-19 pandemic, with closures driving down supply just as demand unexpectedly spiked, with consumers and businesses moving away from plastic. As of March 2022, demand for paper products was up 111 per cent year-over-year, according to Thomasnet.com, which tracks industrial activity in Canada and the U.S. “Our industry has truly never seen a shortage of this magnitude before,” The Phoenix Group of Companies, a printing conglomerate, wrote in a blog post. 

By then, envelope manufacturers were feeling the pinch, with knock-on effects that threatened the ways major institutions operate. In February, Wichita State University published a notice warning that supply chain challenges had created issues for envelope supplier Shocker Printing Solutions. “This will have a major impact on how the university conducts business,” it wrote. 

After Saint-Laurent, QC-based Enveloppe Laurentide notified the Toronto clerk’s office of low supply and long lead-times, the office shored up its dwindling stock with “alternative suppliers,” said Stockburn, helping avoid any serious disruptions to its operations.

Running out of envelopes entirely would be more than an inconvenience for the office of a city clerk. “Notices by mail are required under the legislation,” said Stockburn, adding that actions ranging from city planning initiatives to community polling on proposed changes to neighbourhoods fall under the requirements. “For traffic calming in neighbourhoods, or [allowing] boulevard cafes or to establish a business improvement area, the city clerk’s office would be sending out notices to residents or businesses within a geographic area for those different types of polls,” Stockburn said. Other requirements are more personal. Notices of death registrations, for instance, have to be physically mailed to funeral homes. 

The City of Halifax has also run into envelope supply issues. “Where inventory used to be replenished every few weeks, it has now moved to every few months,” said spokesperson Maggie-Jane Spray. “However, staff have continued to be able to meet all deliverable deadlines and have had ongoing conversations with vendors to ensure that demand can still be met.” 

Municipalities aren’t the only institutions reliant on the increasingly precarious paper supply chain to communicate critical information. Banks, for example, still default to physical mail and need written consent from customers before sending them financial information electronically. Many elections involve ballots circulated by mail, including next week’s vote for the new Conservative Party leader. 

For its part, Ottawa unveiled a digital-government strategy last year, which includes plans to expand departments’ ability to send Canadians notifications by email and text message. And the Canada Revenue Agency has been pressing residents during the pandemic to use its direct deposit system to cash cheques and benefits paper-free. But Stockburn said he’s not aware of any plans at the City of Toronto to shift its notification processes to the digital realm. Doing so would be tricky. “It would require change to the statute,” he said.

For now, the office is coping and Stockburn said supply has improved since Enveloppe Laurentide first sent notice of the shortage. And luckily, he said, they’ve avoided borrowing supplies from other departments. “If we were to use a different division’s envelopes, it might say, ‘Solid Waste Management Services’ or ‘Toronto Water,’” he said. “We haven’t had to get to that.”