Letter vs. Postcard: Which Should Criminal Defense Attorneys Use?

Use a postcard for short messages, higher volume, and speed; use a letter when the charge is sensitive or the message needs more room.

Both formats work, and neither one is correct by default — the right choice depends on what you're trying to say and what the recipient's situation is likely to call for. This isn't a case for picking a winner; it's a real tradeoff worth thinking through before you upload a design.

What postcards get you

A postcard has no envelope to open, which means it gets seen the moment it's pulled out of the mailbox — there's no barrier between "arrived" and "read." It's also the cheaper format to produce and mail, which matters if you're running higher volume or testing a new message before committing to it at scale. The tradeoff is space: a postcard has room for a headline, a short message, and a phone number, not much more. If your message needs more than a few sentences to land, a postcard forces you to cut it down further than you may want to.

What do postcards cost you?

The same visibility that makes a postcard get noticed also makes it visible to anyone who handles the mail before the recipient does — a roommate, a family member, a coworker who grabs mail off a shared table. For a criminal charge, that's a real consideration. Someone facing a DUI or domestic violence charge may not want the fact of it, or even the appearance of a law firm's mailer, visible to whoever else sees their mail. That's not true for every recipient or every charge type, but it's worth weighing deliberately rather than defaulting to postcards purely because they're cheaper.

What letters get you

A letter requires the recipient to open it, which means only they (or whoever opens their mail, which is a smaller risk than a postcard lying face-up) sees the contents. That privacy allows a fuller message — enough room to name the specific charge, explain what happens next, address the recipient's likely concerns, and still land a clear call to action. Letters also tend to read as more personal and more serious, which can matter for a felony charge or a situation where the recipient needs more than a headline to feel like this is worth responding to.

What do letters cost you?

More to produce and mail, and a letter has to earn the open — a plain envelope with no clear reason to open it competes with everything else in the mailbox for that moment of attention. If the outside of the envelope doesn't give the recipient a reason to open it, the extra privacy and space inside doesn't matter, because it never gets read.

What about color and printing?

Postcards always print in full color, at the standard 4 × 6 in size. Letters always print in black and white; we do not offer color letters. If your letter's logo or letterhead depends on color, that is worth knowing before you upload it, and it is a good reason to choose a postcard.

How should you decide between a letter and a postcard?

A few genuine signals worth weighing rather than a single rule:

• Charge sensitivity. Domestic violence, sex offense, and other charges where discretion matters more heavily favor a letter.
• Message length. If what you need to say fits in two sentences and a phone number, a postcard delivers it just as well for less.
• Volume and budget. Testing a new message across a large batch is cheaper to iterate on with postcards; a smaller, higher-intent batch can justify the cost of letters.
• Speed of visibility. If getting seen in the first two seconds matters most for a category where urgency is high (an upcoming arraignment, a short window to act), a postcard's lack of a barrier to being seen is a real advantage.

Some firms run both — postcards for higher-volume categories where the message is short and speed matters, letters for charges where privacy and a fuller message carry more weight. Either format prints and mails the same way once a design is on file, as the postcard and letter fulfillment guide explains. The words matter as much as the format, so see how to write a mailer that gets calls, what a mailer should say, and how to match your letter to the charge. For the wider strategy, see how criminal defense attorneys can use direct mail.

See what actually makes a mailer work regardless of format for the design fundamentals that apply to both.

For the copywriting research behind this, and how to test your own versions, see how to write an effective letter for your law firm.