Direct mail beat estate agents, mobile phone companies, call centres, dodgy builders and banks, pulling in 24% of the public's vote. However, second-placed banks were only just behind with 23% of the vote and third-placed call centres had 22%.
Representatives of all 10 industries were invited to defend their industry, including James Kelly, managing director of the DMA. Speaking after the event, he said he was not surprised mail topped the poll, although he said it would not signal an era of apology from the DMA.
"I think we won because mail touches everyone's lives. However, by and large, people's problems with mail can be easily fixed through the MPS. This can not be said for most other industries represented, who lose people money and cause genuine anxiety. We believe we have nothing to apologise for and we are proud of always wanting to raise our standards."
According to Kelly, BBC production staff said the vote was incredibly close, and had the lines been open for one minute longer, banks would have overtaken mail.
Had banks won, there would have been no representative for presenter Matt Allwright to talk to at the end, although the BBC has said that the phone voting was kept to its planned schedule and that no changes were made to ensure a representative was definitely on camera when it was time for the accolade to be awarded.
Watching the programme was Chris Rendel, managing director of marketing consultancy The Windmill Partnership, said he was not surprised by the verdict.
"If you look at the top three worst -- mail, banks and call centres -- they're all industries people feel they don't have a relationship with. Unfortunately, when the sector was being called 'junk mail', Kelly was already at a disadvantage. With the other nine industries, 90% of the time they get things right; with mail, 90% is waste -- I think that's what swung it," Rendel said.
Kelly added: "I think we were the whipping boy, but we don't lose people thousands of pounds or intrude upon people in the same way as some other industries."
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