The increase has been driven largely by growth among the travel, charity and leisure sectors, which together increased their mail activity by 27.9%.
The manufacturing industry boosted its direct mail activity by 24.5% to 32.01m items, while the financial sector continued to be a major user of direct mail with a 23.5% increase year on year to 292.07m items.
Mailings to the C1 socio-economic group grew 20% compared with last time to 321.54m items, and there was a 17.4% surge in mailings to the 16- to 34-year-old age group.
DMIS managing director Jo Howard-Brown said: "The figures show that direct mail continues to grow steadily. The increase in consumer direct mail only goes to underline the fact that the consumer is spending more and more money through the medium, and advertisers are clearly seeing a return on investment."
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