I assume the gross number advertisers pay for flyers is pretty large. I don't think the economics work though. @Evoex and others know better but IIRC postie gets a portion of a cent per flyer. If handling and delivering them was time based instead of piecework, I suspect it would be at least an order of magnitude higher. Flowing back to the advertiser, while fliers may make sense at $0.02 each (I have no idea actual price they pay), if price went to $0.20 each, I suspect most fliers would disappear as the economics don't work.We have a note in our community mailbox to not deliver community mail, i.e. flyers. Don't need them, don't want them.
Presumably advertisers pay good money because they believe flyers work. That said, someone............ should do a survey of consumers as to the effectiveness or need for flyers as, I suspect, a huge percentage of them just get dumped in the garbage or in the recycling bin.
EDIT:
As low hanging fruit on the save the environment tree, printing something, delivering it to everyone, putting it in a blue bin, collecting the bin, sorting it, bailing and selling for pulp is a huge and carbon intensive loop that absorbed a ton of money (much of it taxpayers money) with very little benefit. Adding a carbon cost to that loop would eliminate most flyers and reduce thousands of tons of crap moving around the loop that were never even looked at.