The Dollar Tree Kitchen Essential That Makes Mail Clutter A Thing Of The Past

Most of us know the irritation of seeing our mail clutter pile up on the kitchen counter or on that side table near the front door. It practically cries out for help. Probably you can relate. Fortunately, the answer to keeping your mail organized can be found at the Dollar Tree — in the kitchen aisle of all places. And we would be remiss if we didn't point out that ridding a home or apartment of mail clutter often requires a mental shift as well.

As for the actual physical organization of your postcards and bills, you'll need to MacGyver an Essentials white wire dish drying rack from the Dollar Tree to make it mail-ready. This quick Dollar Tree hack also calls for Tool Bench mini self-adhesive hooks, also found at Dollar Tree. You'll need at least six of these.

In terms of making the mental shift necessary to keep your mail under control, it's best to do what you can to prevent it from piling up in the first place. This DIY Dollar Tree system puts your mail right at eye level, serving as a reminder for you to go through your extra mail on the regular. You'll also want to cancel subscriptions you no longer read. If you'd like to opt out of junk mail offers, registering with DMAchoice.org opts you out of ad mail, while OptOutPrescreen.com gets rid of credit card and insurance offers. 

The Dollar Tree dish-drying rack is made up of four compartments. Normally, you'd insert your dishes into these slots. To make it something that'll help you tame your mail, you'll swap out the dishes for letters. To do that, you'll need to bend the wires that make up the slots. Essentially, you're going to bend them over by pushing them forward, pressing them against the two base wires that support them. Push all of the wires in the same direction.

Next, fasten the curved dish rack to the wall with the hooks. Instead of pasting the hooks on the wall in an upright position, turn them on their sides and paste them vertically on the wall. You'll need three hooks on each side of the rack's base to hold the mail organizer on the wall. The modified position of the hooks holds the dish-rack-turned-mail-organizer in place.

You can level up this project by installing two racks: one for holding your outgoing mail and the other for sorting incoming mail. This allows you to compartmentalize your mail so that you know at a glance what piece of mail goes where (and how to sort it later). If you've placed your mail organizer by the front door, you can attach two or three hooks to the wall (in the upright position) right below the mail organizer to hold your keys. Finally, if you get a lot of catalogs and admail, consider fastening an Essentials assorted rectangle wire basket just below the mail organizer/s to sort your junk mail until you send it to the trash.