Avoid these people like the plague http://www.mailboxnationwide.com. they score top on google and have an excellent website, unbelievably good prices, and great customer service over the phone. search reviews for them on google for horror stories. i got them to deliver leaflets a couple of years back and they delivered some miles away from the target area and dumped the rest. they then avoided contact and ignored emails and calls. had to threaten them with court proceedings.
I asked them for a price to deliver to
houses only and asked for the number they would hit. They gave me a total number of households number (i.e. including flats). When I questioned it they swore blind they were telling the truth. (Bear in mind this means they could have charged me for every household and only paid their people to deliver to houses). Once I stated the problem along with my source of data for number of houses (census data) they stopped returning calls or emails.
The fact that they quoted me £25/1000 solus meant that I was smelling a rat right from the start. When I asked how that could be done, they told me "economies of scale" - utter balls. Remember, if you're having solus delivery, someone has to walk up a driveway and get the leaflet through the letter box. You CAN NOT consistently do more than 1000 houses in an eight hour day, no matter how big your company is. Pay someone minimum wage and, as I said, you're on a minimum of £48 to get 1,000 out.
Avoid anyone who quotes under £50/1000 solus might be a good rule.
Vin