Four seconds. That's roughly how long your leaflet gets between the doormat and the recycling. Most fail in the first one.
They fail because they open with the business name. Nobody cares about your business name yet. The takeaway menus that survive on fridge doors for two years don't win because of branding — they win because they're useful. A menu gets kept. A price list gets kept. "20% off before the end of March" gets kept, briefly. "Welcome to Smith & Sons, established 1987, we pride ourselves on quality" gets binned mid-sentence.
So lead with the reader's problem. A plumber's leaflet that opens "Boiler making a noise it didn't make last winter?" beats one that opens with a logo, every single time, and it isn't close.
Second failure: too much. If the leaflet has eleven bullet points, three fonts and a word-art starburst, the reader's brain files it under junk before reading a word. One message. One offer. One way to respond. White space isn't wasted space — it's what makes the message findable in those four seconds.
Third: cheap paper on an expensive claim. If the leaflet says "premium kitchen renovations" and feels like a till receipt, the paper is calling the headline a liar. Stock weight is part of the message. 350gsm says something 130gsm can't.
Print still works — a physical thing in a hand beats a scrolled-past ad. But it only works designed. The bin doesn't take sides; it just takes everything lazy.