The holiday shopping campaigns have already begun: by way of TV ads, emails, social media, and — increasingly — catalogs. Yes, real paper ads that arrive in your mailbox, those are becoming more popular again.

Walmart published its first furniture catalog this year. Brands like J.Crew and Nordstrom have recently restarted mailed advertising, too. So why are companies filling up your mailbox with what you might look at as junk mail?

When you think of mailed catalogs, maybe you imagine those old ones from Sears that were hundreds of pages and as thick as a phone book. (And that you could buy homes from.) The catalogs of today are different.

“These catalogs are smaller. They’re intended to be much more targeted,” said Sucharita Kodali, a retail analyst at Forrester.

The point of catalogs today isn’t just to sell you stuff, she said. I mean, that’s always the end goal, of course. But really, mailers are a marketing strategy used by a lot of new and direct-to-consumer retailers to increase brand awareness. It’s expensive advertising that stands out.

“You know, you can send catalogs or you can open stores, and opening stores is even more expensive,” Kodali said.

Catalogs are a way for retailers to exist in real life when they don’t have physical stores.

For bigger and more well-known retailers, catalogs are about curation. They’re an offering of what’s in style — not a display of everything that’s for sale. Because the internet — and with it, the access consumers have to brands and the access brands have to consumers — has made shopping overwhelming.

“So we’re seeing, of course, a rise in fatigue with digital advertising and just more of a desire for these tangible, sensory experiences,” said Haley Ferrini, a media analyst at Mintel.

Mintel’s research shows that 70% of consumers say there are so many ads online that they don’t even notice them. Most people just keep scrolling. And with the rise of AI, consumers have become more skeptical of ads and wary of scammers.

“So it’s kind of like the accessibility of ads online has almost, in turn, diminished the credibility and the associated prestige,” Ferrini said.

Plus, mailers offer nostalgia.

“There still remains a level of excitement in getting your mail every day, no matter what you’re getting,” said Paul Miller, managing director at the American Commerce Marketing Association. “You know, they’re making the mail entertaining.”

Maybe almost too entertaining. Each year, Amazon sends out a holiday toy catalog with stickers for kids to mark their favorite items. The booklets also have games and codes for free Roblox wearables.

And yeah, children, love this thing. Parents? Not so much. And they’re taking to social media to commiserate. Like this video from digital creator Beth Crosby.

What’s maybe savviest about these catalogs is that Amazon doesn’t list the prices of the toys — just QR codes, which shoppers can scan for faster checkout.