Brewed For Thought: Life

The United States Postal Service is facing more financial problems. Mail is becoming less popular, costs are rising and the competition for the services is steep. Is there anything that can be done to save this tradition or will I be telling my children of days when people brought envelopes of news directly to your house for less than the change found in your pocket.

There are significant issues with the Postal Service and it’s future success that must be addressed. Even if these things are addressed, there’s a good chance the system could collapse, leaving no affordable mail service in it’s place.

First, the Postal Service is losing a vital core of its business: bills. More and more, companies and consumers are opting for paperless billing. This is lost revenue that can not be replaced.

Second, People are sending less mail for personal reasons. When was the last hand written letter you received? This is also a llost revenue. Sure, letters could make a comeback, but hipsters would tire of the task and soon the act would be uncool again.

Third, no one seems to care about the service. What arrives in the mail? Bills and junk. Occasionally something good, but UPS and Fed Ex are the bearers of good news in today’s society.

So how do you fix these things? What ways can generate more money and improve the public face of the Postal Service?

For starter’s, let’s do something about the junk mail. Junk mail makes tons of money for the postal service. The question isn’t if this can save the service, but how much can it save? Rates can be raised on junk mail with a two-pronged attack on the problems.

First, higher rates would lead to more revenue. Second, even if revenues are not increased, a decrease in volume would improve the experience of the ricipient while reducing demand on the service. Charge more for bulk rate. You’re simply moving garbage from the Post Office to the home and it’s hurting your image.

Next, improve the experience of sending packages. The steps to improve delivery pick-up at the home or office are fantastic and these should be continued. The Post Office experience on the other hand is horrible. While I always like the result in terms of price and delivery times, the counter is a miserable place. I should say the trip to the counter is miserable as lines are long and slow as the locations seem to be woefully under-staffed, especially at Christmas.

One solution would be automated machines for printing postage. I actually tried this the other day. The interface was a bit clunky, the menus and options seemed to never end but I was able to make my payment. Theoretically, the hard part was over with one exception. I needed to label my package with Priority Mail stickers. There were none to be found anywhere so back into the line I went.

Lastly, remind people of how convenient and easy the mail can be, even over short distances. I have a set of keys from a friend who lives about an hour away. We’re sitting on them until we see him again, but wouldn’t the $1 and change the post office would charge us be a much easier solution? Remind people of that. Even if a stamp were to cost $1, isn’t that an incredible deal? Try giving someone on the street a dollar to deliver anything for you any distance. Pizza isn’t delivered to your door for less than a dollar, but we expect an envelope to be picked up at hour house and delivered across the country in a matter of days for that same price?

I think the Postal Service still offers the best value for sending packages and I would argue that the point to point service rivals or exceeds anything offered by FedEx or UPS. The problem lies in the execution and in marketing. Sending grandma a letter isn’t going to save the service, but a modern look at the benefits and how to maximize the resources will do wonders. I hope to see postmen delivering mail for years to come and not join the ranks of home telephones and newspapers.

A few years back, I received an email offering financial support for my political aspirations. I was honored by such an unsolicited email and almost told them to feel free to send me any money they’d like via PayPal and rest assured I would handle it myself. That’s when I did a little research and realized this person was trying to contact Marco Rubio (or possibly his brother Mario, another Florida politician) in his senatorial campaign. It was also when I realized my name would forever be linked to someone who couldn’t be more different than I polticially.  Continue reading →