USPS Rant

January 6, 2010

Culver, Rants

Culver, Humor, Rants, Trends

Our old P.O. Box 88

Our old P.O. Box 88

Well it was a tough decision, but we’re dropping our Post Office Box.  Easterday Construction has had P.O. Box 88 as long as I can remember and possibly since before I was born!  We have some old letterhead that goes back to before any elaborate addresses were even required in Culver.  Our office was in the State Exchange Bank Building and the lumber yard was on Slate Street.  Apparently that’s all the Culver postman needed to know at that time!

For years and years, our mailing address was P.O. Box 88 and our delivery address was “The Corner of Lake Shore Drive & Slate Street”.  Then when 911 service came around the Town assigned us a street number.  402 North Slate Street…  never mind that we’re on the west side of the street and all the other numbers on the west side of the street are odd.

Due to the bidding process we participate in as a contractor, it used to be important to get the mail as soon as possible.  We picked up the mail each day and on bid days, we anticipated getting those last minute bids we needed in order to put our pricing together.  I’m speaking from hearsay though, since for as long as I’ve been here we’ve had a fax machine where most of those bids have come in.  Now, with email, last minute is often truly last minute as we receive email quotes right down to the wire.  We then call someone at the bid site on their cell phone so they can write in a number while running in the door.  Yeah, there’s no stress in our industry…

It’s now become difficult to justify the cost of the Post Office Box.  The majority of what comes from the Post Office is junk mail and bills.  Anything time sensitive comes electronically.  We even asked them at the Post Office for their thoughts justifying it and they couldn’t give us any good reason not to just go with delivery to our office.  Part of our deliveries have come here anyway.

The Postal Service continues to complain about struggling to be competitive, but they don’t seem to be doing much to help themselves.  You would think they would save money by making a P.O. Box free and eliminating the delivery to our address, but they apparently don’t think like that.

Last month I received a survey from USPS asking for an evaluation.  Before the survey came, I received a post card telling me that I would be receiving a survey.  After I received the survey, I received another post card reminding me to fill out the survey if I hadn’t.  All three suggested that I fill out the survey online for convenience.  Whoa!  Nothing like a little wasteful redundancy complete with a free plug for your competition!

I understand that they are struggling not to go the way of the buggy whip as times change.   I have no solution for them.  They do some things extremely well. I’m impressed with some of the mailing services available at their website.  Their ability to accept downloaded mailing addresses and send mass mailings is impressive.  We used to mail out post cards to notify subcontractors and suppliers of projects on which we were bidding.  That USPS service would have been great for that… except it wasn’t available then and now we fax those notifications… and I doubt we’re far from switching that to email.

I still enjoy receiving the occasional hand written letter, Birthday Card or Christmas Card.  We sent out a couple of post cards the last time we were in Las Vegas and hope that the recipients felt suitably jealous.  They pretty much have a monopoly on that market, but how they parlay that into a profitable business model isn’t something I can help them with.

I’ve been a bit sad about dropping P.O. Box 88.  It’s one of those history things.   But the expense doesn’t equate to a value-added service, so nostalgia has to take a back seat to pragmatism.

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