The post office has responded to the digital age by continually pushing up the price of stamps. A new study finds that business model is no longer viable. The post office needs to see the digitization of information as an opportunity and act accordingly.
Along with most threats, there is also an opportunity. The post office can respond by being more environmentally responsible, more fiscally responsible and by finding better ways to meet customer needs.
Three areas where the post office can make dramatic improvements deal with mail delivery, junk mail and spam.
The business model for the post office is essentially backwards. If you have a box at the post office and go to pick up your own mail, they charge you rent. They bring you your mail for free.
The post office should reverse this model. Getting frequent delivery at home should cost and getting your mail at the post office should be cheaper. Also, there should be more use made of groups of mail boxes in neighborhoods. A group of, say, 25 mail boxes on a corner could serve customers in the immediate area. The loading of these boxes could be highly automated.
It will be difficult for people to accept, initially, but probably a typical customer will get snail mail twice a week, either on Monday and Thursday or Tuesday and Friday. If they want mail delivery more often, they probably have to pay more or go to the post office.
But the biggest changes could come in solving the problems of junk mail and spam.
A lot of raw materials and energy goes into producing, delivering and discarding junk mail. The post office should give its customers the option of receiving junk mail electronically or not at all. Since the post office has a monopoly, it could force junk mailers to provide their information in digital format. The post office could charge a small fee, perhaps two cents, for delivering or discarding the digital version to the customers according to their selections.
This would be money for nothing, or nearly nothing, for the post office and would result in a tremendous savings in resources.
This brings us to how the post office can solve the serious problem of spam. Email is becoming worthless because of the large number of spammers and scammers. The post office could set up a secure email network. No spam. Every sender would be identified. Customers would have more choices to opt in our out of various lists.
A small fee could be charged to senders. Users might also pay a small fee for this service.
The post office will have to do more. Automation will have to increase. Lobby hours will have to be reduced. The post office will need to be paid well for government services it provides like processing passport applications.
But the time has come for the post office to adopt a new business model. If it is going to survive, it needs a piece of the digital information revolution. Sticking with snail mail alone is a dead end.