THE WINTER CRAWL BEGINS
The slowest time of the year for mail delivery? The three weeks before Christmas. The second worst? All of winter.
USPS performance overall last week was terrible, with the possible exception of First-Class Letters. Marketing Mail was well below the YTD average, as were First-Class flats. No states really stood out as terrible – it was just poor overall performance.
Why does delivery stink in the winter? I’ve heard a couple of possible explanations. First, well, it’s winter. It’s cold and slippery and harder to deliver mail. The second is that before the holidays, it’s all hands on deck – they are anticipating and preparing as best they can to manage the volume. After the holidays, the temps are let go, vacations are allowed again, and absenteeism gets worse with rampant colds and flus – it all adds up to subpar delivery.
The consolation prize in all these statistics is this: USPS is doing much better than it was at this time last year. Their year-over-year performance continues to improve. Every year, the weather gets cold in America, and the mail gets slow. But we can only hope a little less slow every year.
