Twelve years ago, 2001 marked the all-time peak in first-class mail volume. At the time, U.S. mail volume was greater than ever, but there was concern that the online revolution might reverse that trend quite soon. But Susan Brennan, te U.S. Postal spokeswoman at the time, however didn’t buy it. She gave a quote to Wired magazine back in 2001: “The Postal Service is, and always has been, one of the most high-tech companies in the world,”
However, Wired Magazine wasn’t convinced. In the article Wired asked: “But what about e-mail? If people write fewer letters, won’t that hurt the bottom line even more?” and Brennan said: “E-mail is not a threat.” After this testament of denial, what a shock it must have been to discover that the first-class mail volume has dropped by more than 33 percent in the years since. E-mail is not the only culprit though. Online billing has made its significant contribution to the current US Postal crisis.
Because of this, US Postal:
- will lose $6 billion this year, after jaw dropping $16 billion last year.
- missed payments to its retiree health benefits fund
- will end Saturday mail delivery
Al in all “The Postal Service as it exists today is financially unsustainable and it needs an emergency increase in postage rates to keep operating. Even though the phrase “disruptive innovation” is many times over-used, the invicted crisis of US Postal provides us with a clear example of e-mail, e-invoicing and e-commerce being really disruptive.
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