Postal Service Finds a Friend in the Internet

POSTAL SERVICE FINDS A FRIEND IN THE INTERNET
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Katie Hafner]
As people send e-mail and e-cards instead of handwritten letters and greetings, as they pay more bills online and file tax returns electronically, the Postal Service has started to seem like a drab and tired reminder of the old way of doing things. Yet the Internet is actually injecting new life -- and a sorely needed source of revenue -- into the Postal Service. And it is happening with packages -- millions of them shipped every day, in a journey that starts with a few mouse clicks and ends a day or two or five later at a customer’s door. In 2005, revenue from first-class mail like cards and letters, which still made up more than half the Postal Service’s total sales of $66.6 billion, dropped nearly 1 percent from 2004. But revenue from packages helped make up for much of that drop, rising 2.8 percent, to $8.6 billion, last year, as it handled nearly three billion packages. It is impossible to say how many of these were online orders, but Postal Service officials give e-commerce a lot of credit.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/02/business/02postal.html
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