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The Spectacle Blog
Post Office: Fount of High Fashion?
The Postal Service is effectively bankrupt. So now it wants to get into the fashion business.
You’ve got to hand it to the Postal Service. Even with a monopoly, it is going broke. But taxpayers already are subsidizing everyone and everything. So why not the Post Office as well!?
The obvious solution is to end the government monopoly and privatize the Postal Service. But Washington never sees the obvious and the Post Office naturally wants to keep going. So it’s come up with a couple new ideas to get back on its feet financially.
First the end of Saturday mail, now a new clothing line. The U.S. Postal Service is taking unprecedented steps to make itself relevant and profitable these days.
The cash-strapped agency announced plans on Tuesday to launch a new line of all-weather apparel and accessories sometime next year.
Move over, upscale North Face. Or should it be the grittier Carhartt brand that worries?
The Postal Service chose “Rain Heat & Snow” as its own brand name, alluding to its unofficial motto: “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stay these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”
Only men’s apparel and accessories will be available initially, but the agency plans to add a women’s line in the future, it said Tuesday.
What could be a more obvious solution to the Post Office’s money woes?
The Postal Service can’t make money delivering the mail when competition is outlawed, but no matter. Surely it can make money competing against every fashion designer and department store in America!
Indeed, why stop there? Why not a Postal Service line of automobiles? How about special Post Office purses and bags? Or Postal Service skin products? The Post Office sends letters overseas—maybe a Postal Service travel service? Or even a Postal Service airline!
Washington is broke. The government must spend less and do less. Especially when the private sector could do the same work more efficiently. Like delivering the mail.
View all comments (6) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Doug Bandow
http://spectator.org/blog/2013/02/21/post-office-fount-of-high-fash
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Derek Leaberry| 2.21.13 @ 9:38AM
Here in downtown DC, the Post Office has initiated the next step in progressive mail delivery- self-service. The plastic mail buckets full of mail are left in the lobby of the building and the renters in the building are expected to wade through the buckets to find their mail.
L.E. Powers| 2.21.13 @ 10:02AM
Doug,
The USPS has many problems, but it is not a true monopoly. Many of the most lucrative parts of its business see competition from UPS, FedEx, and others. The USPS, by law, MUST service areas other carriers don't want. And on top of it, they cannot unilaterally set their own prices.
USPS is an odd creture, like Amtrak, created as a government owned corporation, which the government requires to do certain very unprofitable things while simultaneously preventing them from managing their business model to generate a profit or at least break even.
If USPS, and Amtrak for that matter, truly serve a public interest, Congress should bring them back under the true government fold and adequately fund them. I am not advocating "expanding" government, per se, since this is seen by the public as a government institution anyway. Of course, taking on USPS's losses and funding that deficit could be viewed as new spending. But who is foolish enough to believe that USPS creditors would really be left holding the bag. Eventually, this constitutional creature of Congress will be bailed out by the taxpayer. It is mearly a "pay me now, or pay me later" proposition.
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.21.13 @ 10:50AM
With email and pdf capability in most households, the days of the post-office are numbered. These USPS gimmics are just the twists and turns of a dying animal.
Conservative Bob| 2.21.13 @ 6:03PM
The postal service unions and work rules coupled with congressional interference IE can't close offices, are the problems driving the USPS into the ditch. they increase rates decrease services and never lay anyone off. The alternative to your suggestion would be to not bring it back into the fold but to unchain its competition and let UPS, FedEx et. al. have their way with them. Cut all support and let the monster go away...
Tom Kyba| 2.21.13 @ 12:37PM
What the hell, it's not their money.
R Martin| 2.21.13 @ 5:54PM
Did the Washington Post article disclose the thinking and logic behind USPS's decision to enter the rag trade? The first sentence indicates they want to be relevant and profitable. Let's see, I think USPS is losing about $5 billion per year. The combined net income of Ralph Lauren Corp. and Lululemon, Inc. last year was about $270 million. I have some doubts this new Post Office strategy is going to work. Did the OMB crunch their numbers?