Today I went to the local post office to buy holiday stamps and Priority Mail boxes. (An aside: Priority Mail for gift parcels is a great deal – you can cram as much stuff as possible into your free “flat rate” box that will arrive in about 3 days – all for about the price of the box alone at the UPS Store.)

After waiting in line for 20 minutes, the clerk motioned me forward. (Note to self: avoid the PO at lunch time; half the clerks go on break just in time for their noon customer rush.)

“I’d like to buy some Christmas stamps, please.”

“I’m sorry sir, we’re out of holiday stamps.”

“When will you get some more?” I asked hopefully.

“They’re backordered now, but we should have them by the end of the month.”

“But the end of the month is after Christmas.” I said lamely.

“We have these salsa dance stamps – they have some nice holiday colors in them.” the clerk suggested.

I appreciated the unexpected empathy; maybe the Post Office really does care. I pictured salsa dance stamps on my Christmas card envelopes and wondered if anyone would notice. Dancing is part of the holidays, isn’t it?

With so much of this customer facing process broken, and the salsa dance suggestion thrown in by an earnest postal worker, my mind went tilt.

Yet another example of a good employee coping as well as possible with a broken process.

“Well, how about some flat rate Priority Mail boxes?” I needed to ship some Christmas gifts.

“I’m sorry, we’re out. You can just use your own boxes and put Priority Mail stickers on them.”

She didn’t understand. Call me thrifty, but I like using the free Priority Mail boxes. Especially the flat rate variety that you can cram full with the heavy stuff for no extra charge. Besides, did I mention the price of boxes at the UPS Store?

I left empty handed. I was an eager customer thwarted from spending money.

The US Postal Service is experiencing monumental market shifts: email, on-line bill pay, FedEx Ground, UPS Stores, Google adwords. Their market share is shrinking all around.

All that’s left for them is neighborhood junk circulars and…holiday mail.

A good first step might be for the post office to stock stamps and boxes so I can do business with them. Maybe if the Postmaster General read Womack’s new book Lean Solutions, it would make a difference. I’ll get their lean transformation started and just mail him a copy myself…damn, I don’t have any Priortiy Mail boxes.

See you at the UPS Store.