Door delivery is abolished, and even curbside delivery will be abolished in urban locations where we can install kiosks. If you want delivery you will pay a fee for that ~ just like in France.
All those little rural post offices (almost all ~ 28,000 of them anyway) will be abolished and we'll trace out an optimized network called the Preferential Mail Network. That should leave us with about 105 mail processing centers exclusive of a "standard mail" network.
USPS is currently cutting 250 mail processing centers ~ which is why service will decline. You have to eliminate your most costly, least efficient centers ~ not just those that satisfy untested considerations regarding network travel opportunities. Once you whack the cost out of the system you improve service times within the NEW NETWORKS.
Let's say you want early delivery ~ because your business depends on the mail ~ and with service time reductions you really suffer.
I'd put you on a special route that delivers everything that's worked up by 8 AM to YOU FIRST for a fee. Figure 10 to 15 customers per route who might well benefit from that service, a quite profitable early delivery option is quite feasible. Barcode Sorting Systems allow for this BTW. No reason to not do it.
There are some other things to be done, but I think you get the gist of it ~
I doubt a local circular delivery service acting on its own could beat my price ~ which, in any case, is already true.
Eliminate all services except first class mail, and maybe whatever rate the junk mail gets sent. Tell UPS and FedEx we're handing over all our overnight customers to you, so you damned well better find a way to serve rural customers at a decent rate.
Make mail delivery once a week. If you want it slow and cheap, send it by the Post Office. Otherwise, use a private firm.
Your thoughts?