Sometime in my formative years, I became aware that the US Postal Service banned the use of string on parcels. And I knew there were other rules. I deeply internalized the idea that packages had to be just so or they wouldn’t get delivered. (Here’s a good LA Times article on the topic that doesn’t seem to be behind a paywall)

Here in NZ, a lot of parcel shipping happens by private courier. Our experience with the actual postal service is limited, since there isn’t much mail anymore, but overall not very good. The private couriers may or may not actually be better, but they certainly seem quicker and easier to deal with.

Case in point… This suitcase was just the right size for some drapes we bought secondhand for our downstairs guest suite. The seller charged us $49 for courier delivery from their location, about a 3 hour drive from us. It took two days for the drapes to get here. They used big homemade cardboard tags that could never have made it through a sorting machine. I will use the suitcase to haul donations to the thrift store.

The online post office calculator tells me it would have been just slightly more expensive for them to deliver it, and of course they have stricter rules about packaging. They would have gotten it here a day earlier. The extra day didn’t matter here, but objectively it looks like NZ Post was quite competitive in this case.

I’ve always been a big believer in supporting public institutions like the PO… because otherwise we risk societal collapse and enslavement by the Musks and Bezoses (Bezii??). But somehow in this place at this time the idea of a guy chucking a suitcase into a van and driving it up instead of going to the perceived bother of mailing it properly is ok with me. Hmmm, will have to think about that.