NNA, NAA blast Saturday mail delivery decision

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Postal Service took another major step in its battle for fiscal viability Wednesday, announcing plans to halt Saturday mail delivery.

Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe said package delivery, which has seen growth in recent years as online purchasing booms, will continue on Saturdays when the plan is implemented in August.

Donahoe said one less day delivering letters, magazines, catalogs, ads and other mail would save $2 billion annually. "It's an important part of our strategy to return to financial stability," he said.

"The U.S. Postal Service’s announcement today that it intends to maintain Saturday delivery of packages but abandon delivery of newspapers is an indication USPS is moving further and further away from the universal service the American public expects," said NNA President Merle Baranczyk, Publisher of the Mountain Mail, Salida, CO.

"This unfortunate decision sees packages as profitable but forgets the importance of money in the mail for small businesses and thousands of American communities who depend upon local newspaper delivery on Saturdays," Baranczyk added.

"The National Newspaper Association has a long record of supporting six-day delivery. It is regrettable the inaction of Congress to deal with the unfair requirements it imposed upon the Postal Service in 2006 has led USPS to make such a discriminatory choice. NNA disagrees with both the policy decision and the legal reasoning behind it. We hope to still work with the Postal Service on a plan to ensure timely delivery of newspapers."

The change will also be hard on newspapers, particularly small dailies and weeklies, which have moved away from costly hand delivery in favor of the mail over the years. While dissatisfaction with postal delivery has forced some to move back to carriers, many still rely on the post office for delivery on Saturday, an important day in terms of reader engagement and getting circulars in the hands of people when they have time to go shopping.  

"Many newspapers have moved out of mail delivery because of poor service," said Paul Boyle, svp for public policy for the Newspaper Association of America. "But those who stay are likely to see financial harm as a result."

And there's no guarantee that delivery snags will end there, as squeezing six days of delivery into five could create its own problems.

"I think there’s a general concern that there’s so much volume that there could be disruption in mail service early in the week," Boyle said. "There could be fallout for other days."