We think of the United States Postal Service (USPS) as our first and oldest business partner. Starting in 1994, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos would pack books in a garage in Seattle and drive them to his local post office, where he knew he could count on the USPS to deliver them.
Today, we work closely with the USPS to provide excellent service and to innovate for our customers. The USPS does not receive direct taxpayer funds. It relies on revenue from its services, including package delivery. In 2020, packages contributed nearly $11 billion in profit for the USPS. Experts and impartial regulators have consistently recognized that USPS’s partnerships with companies like Amazon are a bright spot of growth and profitability for the Postal Service, contributing billions in profits annually and helping sustain USPS’s mission to serve every address in the nation.
Despite these strong partnerships, the USPS is not without challenge. Due to burdensome funding mandates and declining letter mail, the Postal Service finds itself in a financially untenable situation: It is projected to lose $160 billion over the next 10 years, according to its own estimates.