In the past 10 minutes, I have emailed a pdf of a contract to a client and received an email with a countersigned version back.  In the past this exchange would have taken place via the mail.  Then there was overnight/express mail.  Then there were faxes.  But now it is mostly email and file transfer.

When express mail came in to being, the US Postal Service figured out that they needed to be in the mix and launched their own offering.  With faxes, well, there was not much they could do.  But now that file transfer is becoming the norm, there is no reason why the US Postal Service couldn’t participate.  With a goal of ensuring that important documents and files get from point A to point B in a secure and timely fashion, the US Postal Service has a much better branding starting point than Dropbox.com or Box.net.

And yet, with billions of dollars in losses and swarms upon swarms of Post Office closings, they seem to be destined to go the way of ice makers (you know, the people who made and delivered blocks of ices before people had freezers or ice-makers) and Blockbuster.

This all comes down to the age-old question of how an organization should position its brand.  As a physical delivery product, the US Postal Service has a grim future.  Perhaps the real positioning should focus on safe, secure, and timely document transfer…