What’s Happening in the World of Shipping: Swiss Mail Drones and Famous Faces of the USPS®

Welcome back! If you’re just joining us for the first time, “What’s Happening in the World of Shipping” is a Pitney Bowes news roundup series dedicated to focusing on a handful of the latest breaking developments in the shipping and mailing world, so that business shippers will always have their fingers on the pulse of their industry.

In this week’s installment, we’re taking a look the deployment of mail delivery drones in Switzerland and a fun detour into some of the U.S. Postal Service’s most famous names and faces.

Switzerland enlists robots to help deliver mail – CNN Money

This story was published in August, but it’s covering an exciting breakthrough happening right now: the roll out of new mail delivery drones. CNN Money reports that Switzerland’s national postal service, Swiss Post, will begin deploying small, six-wheeled delivery drones this month to take over the last mile of package delivery. For this preliminary testing period, Swiss Post will be using the robots to carry dummy packages along sidewalks to assess their speed, accuracy and ability to maneuver around obstacles, like pedestrians, cars and pets. Swiss Post is only testing five of these robots now, and they’re not expected to travel more than three or four miles in a trip, but they will determine if they want to use these robots regularly for real deliveries after a few additional months of testing.

Interestingly, these robots are being developed by Starship Technologies, the same Estonian company that began testing delivery drones in Washington, D.C., this fall. Those robots are expected to continue their testing phrase through to December.

Famous employees of the US Postal Service – Federal News Radio

The USPS isn’t just one of the country’s premier means of delivering mail and packages to millions of Americans, it’s also been a career gateway for some of our finest politicians, scientists and entertainers. Federal News Radio recently profiled some of the biggest names in America who got their start delivering mail for USPS, including:

  • Abraham Lincoln, who served as the Salem, Illinois postmaster for three years, carrying mail in his hat on deliveries.
  • Before becoming the Science Guy, Bill Nye worked as a Laramie, Wyoming postmaster.
  • Benjamin Franklin, who was appointed in 1775 as the first ever Postmaster General.
  • Bing Crosby, who was a postal clerk in Spokane, Washington, before hitting it big as one of America’s iconic singers.
  • In 1918, Walt Disney was a substitute letter carrier in Chicago.
  • Novelist and Nobel Prize laureate William Faulkner, who resigned as University, Mississippi postmaster after three years of service.
  • Samuel L. Gravely was the U.S. Navy’s first African-American admiral. But, before that, he was working as a Virginia railway mail clerk in 1948.

And, that’s just the tip of the iceberg! Check out Federal News Radio’s rundown for some other major American figures who have represented the U.S. Postal Service through the years.

For more of the latest news and breaking developments in the world of shipping and mailing, keep checking back with Pitney Bowes Shipping Simplified.

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