Anyone who mailed personally or commercially to, from, or within the state of Georgia last year probably remembers wondering how much longer it could possibly take for a letter to arrive safely at point B after it had entered the mailstream at point A. The delays were indeed extensive, but the reasons for them weren’t specific to the Peachtree State.

As always, there is a bigger picture, and its name in this case is Delivering for America (DFA): a reorganization plan announced by the U.S. Postal Service on March 23, 2021. The stumbling pace of its rollout in Georgia hints at what commercial mailers in the rest of the country could face if lessons from the experience are not learned and applied.

The 10-year plan’s stated intent is to transform the Postal Service “from an organization in financial and operational crisis to one that is self-sustaining and high performing.” This is to be accomplished by making more than $40 billion in capital investments over the life of the plan for improvements in postal processing facilities, delivery operations, and IT systems.