While you're shopping and wrapping and packing presents this season, have you ever wondered what the post office looks like behind the scenes during the holidays? So did I.
I meet Karen Mazurkiewicz at the Rochester Main Post Office on a Monday morning in early December, as people are carrying in stacks of packages, standing in a line that’s almost out the door.
Mazurkiewicz is the spokesperson for the United States Postal Service in Western New York, and says while it may look busy out front, all the magic here actually happens at night, once the lines are gone.
Behind the lines, the distribution center looks like a life size game of mousetrap. Packages zoom above us on conveyor belts, and people are driving carts of letters and packages across the 315,000 sq. ft. facility.
Mazurkiewicz says as holiday shopping shifts to heavy online purchases , it’s only gotten more hectic back here
“What used to be I would say a two week holiday is now a two month holiday. And it’s really because of online shopping. So they deals start coming out like, around Veterans Day really. And we see the tick up immediately. And then we will be doing returns and we will be doing the extra online shopping that people do when they get the gift cards, right up until the middle of January.”
Any letters that are sent in Rochester, even if it’s just across town, go through this regional hub, and an estimated 10 million packages will come through this center to Rochester residents this holiday season.
There’s also another type of precious cargo the post office handles, letters to Santa.
“The postal employees take a lot of pride in making sure that Santa’s letters get to him. And if there is a return address, a return letter is sent back. Now Santa knows where all the kids live. But the post office has to deliver the letter, so that’s why we need the full address on it. So any letter that comes into the greater Rochester area, we have postal elves who help facilitate that, and make sure the Santa letter does get back to them.”
Elves at this location will have seen about a thousand Santa letters.
