As holiday deliveries peak, carriers and trucks fill Minnesota neighborhoods

It is "D day" for delivery men and women around the country.

This week is the busiest of the holiday mailing and shopping season with many people rushing to mail gifts and cards in time for Christmas next week. But despite the supply chain headaches and labor shortages this year, shippers have been keeping up with demand and are on track to finish the year strong.

"It's just been insanity," said Kimberly Thompson, 45, who has worked for the United States Postal Service for almost 25 years, as she delivered to a St. Paul apartment complex Tuesday. On the busy corner of Grand Avenue and Dale Street, Thompson's postal van shared the block with a FedEx truck and, after she left, a UPS truck pulled up.

Thompson, whose overtime shift can include 13-hour days, starts her workday at 6 a.m.. She can walk as many as 30,000 steps during a shift. At the beginning of the week, Thompson only had enough time to snack on carrots and almonds while working her route.

"It's very overwhelming and then you have the weather to deal with," she said.

The postal service estimates that it will process and deliver nationwide nearly 2.3 billion pieces of mail including cards and packages just this week. Its deadline to ensure items are delivered in time for Christmas via retail ground service was Wednesday. FedEx's Ground services shipping deadline was also Wednesday.

Already this holiday season, the postal service estimates the amount of packages it is processing in Minnesota has increased by about 6% compared to the same time last year.

"This our season," said Desai Abdul-Razzaaq, a spokesman for the United States Postal Service. "This is when we shine and do our best."

At the Amazon delivery station in Maple Grove on Wednesday, square bags of packages waited for a line of drivers ready to deliver holiday cheer. The number of Amazon brown boxes has grown from last year.

In the fourth quarter of 2020, Amazon said it processed 11.8 million packages out of its Maple Grove and Eagan stations. In this year's fourth quarter, it has so far serviced 10.4 million, with projections that it will deliver 12.6 million packages by Jan. 1.

"It's been pretty high volume," said Paul Wedum, 52, a driver with Kenlink Logistics, a delivery service partner that handles about 20% of the deliveries from the Maple Grove facility.

He started to notice the jump in packages several weeks ago. But while many people bought their gifts early, some will probably still wait until the last minute. Wedum recalled a year ago that one father stood by the door on Christmas Eve and asked Wedum to deliver gifts to another entrance so his kids wouldn't see.

Wedum, like many drivers, works six days a week during the holiday peak season. "The opportunity to get overtime for this job is always a bonus," he said.

As of last week, major parcel carriers have shown high on-time performance since mid November including during Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday, according to software company ShipMatrix.

Carriers have expanded their capacity since last year at this time, when the pandemic led many people to avoid in-person shopping. The postal service at this time a year ago experienced a 50% jump in package delivery compared to 2019.

"We seem to get through [the holidays] simply by being more prepared and by keeping the inventory in place," said Judy Longbottom, who owns UPS Stores in Minneapolis and Edina.

During the holidays, her stores, which also offer USPS services, sell a lot of postage stamps, shipping labels, envelopes, boxes and other supplies. Longbottom had to make sure to stock up, especially since logistics issues made it take longer to get certain items.

The postal service pushed to hire 40,000 seasonal workers for this holiday. It also leased 13 million square feet of additional space to help address space constraints.

A large postal support annex in Eagan features a new package-sorting machine that can process thousands of packages an hour, or up to 12 times faster than manual sortation.

ShipMatrix recommended consumers place orders by Wednesday, unless the retailer is shipping the items via faster express services. Even if retailers do promise fast delivery, customers should be cautious as mail carriers have added extra time to their commitment schedules.