Perfect timing. Road trip for a few weeks.
Canada Post - Huge losses
- Thread starter raginduck
- Start date
I have my doubts. They have a ton of legacy costs they can't avoid. I don't think they can offer competitive rates on parcel delivery. When they were profitable, letter mail was an order of magnitude higher. Horse drawn carriages were profitable and dominated personal transportation at one point too. That doesn't mean they can still be profitable at volume today.
Without a doubt there are many cuts that can and must be made without affecting service (mostly up the tree although reducing to fewer days per week may allow many at the bottom as well). Hopefully this government plan is real and not just lip service and CP can emerge as a viable entity for the next decade or more.
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On a slightly related note, although I don't think OPSEU was a major factor in this closure, they sure aren't helping themselves when they ignore all financial reality and try to get blood from a stone. We want more money quickly turns into enjoy EI when there is no more money to be had. FAFO lessons for public sector (and pseudo-public sector) unions are long overdue.
"Well, after 56 years in operation, Georgian College in Orillia (as well as Muskoka) will be closing its doors due to funding. As I type this, full-time support staff at the Orillia campus are currently on strike."
"Well, after 56 years in operation, Georgian College in Orillia (as well as Muskoka) will be closing its doors due to funding. As I type this, full-time support staff at the Orillia campus are currently on strike."
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Mad Mike
Well-known member
There is no easy return to profitability. CUPW productivity is about 50% of other major carriers, and even worse when compared to the new smaller local delivery workforces.
CPC's decline started around 2013. At that time the gov recognized the changes necessary to keep them from losing money, and they put a plan in action. 2015 Libs reversed the plan and CPC went into a marketshare tailspin in their most profitable sectors as they tried to prop up lettermail. They raised prices on parcels, lowered service standards -- basically, they opened the barn doors to let competition into their dominant position.
The genie is out of the bottle; there is no practical way CPC can regain parcel market share now that other carriers have built out competitive delivery networks. CPC's only path forward is rightsizing for mail delivery, they will continue to lose on packages, perhaps they sell that off or convert package delivery to Purolator entirely.
This could have been a different story if JT hadn't meddled in their business back in 2015. A decade of wallowing in losses and ever-decreasing workforce productivity is likely irreparable.
The feds won't shut them down, but as we are seeing they aren't going to let them continue as they are. Supermailboxes will save money over time, but that's not enough. The union needs to get its sh:t together and look for improvements in workforce efficiencies that match their competitors.
When was the last time you saw a union do that? If unions filled that roll, I think they could serve a very useful purpose and justify their existence. For instance, if you want a competent drywaller, call the hall and they will give you a number. Sadly, every single union I have ever seen protected every useless drunk dirtbag member as their primary priority as that maximizes union revenue. Union revenue is maximized with maximum number of employees at maximum pay. Improved productivity directly hurts union revenue.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
Georgian, like many other colleges, tapped into the foreign student surge JT engineered. It provided mountains of cash... it also changed the focus of many community colleges from training locals to enter the workforce with in-demand skills tech, medical, and administrative skills, to providing 1-year programs like supply chain management, office skills, etc that catered to foreign students looking for a path to a PR.
The college down the road from me went from 100% local students in 2015 to 90% foreign in 2024. A decade later, and the area has an acute shortage of tradespeople and medical support staff as the local colleges haven't churned them out for a while.
That's why I said slightly related. As with CP, college problems were made by management decisions but that doesn't change the current reality that they are insolvent and major changes are required.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
I hear you. It shouldn't be that way -- unions are there for a reason, I get that.
In my perfect world, unions would have similar rights and protections as employers, there would be no PSUs, and different unions would be free to compete for the right to represent existing locals.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
I think the college problems were germinated by gov. Opening the floodgates to students willing to pay $20K+ a year vs locals paying $5K can motivate management changes. Colleges hopped on the bandwagon and invested in staff and facilities, thinking the party would never end.
It's ending. Now they have to roll back to meet their traditional mandates -- rolling back is never cheap or easy.
There is plenty of blame to go around but a reminder the Colleges (and Universities) are under the provincial government and the provincial government also controls what schools are on the Designated Learning Institution list for foreign students.
The federal government has obvious blame but so does the province. The feds opened the door, the province at best was asleep at the wheel, maybe worse? They sat back and let the college system go off the rails on this subject. Since they also control the DLI they also let all the diploma mills and mall colleges get in on this nonsense.
Many of these colleges have/had satellite campuses in Toronto/GTA that are ONLY for foreign students. Niagara College, as an example, has a "campus" in DT Toronto that is not listed as a campus on their main website, it only lists foreign tuition for that location (when you find it), all because a NC two year diploma in business is so world renowned... many other examples. Basically foreign student only campuses, in the GTA because that's where the "students" want to be (and it is not for school). That is under Doug's government's mandate not JT.
As for Canada Post, I see no real solution here other than the reset button. The recent shutdowns have made them totally untrusted for parcels, fliers, mail, etc. That trust will never fully come back plus people/businesses have moved to other solutions. Their business is permanently broken IMO and cannot be fixed. Both management and the union are at fault.
As for super mailboxes, everyone cries about the NIMBYs not wanting one in their yard, right up to the point they put it in your yard... then it is unfair. I don't want one in my front yard and I don't have any ill-will for anyone that does not want one in their front (or side) yard.
As for super mailboxes, everyone cries about the NIMBYs not wanting one in their yard, right up to the point they put it in your yard... then it is unfair. I don't want one in my front yard and I don't have any ill-will for anyone that does not want one in their front (or side) yard.
Why do I ship dozens of samples and small packages every week with anybody except Canada Post ? Because I don’t wake up and find the other guys on strike . It’s important to MY business that stuff moves efficiently. I’m not risking a couple hundred bucks in samples , tied to thousands of dollars in orders to a company that may be told , sorry boys , just leave that box over there for a while ….
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They never put it in your yard. They put them in the ROW owned by the municipality. You feel you own it, but it was never yours to begin with.
I understand that. I still don't want it in front of my house and have no ill-will for anyone else that has the same opinion.
It's fair not to want it. It's also fair for CP/the municipality to note your objection and install it there anyway if they think it's the best spot.
I've heard that same thing about CP rerouting thru Puro.. but I highly doubt it's happening at CP. Has anyone seen any evidence of that happening?
For that to happen.. CP managers would have to be down on the floor relabeling packages and trucks would be going in and out of CP's facilities.
It is happening.. but not at CP.. There's numerous companies that can and will provide that service.
justride
Well-known member
The volume of mail is way down at the Gateway and Albert Jackson. The mail is going somewhere, wheater it is rerouting or customer are choosing other carriers. Note that Purolator is partly owned by Canada Post and Doug Ettinger is the President and CEO of Canada Post, and Doug also chairs the board of Innovapost and serves on the board of Purolator.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
Remember... the province is a regulator; they can't stop colleges from expanding. They can hold them to standards that would have either raised the bar for earning a diploma or slowed the expansion. Probably somewhere in the middle, as existing institutions were mostly at fault for poor-quality programs.
Provinces are guilty of poorly regulating the programs, but that's really a moot point, as students didn't come for a better education, they came following a shortcut/loophole for immigrating to Canada.
Remember - the JT regime made studying in Canada less about education, more about immigration when they simplified Post-Graduation Work Permits (PGWP) and increased Express Entry points for students studying in Canada.
Virtually all foreign students came in with the hope of PR, not to be better educated.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
My hood was one of the last that CPC rushed into place on 2015. The neighbors freaked -- but I think it was mostly because they thought because the boxes weren't installed, we'd continue to get home delivery.
They don't often install them in front of houses, it's usually a side yard on a corner or intersection of small streets.
If it has to go in front of someone's house I guess they'll do that. I don't know if that would be worse than a bus stop, power transformer box, or a speed bump.
