Mixed-Mail & Parcel Sorting Technology Provides New Business Opportunities to Mail & Parcel Processing Centers

Why is the United States Postal Service, USPS spending billions of dollars to automate product handling and logistics across the nation? Because its’ committed to being the final delivery services for media, books, mail order prescription and other small parcels for the home and businesses delivery service. Their business continues to mushroom and their expanding “small parcel” shipment volume presents $100’s of millions in new business opportunity to existing mail pre-sort and parcel processing centers that jump on board and take advantage of this market opportunity.

The USPS is still the most advantageous and formidable carrier when you consider it’s daily delivery coverage for both the B to B and B to C markets states Dan Hanrahan president of The Numina Group (Burr Ridge, IL), a firm specializing in parcel sorting and material handling automation. What’s needed by industry to win a piece of the small parcel handling business is more flexible sorting and automation technology that handles existing mail streams such as business mail and flats and also can process larger parcel size footprints.

Hanrahan explains that the USPS, once considered the “slow boat” of parcel carriers, has installed new technologies and automation throughout its’ distribution network and private industry mail centers and carriers are now being given larger financial incentives from the USPS to automate and inject the mail and parcels into local delivery centers, thereby improving services while lowering delivery costs. Think of Amazon, and dozens of other high volume shippers of books, DVDs mail order pharmaceuticals, apparel and business-home office products, they all want the six day a week delivery with faster and lower costs provided by the USPS.

“Matching the right technology to the USPS strategy provides a formidable combination,” Hanrahan says. Using automated parcel sorting systems such as Numina’s NTS(TM) tray sorting technologies, the private sector can intelligently inject mail stream into the USPS automated centers and streamline delivery and costs using automated sorting and electronic manifesting for mail and parcels. “It enables the USPS to shortcut its’ old, labor-intensive, multi-site manual handling of mail and parcels that required shipping and handling as many as three or four times en route to its destination.

Hanrahan adds that material handling automation eliminates expensive manual handling, and enables “zone injection” to the closes initial point of distribution such as the USPS SFC (Section Center Facilities) or better yet to a local DDU (Direct Delivery Unit), so letters and parcels avoid all of the sorting and redistribution costs and delays that were so long associated with the old USPS delivery methodology.

Numina Group’s mixed mail and small parcel sorting technology enables parcel services and mail processing centers to process anything from a business letters, flats, irregular, bound printed materials, bagged items and parcels in sizes up to 12” x 18”and 25-lbs on the same hardware. An automated feed system measures and classifies letter or parcel according to size, weight, destination and other rate-related characteristics.

“An item is handled automatically all of the way through the system,” explains Hanrahan. “Using advanced sensor and vision technologies the system classifies the parcel type, OCR (optical character recognition) to decode the address, print and apply parcel tracking label and postal indicia (if required), and then automatically sort and communicate the electronic manifest so that a client gets the lowest cost and best shipping rate.”

Hanrahan says a number of major parcel carriers and mail processing centers are embracing material handling automation by installing the Numina NTS parcel sorting technology. Companies that ship small parcels or plan to enter this market can gain faster delivered and increase revenues at the same time.”

For more information: Dan Hanrahan, Numina Group, 60 Shore Drive, Burr Ridge, IL 60527. Phone: (630) 323-0110 x 404, or email: dhanrahan@numinagroup.com, or visit the Web site: www.numinagroup.com