A hundred years ago it was not uncommon to receive your house, in pieces, in the mail. Sears and Roebuck made a name for themselves by making all the necessities of life available through the mail in order to reach areas of the country that didn’t have access to large stores. As highways were built and America was brought into the industrial age, people began shopping in supermarkets and big box stores, eliminating the need for mail order houses, shoes, and clothing for decades. Today people have begun to revive the idea of mail order because of the convenience factor, thanks to the availability of everything you could ever want on the internet. Unfortunately now that people are ordering everything imaginable online there has also been an uptick in theft of packages from mailboxes and front porches, meet Smart Mail Boxes.
E-commerce has grown from $169 billion in 2010 to $342 billion in 2015- more than double in just five years. In 2016 11 million people had packages stolen from their doorsteps, which costs not only the homeowners but also delivery companies and vendors. Over half of Americans are worried about packages being stolen, which threatens growth and sustainability of online sales. Because of problems with theft and weather, 1 billion packages aren’t delivered on the first try, which keeps customers from their packages and costs delivery companies time and resources.
The Internet of Things is changing the way people receive packages. Barcodes on packages can send you text alerts at various points while in transit, and smart mail boxes can alert homeowners to the presence of a delivery while keeping packages out of the hands of would-be thieves and bad weather. You can even choose to delay a package if you aren’t going to be home, notifying the delivery driver so he or she doesn’t waste time on undeliverable packages.
In order for any industry sector to grow there need to be innovations made to support this growth. Home delivery of goods is certainly nothing new, but when your great grandma was ordering her Craftsman-style house out of the Sears and Roebuck catalog she knew she would be home when it was delivered. In today’s busy society there is still a need to get things delivered to save precious time, but the technology to keep those deliveries safe is just starting to catch up to the popularity of never having to leave your home to shop ever again. Learn more about how smart mailboxes are revolutionizing e-commerce from this infographic!
Smart Mail Boxes
