CONVERSE, Texas — Whether you're wrapping or unwrapping gifts, there is a lot of work involved getting that box to your doorstep. The U.S. Postal Service gave KENS 5 a behind the scenes look at how the holidays get delivered.
They may not look like elves, but these workers at the USPS Package Support Annex in Converse play a crucial role in making Christmas happen. The building only sees use during November and December to handle the extra volume of packages.
"It’s a lot to count,” said Shift Supervisor Rick Torres. “It's in the millions. Yes, it's a lot of packages."
The Postal Service starts using its package support annex in Converse in late November, but planning for the season begins nearly a year in advance.
"We've been doing this a long time,” said Plant Manager Kim Calderone. “I know I’ve been at it for 30 years, and we pretty much have this whole thing down."
Calderon said a little bit of technology always helps. Like the Single Induction Package Sorter, or "SIPS" for short, which was added in the last few years.
"So that camera on top is going to take a picture of the label and identify exactly what they're going to go to the pockets of a container,” said Torres, describing how they use the device. “Once that container fills up, we put a new empty container with a new flag identifying it."
The SIPS machine automatically sorts much larger packages than they could before. Calderon said they’ve been seeing more of the larger packages this year.
“We're getting a lot of large packages with Ground Advantage” Calderon said. “It's really been a motivation for folks to go ahead and go with Ground Advantage because it's less expensive."
Calderon said between that, and more year-round employees at the postal service she expects a smooth holiday season. Nationwide since 2020, 150,000 of the Postal Service’s supplemental non-career employees have been converted to full-time “career” positions.
“We haven't needed to bring on as many peak season people as we had in years past," Calderon said.