‘The New Post’ in Bucktown Wants to Replace U.S. Post Office For Last Half-Mile Package Deliveries
BUCKTOWN — Doorman’s Bucktown outpost closed in September, leaving some 400 residents who relied on the package delivery service in the lurch. On Friday, it re-emerged as The New Post — a new company with a familiar face behind the front counter at 1741 N. Damen Avenue.
“Most of the problems with the Post Office, UPS and Fedex are with packages going missing. A better delivery experience, that’s our whole proposition,” said Sean Khokhar, general manager of The New Post and previously the GM for Doorman.
As soon as packages get to the Bucktown depot, users of The New Post (who use the Damen address as the delivery destination instead of their home address) get a text or email notification. Then they can arrange a delivery anytime up until 11 p.m. during the week or 10 p.m. on weekends.
The New Post serves online shopping aficionados — or those expecting to receive a lot of packages for upcoming weddings and forthcoming babies — by offering monthly $19, $39 or $79 subscriptions for package deliveries or an “a la carte” $5 per package option.
As with Doorman, The New Post will help users schedule personalized package deliveries so they don’t have to face the choice between missing daytime deliveries and risking theft.
Khokhar started working at San Francisco-based Doorman in 2016, when it opened in Bucktown after relocating from the West Loop.
Owned by Andrew Sobko (who was not part of the now-defunct Doorman), The New Post will offer the same service as Doorman, although this time around they will allow pickups, so customers can swing by the storefront to get their packages.
Eventually, Khokhar says he wants The New Post, which will launch delivery service within the next few weeks, to use autonomous cars and drones to get packages to customers.
Khokhar described The New Post as kind of like “a holding house” for packages, safer than a doorstep. He said the name The New Post refers to the U.S. Post Office and wanting to be “the new post office.”
“The U.S. Post Office has lost numerous packages and they weren’t equipped when the whole e-commerce thing really started two years ago. It is very hard for them to change; they are like a big dinosaur. We are a younger company and we listen to what customer pain points are. Customers want better technology and better customer service,” he said.
Doorman aprubtly closed all of its locations in the fall because it wasn’t profitable enough for investors, but Khokhar said Chicago was doing well compared it the app’s other locations in San Francisco and New York. He brought on Sobko as an owner to keep the venture alive.
“Most of the people who subscribed to the service in Chicago pretty much live in Wicker Park, Bucktown and Logan Square. New York has huge boroughs that are all separated and San Francisco is so congested. In Chicago, we were able to scale down costs,” he said.
The New Post app is not yet launched but for now customers can sign up online to get text and email alerts and pick up their packages at the storefront. So far, about a dozen folks have signed on.
“We are just getting the word out,” Khokhar said.
Khokhar said 80 percent of the customer base from when the venture was Doorman signed up after having been victims of package thefts and the remainder wanted convenience.
“They want the convenience of having better tracking of packages. Others were shipping medications and food that were time sensitive. If somebody steals medication or food, that’s a problem. If you don’t get the medicine on time, you can get sick. If you don’t get food on time, that meal is gone,” he said.
Hours at The New Post, 1741 N. Damen Ave., are 8 a.m. — 11 p.m. Monday- Friday; 9 a.m. — 10 p.m. Saturday; and 10 a.m. — to 9 p.m. Sunday.
