Strongsville UPS Mail Store Owner Misses The Shipping Season And Her Part In It

STRONGSVILLE, Ohio, Dec. 11 /PRNewswire/ -- For the last dozen years, Chris May was a key part of her town's holiday shipping frenzy. Her United Parcel Service (UPS) (NYSE: UPS) Mail Boxes Etc. store in Strongsville was the local "go to" stop for regular mail services and those angst-ridden last-minute dashes to get Aunt Maude's package in the mail before the holiday deadline.

But this year, thanks to the indifference of senior management at UPS in faraway Atlanta, May and her family are spending the holidays out of the shipping business and contemplating the future without the store she had operated since 1995. "My son says I played chicken with a big brown truck and lost," May said.

The circumstance that led to May's loss of her franchise business in Strongsville has been repeated across the country since the 2001 acquisition of Mail Boxes Etc. (MBE) by UPS, and has led to May and some 130 of her fellow franchisees filing a lawsuit in California to redress the alleged misdeeds of UPS. A recent California appellate court action, overturning a lower court's decision, gives hope to the Platinum Shield Association members (including May) that they will now get their day in court.

As May recounts the events of the past five-plus years, she notes the enthusiasm she and many other former MBE owners found in the predictions of UPS senior officials, who promised that UPS would establish a combined marketing effort that would benefit every store owner. "We had gone through some rough financial times with the previous owner (U.S. Office Products), and we believed that UPS being a stronger company would put things back on the right track," May recalled.

"Then at the end of 2002," she continued, "we were told about a series of tests to determine what the new store format would be, and early in 2003 UPS held a series of road shows with franchisees when they rolled out the new concept called The UPS Store. More disturbing, though, was that we were told we had to make the decision almost immediately to convert from Mail Boxes Etc. to a new name and a dramatically less profitable business model.

"If we did not convert at that time," May remembered, "we were told we could remain Mail Boxes stores until our original agreements expired. This was really a shock, and we were never given any details on the tests to understand why UPS took the action they laid on us."

May said her original MBE agreement ran through the end of 2005, at which time the UPS system representatives informed her that she had to decide: throw away more than a decade of "brand-building" as an MBE store and convert to the UPS Store format, or go independent. "I'm a positive person," she said, "but I had already seen a drop of eight percent in my business in the first year after UPS took over, and then another 10 percent drop the next year, and the more I talked with other franchisees, the less I was sure that UPS had a good plan for us.

"I really thought at first that UPS just needed to tweak their plan a little to make it better, but all we saw was a reduction in our daily sales, less support from headquarters and no sign that we who had been MBE franchisees mattered in the long-term UPS plan," May added.

Then in February 2006 the full impact of UPS' effort to unify its retail outlets hit May, when UPS filed a temporary restraining order against her and many other franchisees in federal court, alleging that she and the others were violating trademark statutes by continuing to operate under the MBE banner. "They de-identified my store on February 1 and filed the TRO on February 14, Valentine's Day," she said. The federal court took more than six months to reach a decision to shift the case to California, where MBE was headquartered.

"The real sign of UPS' intent came in October of 2006 when they opened a UPS Store a half-mile from my store," May said, "and at that point I knew the end was near, because my franchise company was directly competing against me." On April 21, 2007 May closed her store and walked away from a 12-year run, from early success to the bitterness of what she feels was an unnecessarily harsh forced closure.

"It's sad to look back," May stated; "in the MBE days I was always in the top five stores in my district, and I thought the store would be a good revenue generator for years, and then we could sell it and put that money into our retirement plan." May added that she had not come to the franchise business with no background; she worked in marketing at Land 'o Lakes for several years, and her husband is a corporate veteran also.

"I had two kids while I ran the store, my son in 1997 and my daughter in 2004," she recalled, "and they both loved to come down to the store -- especially at holiday season -- and see all the action and talk to my customers. And I remember that one of my reasons for getting into the shipping franchise was because the town we used to live in didn't have one. So I'd drive to Strongsville and use the very store that I wound up buying."

When she thinks about the future, May says she hasn't completely ruled out perhaps trying another franchise. "Some are good, and as I've learned, some are not so good; I really enjoyed dealing with customers, and in a town like this, there is a family aspect that's great."

This year will be very different for Chris May and her family. Driving past her former store, she will remember the many crazy days of a dozen holiday seasons and the hard work she put into making her store a success. And then she will remember Valentine's Day of 2006, when all the planning and hard work were undone in an instant.

For further information please contact Joe Wightman, Platinum Shield Association at 917-880-9609 or Mike Furtney or Joann Killeen of the Killeen Furtney Group, Los Angeles. 310-476-6941 Office.