New owner of Shipping Station immersed in busy holiday season

Taking over an established business can present some challenges for a new owner, but that didn’t stop Duane Dierenfield from jumping in when he bought The Shipping Station in Evergreen.

“I took over September 1, just in time to learn how to do what the post office requires us to do,” Dierenfield said. “I’m getting a good taste of what it’s like to ship at Christmas.”

Dierenfield purchased the business from his brother-in-law, Travis Holmquist, who had purchased it from Linda Graham earlier this year.

“Travis has a passion for music, and he ended up devoting his time to his band, which is on a national tour right now,” Dierenfield said. “The opportunity presented itself and I decided to buy The Shipping Station.”

While shipping may be new to Dierenfield, he is no stranger to owning his own business. Before taking over The Shipping Station, Dierenfield had his own epoxy flooring business.

“It was a good business, but in construction, it’s a hit-and-miss business, and it was getting hard on my back,” said Dierenfield. “This is more upright, and it suits me just fine.”

In addition to offering shipping and mailing services, The Shipping Station sells stamps, cards, packing peanuts, boxes and tape, as well as renting post-office boxes.

The Shipping Station is not an official post office but Dierenfield said that because it do offers contract mail services, he sees quite a few customers.

“We ship both UPS and through the post office, and we’ve got a post office sign out front, so a lot of people come here,” Dierenfield said. “We serve more than 7,000 people here in Evergreen, so we do quite a bit of volume.”

Dierenfield said he handles more shipping and mailing volume than the Columbia Falls Post Office, though not as much as the main Postal Service office in Kalispell.

“We build a lot of relationships with customers and we work hand-in-hand with the post office,” Dierenfield said. “The U.S. post office may be downsizing, but we still see a big call for it, and I would say that about 90 percent of our volume is for the post office.”

Dierenfield said making people happy and building relationships with his customers have made the shipping business fun.

“I enjoy it a lot, actually,” Dierenfield said. “We really get to build relationships with the people who come in. We get a lot of repeat customers, and seeing people smile is great.”

At this time of year, those smiles are common, with gifts and cards making up the bulk of his business.

“Just the other day there was a kid who came in to check the mail for his mom, and he got a card from his grandparents with $20 in it,” Dierenfield said. “He was so happy and excited, and it’s things like that that make this job fun. It makes my job feel like it’s not just a job. In a way, I feel like Santa; I just don’t wear the suit.”

Although Dierenfield said the Monday before Christmas likely will be the busiest day of the year for him, he said he’s likely to be busy throughout the year, although not quite at the same level as the holiday season.

“For the rest of the year, there’ll be returns in January, tax time will kick in in April, so there’ll be a lot of certified mail, and in summer the snowbirds come back and are opening their mail boxes back up,” Dierenfield said. “Tourism kicks in and people are mailing things back home, and then it’s the holidays again.”

During the busiest mailing time of the year, shoppers are scrambling to send their gifts and cards in time for Christmas.

The U.S. Postal Service is expecting nearly 15.2 billion cards, letters and packages between Thanksgiving and Christmas and on average will process 562 million pieces of mail every day this holiday season.

Dec. 17 will be the busiest day to mail holiday cards, letters and packages, with an estimated 658 million pieces to be processed that day.

Dierenfield said the best way to ensure gifts and greetings get to their destinations is to double-check the address and make sure the gift is in the mail on or before the following days:

Dec. 20: First-Class Mail

Dec. 21: Priority Mail

Dec. 22: Express Mail