And – be a little greener too! I’m sure you’ve heard of Stamps.com. You’ve probably seen the advertisements for photo stamps in your post office – which by the way are absolutely wonderful on holiday greeting cards. But, did you know that you can actually print postage on your own printer and save yourself a trip to the post office? I have family and friends all over the country – and now I have nieces, nephews and friends in colleges all over the country as well. These days, care packages to them frequently consist of iTunes and Starbucks gift cards and maybe some photos or media cards rather than boxes of cookies. I can just pop these into the envelope or box, weigh it, and print out postage from home. I can even get delivery confirmation without paying extra like you would at the post office. And, if I do choose to insure the package, insurance costs less than it would at the post office.

Plus, how many times have you had to mail something and you don’t get to the post office in time? Not a big problem if you have stamps on hand, but you have an issue if you don’t have any postage on hand. Our post office opens late and closes early so I frequently miss the regular hours. With the stamps.com service, I don’t even have to keep stamps on hand. I can print out postage any time, day or night.

So, even though there is a monthly fee for using Stamps.com, the convenience of skipping the trip to the post office or finding enough 2 cent stamps to match up with all of my 42 cent stamps or whatever the current postage rate is, more than makes up for the monthly fee.

As for the greener part – the postal service comes to your home nearly every day.  Do your part to save the environment and skip the trip to the post office.  Hand your outgoing mail right to your postal carrier when he or she is in your neighborhood.  You can even schedule a USPS pickup if you’re mailing Priority or Express Mail packages.  You can even save money on packaging – you can go to the Postal Service website and order Priority Mail boxes – which are free.

Check it out. They even have a risk free trial.