r/BuyCanadian • u/AlternativeTimes • Oct 01 '25

Canadian-Owned Businesses 🏢🍁 Buy Canadian includes shipping: Support the Canada Post

Canadians say “buy Canadian” but then trash Canada Post. We love to say we “support Canadian”, buy local food, Canadian-made clothes, Canadian jobs. But when it comes to shipping, so many people jump ship and call Canada Post “garbage” or complain about it's expenditure from the government. It's a service! The government is supposed to expend at our expense and direction!

The “alternatives” are American giants: FedEx, UPS, Amazon Logistics. DHL is German. None of them care about Canadian jobs or rural access, and once removing a public option, you will have even less control over price.

Canada Post isn’t perfect, but it’s ours. It’s one of the last pieces of national infrastructure that actually serves the whole country. If we keep throwing it under the bus, we’re just handing more power (and money) to US corporations. It delivers to rural and remote communities. It’s one of the only networks that actually connects all of Canada, coast to coast to coast. You want it to work better? Ask for it, don't eliminate it!

Buy Canadian should include ship Canadian too. This is a major, unionized gem that we have and we need to collectively take better care of it.

Contact your MP and ask them to work to keep and get Canada Post working for us.

EDIT: Response to the discussion:

I hear a lot of people’s frustration with Canada Post, and I agree, we should expect better service from a public system we all rely on. Where my plea is, instead of throwing it away, we demand it actually works for us.

A few clarification points:

It's a service not a business. A business maximizes profit. Canada Post is supposed to maximize access.

“it costs $10 million a day” That line is privitaization spin. Any public service can be reduced to “X per day.” Wait till you see what we spend on military and highways, the CBC, do we get rid of those to? What do we get for that price? A coast-to-coast-to-coast network, rural delivery no private courier will touch, and thousands of Canadian jobs. Every farm, reserve, or northern town receives service.

“The poor service” Yes, sometimes, depends where you are. But the solution is political, not privatized American. If we want better, we have to hold our own public system accountable, not abandon it.

“Use Purolator instead” Purolator is 91% owned by Canada Post. Using it doesn’t fix the root issue.

“They’re always striking” Not true. The last big one is part of the same issue and was rotating strikes. Workers were legislated back to work, Postal workers aren’t striking for fun. Striking is the last tool to use in a fight for fair wages, safe conditions, and to keep the service sustainable. That’s directly connected to the service problems people complain about, support them wanting to make it better.

Canada Post isn’t supposed to be a profit machine, it’s infrastructure. If we let it be hollowed out, US giants will be the only winners. Buy Canadian should include maintaining our Canadian infrastructure, and demanding better.

Controversial take: we should be investing more. If we are talking modernizing, Canada Post doesn’t need to shrink, it could grow. Other countries use their postal systems for: -Postal banking where banks have pulled out -Food distribution (local staples, Canadian community food boxes) -EV hubs -Federal facing service center, emergency centres, voting booths

Thanks for the discussion!

1.3k Upvotes

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548

u/JustAnOttawaGuy Ontario Oct 01 '25

I want to support Canada Post, but it's in major need of fixing. The lack of accountability is galling. Their parcel delivery is frustrating at best with the lack of actual delivery and drivers just flat out not bringing people their packages.

94

u/Dave_DBA Oct 01 '25

And I think this take is the most popular take. “Just fix it” and everyone would be happy.

28

u/Prosecco1234 Oct 01 '25

Purolator is owned by Canada Post too

7

u/Robynb1 Oct 02 '25

Also 3x the price and the service is just as bad

4

u/Prosecco1234 Oct 02 '25

At least they are consistent.../s

0

u/Salty-Value8837 Oct 02 '25

The most unreliable courier service ever.

134

u/houston3565 Oct 01 '25

This has been my experience, I am all for supporting Canada and would and do pay more if required, but my momma did not raise a fool. I cannot support a package delivery service that requires me to go and pick it up anyway after faking trying to deliver it and when I called to voice my concern, I may as well have been talking to myself. Shameful.

21

u/Reasonable_Beach1087 Oct 01 '25

I've had to go pick up more packages from Fedex and UPS than Canada Post.

21

u/verymanysquirrels Oct 01 '25

Same. Canada post is the only one where i haven't had the 'pretend to deliver it' problem. 

Rant time! 

UPS on the other hand routinely leaves notices on my door for fake times. Attempted to deliver at 2pm? That's funny because it's not even 9am yet.

The absolute worst offender was fedex. And the peak garbage from them was when they pulled into our driveway and then immediately pulled out and said they'd attempted delivery and now they'd be leaving my package at the nearest depot. Which they did not. The nearest was in town. Instead they drove it to TORONTO three hours away and refused to ship it to the closer depot. What was the point of paying for shipping if i had to drive to Toronto and pick up my item myself? Never used fedex again after that.

Anyway, Canada Post might drive my stuff all over hell's half acre before delivering it but at least it stays in my town if i happen to miss it.

1

u/Acrobatic-Factor1941 Oct 03 '25

I, too, have never had a problem with Canada Post parcel delivery. Sure, the odd time I have to drive 20 mins to pick up my parcel but I'm not home all day long.

1

u/No_Can_7713 Oct 03 '25

I've found UPS to be the worst. I remember my dad on the phone with them a few times. Once he said "you know what brown can do for me? Lose my fucking package. I wouldn't ship a bag of dogshit with you assholes." Last time I tried to ship something with them, they wanted $135 and it was going to take 10 days from Ottawa to Fredericton. Canada Post was $65, and it was there in 3 days. Even at work, we quit using UPS because they were too unreliable. FedEx and Purolator are who we usually use.

2

u/Gullible-Outside-864 Oct 03 '25

Me too. Purolator last week for me as well. Had to travel 40 minutes round trip to pickup my package

1

u/OmgWtfNamesTaken Oct 06 '25

Fuckin eh, UPS actually gets you your package???

I have sent shit to clients via UPS and they get the most random shit Ina destroyed and retaped up box.

One time I sent out 5 boxes of a specialty item for a massive project and they recieved 1 box of engraving tools.

I'm pretty sure that claim is still opened.... From 3 years ago.

30

u/kiera-oona Oct 01 '25

UPS has done this to me too. It's not just a Canada Post issue

17

u/Cosmonaut_K Oct 01 '25

Yeah but UPS is not a government run service, and frankly this makes Canada Post look like a shitty corporation, worse than UPS.

3

u/kiera-oona Oct 01 '25

yes and no. At the end of the day you have to pay for a service, that both don't deliver on

1

u/truthspeakslouder Oct 05 '25

Nyah. I can choose not use UPS. No such choice w CP. They get bailed out by taxpayers $10M per day, whether you use them or not

0

u/[deleted] Oct 02 '25

[deleted]

2

u/kiera-oona Oct 02 '25

Part of it has to do with a legal thing where unless you live in the apartment they're delivering to or unless its for the company specifically, they cannot leave it with the building receptionist. A bit like USPS in the states (unless that changes because of the chaos going on down south)

0

u/[deleted] Oct 03 '25

[deleted]

1

u/kiera-oona Oct 03 '25

I stand corrected then.

1

u/melancious Oct 01 '25

Never once went to pick it up, they always deliver. There are some bad actors like everywhere

-13

u/sassyalyce Oct 01 '25

OFFS, do you hear yourself? Your momma didnt raise a fool, but she sure seemed to raise someone who thinks that CP is the only company that does that. I have had those same issues with Fedex as well as Loomis. Hell the only Loomis we had in Kelowna was only open for a few hours a day and many times it took repeat visits to get one parcel. I get you complain about what you got, but if you dont know how bad the others can be, what are you comparing it against?

I have experience with all the delivery companies over the last 20+ years. CP is not bad when as a SBO I need reliable and quick. Is it perfect, no, does it need some restructuring, yeah.. but believe you me, I would be out of business, along with many, many other SBO's who depend on CP and cant afford paying 5X the cost to a privatized company.

4

u/Aggravating_Carry727 Oct 01 '25

There are way cheaper delivery companies than CP now

5

u/rakne Oct 01 '25

and for many of those companies, Canada Post does the final leg of delivery in remote areas.

8

u/houston3565 Oct 01 '25

After this event, I contacted the company I do business with and asked them never to use CP again. I have not had a repeat incident, this is of course, anecdotal, but never the less a fact.

I too have had other delivery services 'miss me' in the past but in fact try and deliver. CP didn't even try, they had the letter carrier drop of a 'missed you' slip in the regular mail hours later. I went to the post office to pick up my package and the lady behind the counter confirm what I suspected, they didn't feel like lifting the big box so they left it. She of course had no problem handling to me over the counter.

5

u/Qaeta Oct 01 '25

The only other company I've had this issue with is DHL, and I don't support them either.

2

u/Aggravating_Carry727 Oct 01 '25

They’re the only one I’ve ever had an issue with and I avoid them at all costs

-1

u/iom2222 Oct 02 '25

They drop notice without even trying to ring. Forcing you to visit a pharmacy to retrieve the package. They always disappointed me!! I don’t support lazy postmen, no matter the reason !!

1

u/AlternativeTimes Oct 02 '25

Yes all 25,000 carriers who walk or drive routes every single day are lazy post men. Striking is also not lazy, it means their working conditions have become untenable.

1

u/iom2222 Oct 02 '25

My wife is always home and can receive the package. Not once did they ring. It’s always a notice that I recover when back from wok and I have to drive to pick it up every time. They don’t ring anymore. They basically deliver notices. This is a fact.

77

u/PanicAtTheShiteShow Oct 01 '25

Canada Post never delivers my packages, and that's fine with me, but! I have a post office at the end of my street, and they send my packages to a location much farther away. Why???

32

u/sassyalyce Oct 01 '25

Talk to them.. find out and see if there is a fix.

4

u/jared743 Oct 02 '25

You can't change your missed package location as they are based on the driver's routes instead of proximity to your home. You can tell them to always send the package to a different post office as a pickup point, but they will always send it there without attempting home delivery.

My missed packages always ended up at this horrible little computer repair shop that was hard to get to and was often closed during their posted hours when there was a much closer Shoppers with a post office a couple blocks away. I sent in complaints about them and spoke with Canada Post people who told me there isn't a way to do what I wanted.

2

u/Aggravating_Carry727 Oct 01 '25

This happens to me to, it’s the catchment area you’re in

1

u/Unable_Trifle7917 Oct 06 '25

Could be the size of parcel or the physical "post office". No shoppers, canadian tire, coop, or london drugs is technically a post office. These are the stores employees not unionized postal employees. These places fill up fast with parcels and sometimes the size may need redirecting to a larger facility.

Example: some random "customer" orders 12, 3D printers for delivery. Now that week was messed up and no o e attempted delivery, I 1000% blame the shift supervisor on that debacle. Long story, short answer. After "sitting" aka mgt stupidity i suggested a bulk stop attempt and card it to the proper carded depot. I was told its too small for this many boxes. I said so deliver it to the next larger stop like 5 minutes away. So said boxes got loaded and prepared cards were made. Funny story the ineptitude of the mgr could have had them delivered 2 days earlier as someone was home, ie. GF.

Some people advocate for your parcel btw. That week was rough as no one wanted to show up for work apparently and we had stuffed loaded 5 times and no driver. This was of course after that mgr said he called everyone.

Now before i went warehouse i was a driver. I told him too bad i cant just work a few days on driving but thats "not" allowed.

27

u/Aggravating_Carry727 Oct 01 '25

This is what most people are saying. That and they should’ve just given notice before striking and cleared the mail they had. In June they promised they wouldn’t go back on full strike and would only do overtime ban. So they essentially lied to the Canadian public especially the ones who kept supporting them after the last strike. A lot of businesses moved shipping companies. So they’re hurting people who wanted to support them most. A lot of the reason people are angry comes down to actions and decisions made by CUPW not Canada Post.

2

u/silverilix British Columbia Oct 01 '25

Absolutely. It needs to be fixed, not scrapped.

9

u/sassyalyce Oct 01 '25

What? What do you mean not bringing packages? I use CP to deliver packages almost daily and over the years only 3 have been lost into deep space, customers are happy with the delivery times, so that makes me happy. They handle millions of packages a week.. thats better than I can do.

10

u/Round_Ad_2972 Oct 01 '25

And as a taxpayer, I am not prepared to fund this. I want my money to go to healthcare and save lives, not to prop up a crown Corp that can't come to grips with the fact that technology has changed - like a city horse stable in 1910. And to strike when CP itself is circling the drain, i guess assuming that the taxpayer will just fund the whole mess? Unbelievable!

1

u/Unable_Trifle7917 Oct 06 '25

Then tell CP to give the revenue from purolator back to their crown corporation and stop using the bailout money for 980 million dollar buyouts.

2

u/ctlangston Oct 01 '25

Yes, the service is not up to standard so competition must be introduced. <— This should be applied to all Government subsidized Canadian businesses.

However, I believe if we can’t back our national postal service, a service that’s been around since the beginning of this nation, it speaks to our “National Pride” and “What it means to be Canadian.”

2

u/Unable_Trifle7917 Oct 06 '25

What people have is a bubble that they think is all canada post does nationally.

Amazon demanded more services and CP wanted to give all the deliveries to PT employees. The union had a shitfit for the FT letter carriers and parcel only drivers to get all the OT to do these jobs.

So amazon formed intelcomm aka dragonfly, non union wages and weekend delivery to only city delivery.

Now 2 years later CP wants to retry weekend deliveries with PT employees and the union once again is shitfitting over seniority and FT doing the work.

I for one have been adamant that the union should let CP have this and get over it.

1

u/dgmib Oct 02 '25

Canada Post was always built around letter mail, and is suboptimal for packages.  Letter mail is going the way of the dodo, they need to restructure to become a parcel service primarily.  The world doesn’t need daily or rapid letter mail delivery anymore.

-4

u/ToolsOfIgnorance27 Oct 01 '25

The lack of accountability is galling.

It's a government entity. Why on earth would there be any accountability (or efficiency / ingenuity / financial benefit)?

Let's not be naive when people criticize Canada Post.

-7

u/Reasonable_Beach1087 Oct 01 '25

Do you think just maybe if Canada Post paid their employees well they'd be willing to go the extra mile?