Owning a UPS Store

scratch

Least Best Moderator
Staff member
I have seen a few of them go out of business and I have some friends in my town that lost their shirt when they converted their Mailboxes Etc store into a UPS Store. I have also seen a couple that seem to do well, I guess it depends on your business sense and having a good location.
 

UPSGUY72

Well-Known Member
I have seen a few of them go out of business and I have some friends in my town that lost their shirt when they converted their Mailboxes Etc store into a UPS Store. I have also seen a couple that seem to do well, I guess it depends on your business sense and having a good location.

I would bet it has to do with the owners working in the store instead of just owning the store....
 

Jackburton

Gone Fish'n
Wanna see some super micro managing, spend an hour talking to the owner of these stores. They take all the risk and UPS tells them how to run their business, down to the place where you order boxes from. There is a reason why Mailbox ect people got pissed when UPS bought them out.
 

barnyard

KTM rider
There is a franchise owner in our area. He has been approached by a couple of other owners to buy their stores. It seems that to be successful, there needs to be a good population base (85,000 at the very minimum) and it helps to have a college nearby to utilize copying services. The local guy says that he is not getting rich and that he basically 'owns' his own job.

As a driver, I am not sure that I would want to own my own business where UPS is the boss of me. That would be kind of daunting.
 

Jackburton

Gone Fish'n
Ups suggests two box vendors. They force neither on anyone.
They also "suggest" store hours. The box vendors that are cheaper for the particular store I pick up and deliver to have been labeled as "inferior" products. The point is UPS's arm of micro managing extends into the franchise just as much as the company owned working facilities.
 

Goatman

Member
Again, I'm just looking to speak to a few store owners if they're here. What a company suggests bothers me me as much as what the surgeon general does.
 

UPSGUY72

Well-Known Member
There is a franchise owner in our area. He has been approached by a couple of other owners to buy their stores. It seems that to be successful, there needs to be a good population base (85,000 at the very minimum) and it helps to have a college nearby to utilize copying services. The local guy says that he is not getting rich and that he basically 'owns' his own job.

As a driver, I am not sure that I would want to own my own business where UPS is the boss of me. That would be kind of daunting.

Well your theory doesn't is flawed there are 2 UPS stores in my city of about 45,000.

Running your own business isn't easy most successful business owner work a lot more hours a week than UPS drivers and even thought they are the boss they still have listen to there customers needs or they would be out of business
 

rod

Retired 22 years
I never could figure out how they stay in business. It cost an arm and a leg to send anything out thru them.
 

ocnewguy

Well-Known Member
They refuse to give me an employee discount at the one by my house. Apparently I don't have the right kind of id card
 

barnyard

KTM rider
The guy in town opened his as an MBE franchise and switched to UPS store when they bought it. He said the change cost him money. He used to make money when people came in and wanted to use FE as their shipper, now he cannot offer that option. He has also said that the promotions that UPS advertises almost always cost him profit.

On the other hand, he has seen his PO box rentals increase. UPS does promote them to medical salespeople that receive drug samples that require signatures. That was a suggestion that I made back when I was a preloader. We have plenty of salespeople that get sig required packages and many of them would be attempted 3 times. I suggested that UPS go to the shippers, point it out and suggest that they include a UPS store PO box as part of the job. The other advantage was that the address would stay the same even if there was turnover in the job. The sales guys at my center saw it as a win/win and said they would send it up the chain.
 

Mr Shifter

Well-Known Member
Here in my area there was one of the last MBEs in the country. I haven't delivered that route for the last couple years and drive by recently and it was still the same MBE set up with dated interior but with a UPS store uniformed employee with UPS store temporary banners up. The owner seemed very let down that UPS bought MBE and left franchise owners like him to rot with 0 promotions or updates to the brand. He told me he put his life savings into MBE and UPS destroyed him. =[
 
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