Holiday postmarks now going through Anchorage instead of North Pole
by Amanda Bohman / abohman@newsminer.com
2 months ago | 3642 views | 28 28 comments | 20 20 recommendations | email to a friend | print
FAIRBANKS — The U.S. Postal Service plans to process requests for a North Pole postmark on holiday mail about 350 miles from Santa’s stomping ground this holiday season, a spokesman said.

Anchorage will be the new North Pole.

The Postal Service receives hundreds of thousands of requests for the special postmark from around the world, Postal Service spokesman Ernie Swanson said.

The requests, often a package of stamped Christmas cards, were previously handled in Fairbanks, which is 14 miles from the Christmas-themed town of North Pole.

“It’s gotten to be a very labor intensive exercise for the office in Fairbanks,” Swanson said. “In Anchorage, we have more personnel and more automated machinery that can do it.”

The Postal Service announced the change this week, and it’s drawn criticism from the North Pole mayor.

“It’s ridiculous,” Mayor Doug Isaacson said.

Isaacson said people forward their holiday mail to Alaska with the expectation the cards and letters will be postmarked in North Pole, “where the spirit of Christmas lives year round,” according to the town motto.

To postmark them in Anchorage is misleading, Isaacson said.

“At least Fairbanks isn’t that far away,” he said.

The North Pole postmark will continue to be made on mail carried to the North Pole post office, Swanson said.

Requests by mail for the postmark must be made by Dec. 15 in order to ensure delivery by Christmas, according to a Postal Service statement.

The holiday mail should be addressed, stamped, placed in a larger envelope and addressed to North Pole Holiday Cancellation at 4141 Postmark Drive in Anchorage. The ZIP code is 99530-9998.

Swanson said other cities attract Christmas mail, including Santa, Idaho, and Snowflake, Ariz.
comments (28)
« bah-humbug wrote on Friday, Nov 20 at 04:42 AM »
Ok....now that Anchorage has taken over Christmas.....and we have VOTED several times to move the capital....WHY AINT IT DONE???? is the capital Juneua or Anchorage.....
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« goo-man wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 09:59 PM »
This is insane. For years kids have been sending "Santa letters" to North Pole, AK. I do not understand the security risk. When kids send letters to God where do the letters end up?
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« Voice_of_the_Crimes wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 06:44 PM »
First it's Santa's toy factory and distribution canters, next thing will be the State Capital to moving to Los Anchorage.

It's like a black hole sucking everything in...
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« AlaskanO wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 04:23 PM »
jonpauls, not so fast, this is happening on HIS watch, so HE gets the blame. All he cares about is looking good to not so friendly chiefs of states, like China. HE has been the worst thing to happen to our country since GOD created it.
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« IH8TMYEXWIFE wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 03:20 PM »
Well this is just stupid.
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« jonpauls wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 01:29 PM »
Dont blame Obama

This garbage is all PC government worker tripe intended to cut down on flow.

If JC himself was president, this would have happened.
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« jonpauls wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 01:19 PM »
This gets better. In San Diego the morning news today actually reported that an errant elf in North Pole was the reason given by the Post Office for the crackdown on Christmas cheer.

Now we all know that the organized news has been having a lot of problems with facts, but this is too much.

Never let it be said that here is no solution that the government can't invent a problem for.

This message corrects the previous message clipped by the DNM 'bot

oh and fix the 'bot willya?
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« fatstrat wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 12:45 PM »
Ahh... but this seems to be the real story

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-11-19-north-pole-santa-letter_N.htm

Wonder why this wasn't mentioned in the article...
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« lckn wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 11:39 AM »
WOW no such thing as local mail anymore. I can't believe it is cost effective to send our normal mail to Anch then BACK to FAIRBANKS for delivery.... but now a government agency wants to lie about where something came from????

Didn't a post mark... use to be somekind of record.. or somekind of proof of "something". NOW a postmark means nothing... I hope the IRS will understand when Santa's mail is postmarked from the moon!! and hundreds of years late!!

LIES, LIES, LIES.. This is what we want to teach our future generations?
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« westvalley94 wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 10:42 AM »
I was born and raised in Fairbanks, I now live in Oklahoma. My daughter recieved a letter from NORTH POLE, ALASKA. I knew about the tradition and got my daughter involved, and watching her eyes light up when she saw where the letter was from was something I will rmember forever. But now because we don't celebrate Ramadan with our Muslim Leader, no kids will be able to enjoy what my daughter felt. Long live the Democratic Socialist Party. And glory to the mighty city of Anchorage. North Pole fight for what is yours.
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« Photodude705 wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 10:07 AM »
Thanks for that, oldakcuss. I thought I was the only one who felt that way, particularily about the North Pole office. I call them the US Postal NO Service. Make sure all your coorespondants have the i's dotted and the t's crossed on any mail they send to you, otherwise they'll send it back, even though they have your name on file that clearly shows your correct address.
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« Crikey wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 09:30 AM »
It's time the USPS privatised their service like so many other forward-thinking countries, however that's as likely as the USA adopting the decimal system. This country likes to be seen as a world power but they are so backwards in many ways.
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« schackjj wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 09:14 AM »
Confirming my suspicion: Anchorage is the center of the universe. /snark
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« AKMomma20 wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 08:33 AM »
Join the Facebook Group to support the cause.

http://www.facebook.com/SantaLettersForNorthPoleAK?ref=mf
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« jtay wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 08:30 AM »
If the Postal Service isn't going to send the letters to North Pole for postmarks, why bother sending them to Anchorage. Wouldn't Seattle or Dallas, or LA be just as good? I bet they have larger labor pool in any of those cities than in Anchorage. Lets get back to common sense, North Pole is in North Pole Alaska not Seattle, Dallas, LA, or even Anchorage.
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« thegoodlife wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 08:25 AM »
spacman the point is all our jobs and mail are going to scum town (anchorage) just so they can have more jobs. The hell with North Pole and the rest of us including Christmas.
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« spaceman wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 08:16 AM »
If the postmark isn't being stamped in North Pole, does it really matter whether it's done in Fairbanks or North Pole? Much ado about nothing.
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« Glacierwolf wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 08:08 AM »
Doug Isaacson – you blew an opportunity here.

Used to be a letter dropped off at the North Pole post office would arrive in a PO box (about 50 feet away) that afternoon or get delivered the next day for home delivery. Today that same letter is bagged up, trucked to Anchorage, sorted in Anchorage, trucked back to Fairbanks, sorted, trucked to North Pole, sorted, and delivered 3-4 days later. 3-4 days to travel 50 feet is not progress, efficient, or cost effective.

What the postal service needs to do is fire some of the Anchorage excess staff they obviously have and hire new staff in Fairbanks, North Pole, and modernize the equipment at these two facilities.

I would expect the mayor to look at the situation a bit deeper than the average bear.

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« I_hate_stupid_people wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 08:04 AM »
If Mayor Doug Isaacson had any balls (Christmas balls) he would make this a national issuse. Who F's with the christmas spirit? Well the goverment I guess it run by a Muslim anyways!

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« thegoodlife wrote on Thursday, Nov 19 at 07:57 AM »
Anchorage is nothing but a blood sucking parasite that has no natural resources but wants everything handed to them. How typical, 'we are doing this to make things easier for those poor Fairbanks workers'. We should have cut Anchorage out of the State when we had the chance. Greedy bas..rds.
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