Small businesses rely on the Postal Service to survive the pandemic. Delays put them in peril.

Nolan said these delays came as her business was nearly 75 percent back to where it was prior to the pandemic.“Most of us have taken cuts to salary, we’ve laid off 10 people, but we’d made it almost work for two months and were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel,” she said, “and then the delays started happening.”Nolan is one of many businesses across the country hit hard by the Postal Service’s shipping delays, which received widespread attention because of claims that the Trump administration had orchestrated the slowdown to impede vote-by-mail efforts.The National Small Business Association polled its members this week to see how many had experienced such delays. The senator’s office said it received more than 7,300 responses from all 50 states: 690, or about 9.5 percent, were from small businesses facing challenges because of the delays.This site is protected by recaptcha Privacy Policy | Terms of Service“It’s clear that the policies directed by Postmaster General DeJoy have hurt people who use the Postal Service as a lifeline for everyday needs, including Michigan small businesses that are facing customer complaints and are losing profits due to delivery issues and delays,” Peters said Wednesday, promising to press the postmaster general when he testifies before the Senate on Friday.Cassidy Lavender’s health and wellness business is certainly seeing the effects described by Peters. It had to close its store in Portland, Oregon, to shoppers because of the pandemic and has remained viable because it was able to grow its already substantial shipping business.But with online retailers like Amazon already able to undercut them on book prices, CEO Emily Powell, the granddaughter of the bookstore’s founder, said Powell’s will struggle to retain customers if it has to raise shipping prices on them or force them to deal with nebulous shipping delays.The Postal Service delays aren’t just a question of margins, Powell said, but the ability of American communities to survive the pandemic and the shifting economy.“The USPS is absolutely a lifeline, not just to us, but to every small business across America,” she said.