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ROUND ROCK, Texas — For more than a decade, Shelley Leatham has been creating and shipping weighted pom-poms, or “pound poms,” to customers across the country.
But it wasn’t until January that she started running into roadblocks with shipping.
The Round Rock business owner works for a manufacturing company in Wharton, Texas, about 90 miles southeast of Houston. Leatham said her company makes the pom poms and weights and ships them to her home, where they are assembled and sent to her customers.
“It takes about four to eight minutes to decide on a set,” Leatham said.
For Leatham, a former college cheerleader and personal trainer for 30 years, this is a venture she considers her pride and joy.
“I realized how much fun it would be to do some fun training, like hitting under the guise of cheerleading,” Leatham said.
After gaining a foothold as an entrepreneur, business was mostly smooth sailing. When a customer orders “PoundPoms,” Leatham always guarantees her two-week shipping.
However, that promise was no longer possible when the manufacturer discovered that the January shipment was delayed.
Leatham had used FedEx to pick up the package, but later discovered that it had been picked up by the United States Postal Service (USPS). This is because USPS has had a long-standing partnership with FedEx for certain packages.
“For me, that’s just part of my integrity. And this is a small business and you only get one chance. It takes one mistake before someone says, ‘I’m not going to do business with that person.’ ”’ Leatham said.
There, Leatham learned that the Houston area had been experiencing significant delays and other issues with postal service in recent weeks. She then immediately informed her customers that she was working on shipping their orders.
Related: Last month, I shipped 11 air-tagged packages via Priority Mail. This is where they went.
It took about a month for Leatham to receive her package.
“Maybe it doesn’t affect a lot of people who run large companies, but maybe it doesn’t affect small business owners? You’re dependent on that process,” Leatham said. Ta.
Leatham hopes her business doesn’t hit any more roadblocks and can continue to send out “PoundPoms” on time as promised.
“It doesn’t leave a bad taste in my mouth, but I think that’s something I’m very conscious of right now,” Leatham said.
In response to issues in the Houston area, the USPS Office of Inspector General has been asked to investigate by numerous elected officials.
Earlier this week, U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), whose jurisdiction stretches from Austin to Houston, sent a letter asking questions about what exactly happened and what could happen. was sent to the postmaster. We should do something about that.
If you have a problem with the postal service, you can email KVUE at mailproblems@kvue.com.
RELATED: USPS mail delays could soon become a nationwide problem, says lawmaker
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