The quaint little post office nestled on the bottom floor of the YMCA building takes pride in many things. It is one of only 10 official government post offices located on college campuses in the country, clerk Andrew Miller said.
Recently the MSU post office gained something else to brag about. The local branch was named to the 100 Percent Club and is only the fifth out of 15,000 post offices nationwide to achieve such a status.
Acting postmaster Doug Kyle said the post office gained membership by earning ten 100 percent rankings from mystery shoppers.
“Anonymous people rated their retail experience, the lobby and the clerk,” he said. “We got 10 perfect scores in a row.”
Once a month, a mystery shopper visited the campus post office. Since the clerks never knew which customers were the mystery shoppers, they had to treat every customer as if they were the mystery shopper, Kyle said.
“We deliver every transaction the same way. This means every customer gets a consistent level of service,” he said.
Kyle explained that after the office earned nine perfect scores, there was a lot of added pressure to make 10.
“When (retiring clerk John Tucker) was on the window, we knew we had a 100 with the mystery shopper,” he said.
Although Kyle highlighted Tucker, he also gave credit to the whole team. “This is the home of champions,” he said.
Now that the post office belongs to the 100 Percent Club, they anticipate rewards.
“We are expecting the regional vice president to come take us and our spouses to dinner,” Kyle said.
He also said a plaque would go up in the office, listing every team member’s name that helped the branch earn the award.
Loni Fields, a contributing team member, said the post office earned recognition because it is so “special.”
“The customers make it special. You cannot go anywhere else and find customers like this,” Fields said. “They made it easy to do what we had to do.”