Maybe it’s because I am a home brewer, but I love the idea of strolling down to the pub and collecting my mail. That’s what you can do in the UK now thanks to the UK’s Royal Mail and www.useyourlocal.com.

According to useyourlocal.com there are 52 pubs a week closing due to the tough financial conditions. Together with the Royal Mail, they are giving pubs another service option which hopefully means they do more business and stay open as an integral part of their local community. Already 500 pubs have signed up for the service.

I also love this as a PR story. It has everything – a real human connection, big business support, a topic that is close to the heart of a nation and a great outcome – and they have been getting media attention from all over the UK to boot.

This idea kicks goals for everyone because the businesses involved fit so perfectly together in terms of what they can contribute and get out of the equation.

Royal Mail gets ‘Post Offices’ that open longer, in more locations, and parcels delivered the first time (their big issue solved for them). The receiver of the parcel gets to pick it up at a time and location that suits them (ditto). The local pub gets to offer more to the local community which gives the customer another reason to visit and the possibility of buying more product from the landlord (and ditto again).

It’s interesting that it took a global financial crisis to make something like this happen – adversity is the mother of invention and all that. The Royal Mail has always had the same issue of some 40 million unsuccessful first-time delivery attempts per year but hadn’t found a solution to the problem until now.

If you want to craft a new service or opportunity and want to know what will make it appeal to customers and the media alike, this is a great example of what to do.

The companys website says:

At UseYourLocal we truly believe that local pubs and clubs can be a real force for good in our local villages, towns and cities and hope that this is just the first in a series of great ideas aimed at finding creative solutions to help breathe life back into local communities.

I for one am looking forward to the next instalment.

What do you think?

• A clever idea or just encouraging more alcohol consumption?
• What is the Australian equivalent – dry cleaning pick ups at the footy?