Red, rectangular in shape. When we were little Poste Italiane mailboxes they were scattered in every corner of the city. They were indispensable to us for sending postcards, keeping in touch with distant relatives and friends, solving daily or bureaucratic problems. We have all sent or received a letter that we still jealously keep in one of the drawers at home. Years have passed and today the 40 mailboxes in our country have become a true pop icon, symbol of an Italy that exists and continues to resist. But even those "red rectangles" must evolve and keep up with the times, transforming itself through innovation and technology but without forgetting the tradition.
For this reason Poste has decided to do mailboxes become “smart”. present in Italy. The first new generation cassettes have already made their debut in Milan in Via Cordusio, Piazza Duomo and Via Orefici. Soon they will also arrive in Turin, Rome and Naples. The experimental phase foresees the installation of 100 new cassettes, when fully operational all the others will arrive. In fact, by 2022 Poste Italiane expects to reach 12 smart boxes spread throughout Italy.
“In line with its social mission, Poste Italiane continues in parallel with the replacement and maintenance of mailboxes, to redevelop the urban space and the installation of the latest generation mailboxes even in small municipalities. Without a screen, the boxes in municipalities under 5000 inhabitants have the same functionality as the smart boxes". explains the company led by Matteo Del Fante in a note, underlining that the data collected can be consulted on the Poste Italiane website by entering the name of the municipality".
SMART MAILBOXES
Poste Italiane's new mailboxes are equipped with an e-ink screen, similar to the one found on e-readers, thanks to which users will receive useful information. We will be able to know the temperature, the humidity level of the fine particles and other environmental data. There will also be sensors that detect the presence of mail inside and allow Poste to optimize the collection phase, reducing the environmental impact.
"The initiative is consistent with the ESG principles on the environment, social issues and corporate governance, respected by socially responsible companies, which contribute to the sustainable development of the country", highlights Poste.
A BIT OF HISTORY
The traditional red mailboxes we all know just turned 60, but their history is much longer. They appeared for the first time in Italy at the end of the 1886th century, in 100 to be precise, the year in which the Directorate General of the Post Office stipulated a contract with Ettore Calzone's mechanical workshop to produce XNUMX mobile boxes "to be placed in the various of the main railway lines of the Kingdom”. Since then they have followed the evolution of Italian society in all its salient moments, from the world wars to the beginning of the Republic, when the Post Office eliminated the emblem of the Kingdom of Italy from the boxes.
Between 1961 and 1965, the posting boxes with two slots as we know them today arrived, while in 1967 the presenter Corrado emerged from a mailbox in a commercial intended to introduce the Italian postal code: for this campaign, Poste involved testimonials such as Gianni Boncompagni, Raffaella Carrà, Gino Bramieri and Ugo Tognazzi. And we get to today, a moment in which mailboxes are called upon to bear witness to another great revolution, the technological one, maintaining their raison d'être, but becoming "smarter" and more sustainable.
