Feb. 16, 2015—The U.S. Postal Service is in the market for roughly 180,000 new mail-carrying vehicles, and is asking automakers to place bids to develop a commercial van that will replace the 200,000 Grumman Long Live Vehicles currently in use, according to a report from the Automotive News.
The Postal Service is willing to spend between $25,000–$35,000 per vehicle, which values to the contract for potential bidders up $6.3 billion.
The new mail-carrying vehicles are asked to have low costs of upkeep, and good fuel economy, as the Postal Service fleet consumed 154 million gallons of gasoline last year alone. The payload capacity is also asked to be at least 1,500 lbs, and offer 155 cubic feet of cargo space to better accommodate the large packages sent by way of online shopping.
