There’s an old saying about packing for college: If it’s too much for one trip in the car, then it’s just too much. I’m sure that’s true for many people and their cars, but let’s say it doesn’t work for you. What can you do?
You can take advantage of stores like Target and Walmart, which have been working with parents and students for years. Walmart tends to send your items in one package, while Target will send you every item (so it seems) separately, each from a different, far-flung corner of America. That’s because Target uses its stores to fulfill their orders, as opposed to the centralized airplane hangars that Amazon uses to store items.
Reviews of the services are mixed, and they’re likely to be overloaded since the shuttering of Bed, Bath & Beyond, which had a similar program as Target and Walmart. Sending things directly through UPS or FedEx can have its problems, but they’re not insurmountable. Your college student just has to find out the details of where packages get dropped off.
If receiving packages is a nightmare at the school, like it is for so many of us who are inconvenienced by Amazon’s blind spots, there are Amazon lockers in a surprisingly large number of vacations — but you can’t use them unless you have the app installed on the phone and you have the phone with you.
It might be a good idea to get a street address for your kid at a UPS store. That way, they can receive non-postal packages and avoid the scheme at their school if need be. The rates are not that bad, but it’s another long-term contract to be involved in.
Parents can debate about whether kids should work or not while carrying four or five university courses on their back, but I think it’s important to not make your kids envision themselves in poverty, at least until their unavoidable freak-out from leaving home resolves.
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