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Siblings Bina and Gary Patel recently opened a PostNet location at 524 North St. The business offers printing and shipping, plus supplies.
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The store offers mailbox services and pickups from a variety of shipping companies.
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The large-scale printers can accommodate banners and customers can also design and print on shirts.

Shipping Business PostNet Opens on North Street

By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
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Look for the banner over the door, next to the A-Mart.

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — You can now design, print, bind and ship all from the same location downtown — and pick up your mail while you're at it.

Siblings Bina and Gary Patel recently opened a PostNet location at 524 North St. The worldwide chain offers shipping, printing and mailbox services.

Gary Patel also owns the convenience store A-Mart right next door.

"PostNet is a one-stop destination for shipping and printing. You can ship your stuff with the multi-carrier, because we offer UPS, FedEx, DHL, and post office, also, and we have a printing press here," Bina Patel said. "So if you want to print something like a brochure, business cards, banners, you can print here, and we also provide the mailbox services here also, so we have a physical mailbox and virtual mailbox both here."

The printers can accommodate large banners and print logos on shirts. The store also has tape, envelopes, other stationery items, packing materials, and shredding services.

The Patels said they were looking into a shipping business and had a friend who used PostNet and liked it. They researched for two years about the business and signed a contract with PostNet in October. 

They said they wanted to their destination to provide customers everything they needed to do, noting shipping services are scarce after FedEx closed its Pittsfield location last year. They had been getting inquiries about FedEx options and UPS, which has a store in Pittsfield and one in Williamstown.

"We just went many times, around here, maybe one UPS Store, even in Berkshire County, we have the A-Mart, and we're trying to make it like one stop," Gary Patel said. "So whoever comes from the hospital, comes for lunch or whatever, and they want to make it one stop to drop a package or something, and that'll help out the community."

The store also provides competitor prices from other carriers for customers to compare.

The store is open from 8 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, with Sunday hours currently by appointment. 

 

Tags: new business,   North Street,   shipping, mailing,   

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Former Miss Hall's Teacher Arraigned on Rape Charges

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff

Warning: this article discusses sexual assault. 
 
PITTSFIELD, Mass. — A former teacher pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to three counts of felony counts rape related to his tenure at Miss Hall's School.
 
Matthew Rutledge, 63, was indicted last month by a Berkshire grand jury following accusations dating back to the 1990s of sexually assaulting students at the girls' school. 
 
"Today, Matthew Rutledge was arraigned for raping me. He began grooming me when I was 15 years old, a student at Miss Hall's School, and his abuse of me continued for years after I left that campus," former student Hilary Simon said to a large crowd outside of Berkshire Superior Court.

"After more than two decades, this case is finally in the hands of the criminal justice system."
 
Simon and Melissa Fares, former students, publicly accused Rutledge of abuse and called out the school for failing to protect them. 
 
They provided testimony at his indictment and, on Wednesday, were in the courtroom to see their alleged abuser arraigned. 
 
Rutledge was working at the day and boarding school until the allegations surfaced nearly three years ago. Pittsfield Police investigated the claims but initially concluded no charges could be brought forward because the students were 16, the age of consent in Massachusetts. 
 
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