Damn it. Either way, I forgot to ask when the wife awoke. She should be home in about 40 minutes for lunch, if I remember I will hit her up then.

And the post office is struggling for many reasons, but the amount of paper mail (or the amount of mail) is the smallest of the problem. The number one issue is the Government will not allow them to operate as any other company would. They are NOT part of the government, have not been for over 40 years, but the government still controls every aspect of what they do.
The thing they are struggling the most with is the governments insistence that they must fund, in its entirety, every persons pension/retirement, in full, when they are fist hired. That alone is costing them millions of dollars a year. It is good that the money will be there for the poeple, but no other company has to do such a ridiculous and costly approach to hiring.
They are also not allowed to control their own prices. That important part of business is regulated by ... you guessed it, the very government that no longer has control of them.
The "non-controlling" government is also not allowing them to cut cost as situations arise. There is no longer any reason for the post office to deliver on Saturdays. No financial institutions are open and most everyone on Medicaid or government assistance gets their "card" funded electronically now. They, the higherups at the PO, asked the government to allow them to go "package only" delivery on Saturdays, still allowing their contract to be covered with Amazon (and other delivery programs such as Fed Ex and UPS), but saving them millions in gas alone and the government, again ... the ones NOT in charge of the USPS ... said no.
These are just a few (there are tons more) of the reasons why the post office is sliding and the "paper/letter reduction" is very far down the list.
And ... wow ... didn't mean to rant, but basically, don't feel bad about using what is there to save money. That was my true reason for posting that.
EDIT - Okay, the wife popped in for lunch and said "no". They will not allow you to send Priority as anything other than Priority. However, your station may turn its head if they chose to as that is not unheard of, but they can get into some deep crapola if busted for allowing you to do so.
Again, if you do chose to cgo that route, just make sure there is no coloring visible that would indicate its a Priority box. I use to do that, like I said, before ordering from DCBS ... now I get nice shipping boxes every month

, so it can be easily done.