Marie Bucher takes the reins of the Lovell Post Office

Marie Bucher has taken the big step to become the new postmaster in Lovell, and like her predecessor, Victor Cordes, she will make the commute daily from Powell, where she has been the supervisor at the Powell Post Office.
Bucher couldn’t be happier to be taking the reins of the Lovell Post Office.
“It’s an office with a fabulous staff, so I knew I was going to have hard workers who were going to make the transition an easier transition for me,” she said. “And it’s just a great community.”
Bucher was born and raised in Northeast Florida in the Jacksonville area, attended college at the University of Florida and earned a degree in recreation, parks and tourism. She then worked for the Florida Park Service for 12 years.
Bucher’s husband, Scott, is from Columbia Falls, Montana, so the family moved to Wyoming in 2015 to be closer to his side of the family. Scott is a sound technician for local bands and is a substitute teacher. The Buchers have three children, a daughter who is a sophomore at the University of Montana, a son who is a senior at Powell High School and another daughter in eighth grade at Powell Middle School.
Bucher saw an opportunity to become a part-time clerk at the Powell Post Office when the family made the move in 2015 and was hired, and she held that position for two years, becoming full-time in 2017. She was promoted to supervisor in 2022.
“Other than loaning myself out to some other offices to do some details, all of my work has been at my home office, Powell, for nine years before I got this position,” she said.
The supervisor position has been a good training ground for a postmaster position, Bucher said.
“You’re learning about management level duties, supervising staff, learning how to efficiently run your office and make sure you’re keeping up with budget and work hours and things like that,” she said. “You go from learning how to just manage the mail to learning how to manage a staff of people. It was definitely the right step to prepare me for a postmaster position.”
Bucher said the Lovell job was attractive because it’s within commuting distance and she still has kids in school, noting, “I didn’t want them to have to make any big moves.”
The staff in Lovell has a fabulous reputation, Bucher said, noting that she has known several of the staff members prior to coming over to Lovell.
“All of the post offices in the Basin work closely together, so we’re familiar with one another,” she said. “I knew I was getting a good crew.”
Bucher said she has had to call Cordes a couple of times, usually to ask where he put something, she said with a laugh, or who to talk to about something – “nothing major,” she said.
As a parks and rec major and former state park employee, Bucher loves the outdoors and also likes to cook and garden.
Bucher comes to Lovell with a reputation as a very nice person, and when asked if she’s up to the rigors of the job, she noted, “I think I am prepared for it. I can be firm when I need to and still have positive working relationships with both employees and community members. I definitely work under the mindset that you get a lot further by letting people know what they can do instead of what they can’t do. I want to work under a positive mindset, and sometimes that probably does come across as being too nice, too sweet, too sugary, but that’s just who I am. I don’t think it means that I’m not following rules or not standing my ground in areas where it needs to happen.”
January 27 was Bucher’s first day as postmaster in Lovell, and she worked in both offices for the first two weeks to help with the transition. Her first full-time week in Lovell only started Monday.
“I’m super excited,” she said. “It’s a notch down in stress, which is nice, because Powell was having so many staffing issues and it’s just a larger office. Again, the staff is great. They made the transition so easy, carriers, too. They’re just very welcoming. So yeah, I’m super excited to be here.”