Why founders use Auteur
A magazine, a field guide, and now a mailbox. They come from one team, and that is not an accident.
We publish what we build
Auteur started as a publication for founders entering the US market. We write The Auteur Brief, where we analyze the tax, banking, and trade changes that actually hit small businesses, and The Field Guide, a 90-term reference that explains US paperwork for both residents and non-residents.
Every guide entry is written against primary sources, names those sources, and carries a verification date. We hold our mailbox to the same standard: the pricing page shows the whole fee schedule, and the fair use policy is published before launch, so you can read exactly what you would be buying.
We have handled other people's mail before
Our team has run cross-border mail operations in Asia for years. Receiving, sorting, scanning, and forwarding someone else's mail is a discipline. Letters get lost when the process is sloppy, and a lost letter can mean a missed tax deadline. We learned that the careful way, over a long time, before we ever offered a US address.
We are also non-resident founders ourselves. We enter the US market the same way you do, with the same forms and the same questions. That is the perspective the whole product is built from.
Henry reads your mail in your language
US mail is written for people who grew up with it. An IRS notice is frightening until someone tells you it is not a fine, just a question with a deadline. Henry, the AI assistant inside Auteur, does exactly that for every letter: what it says, what it means, and what to do next, in English, Korean, or Spanish.
We build the mailbox software ourselves, so Henry is not a bolted-on feature. The whole inbox is designed around the idea that your mail should explain itself.
Priced against the services you already know
US mailbox pricing comes in two shapes. Aggregators like iPostal1 advertise a low monthly price, then bill every action separately: each scan order, each shred, each deposited check. Flat plans like Stable include the actions and charge a higher base price. We think the flat shape is the honest one, because reading your own mail should not be an upsell.
So we adopted it deliberately, and matched the policies you would compare line by line: a 30-day storage window, the same package limits, the same scanning limits, the same seat model. What remains different is what we chose to compete on. Our plan is $19 a month with all 30 pieces opened, scanned, and summarized. Seats have no cap. Henry works in English, Korean, and Spanish. Check deposits are a flat $2.
If you rarely open your mail, an aggregator plan is genuinely cheaper, and we say so on our comparison pages. And when you need more than a mailbox, an office-grade presence or higher volume, our partner save office runs US virtual offices.
Everything it does, side by side
The same capability list, next to the two services founders usually shortlist. We kept the policies deliberately close, so the differences that remain are the real ones.
| Capability | Auteur Mailbox | Stable | iPostal1 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Available today | Pre-launch. Reserving is free and locks the founding price | Yes | Yes |
| Receive mail and packages | Included. Packages up to 25 lb and 2 ft per side | Included, with the same package limits | Included, larger packages accepted too |
| Envelope photo on arrival | Included | Included | Included |
| Open and scan | Included with every piece | Included within the plan allowance | Paid per request, with a page cap per order |
| Summary and translation | Henry explains every letter in English, Korean, or Spanish | AI summaries in English | Not offered. You read the PDFs |
| Forwarding, US and international | Postage plus a flat $2 per shipment | Postage plus a transaction fee, amount not published | Rates shown at checkout, set by each location |
| Combine items into one shipment | One shipment, one $2 fee | Offered | Letters free to combine, per-item fee for packages |
| Check deposits | $2 per check, flat, postage included | Add-on, priced per check on volume plans | Mail-in to your bank, priced per batch plus scans and tracked shipping |
| Shredding and discarding | Free, with an email first | Included as a plan action | Discarding included, shredding is a paid order |
| Physical storage | 30 days, letters and packages alike | 30 days, all mail | 30 days for letters, shorter for larger packages, then paid storage |
| Recipient names | Unlimited, personal or company | Unlimited | Up to 6, company name on business plans |
| Users | 1 included, $20 a month each after, no cap | 1 included, paid seats, capped at 3 | No per-seat model published |
| Registered agent | Offered, all 50 states at launch, in the same inbox | Offered as an add-on | Offered as an add-on |
| Phone and fax | Not offered. Mail only | Not offered | Offered on their virtual office line |
Verified against Stable's and iPostal1's public pricing and service pages on August 7, 2026. Their terms can change, so check their sites for current details. For the full head-to-heads, read Auteur vs Stable and Auteur vs iPostal1. Registered agent details are on the registered agent page.
Where we are today
Auteur Mailbox is in pre-launch. We are opening in California first, in San Francisco, Silicon Valley, and Los Angeles. Reserving is free, takes about a minute, and locks the founding price. We would rather earn trust by publishing our prices and policies early than by promising dates we cannot keep.
See what the mailbox includes
One plan, one metering rule, and a fee schedule that fits in six lines.