The now-three week old Canada Post strike has caused some amount of headache for everyone, no matter if it's someone looking to send packages across the country or businesses waiting to either receive stock or send some out to customers.

But despite those challenges, some local businesses are expressing support for the workers involved in the ongoing labour dispute.

Vicki Tompkins, owner of For Women Only, a local women's clothing store, said she has a number of products on hold, namely shoes and clothes.

"There's certainly fill-in orders that I just can't fill in," she said. "They can't get here."

Tompkins said she is empathetic to the workers involved in the strike, though, noting that everybody wants fair wages.

"Hopefully they will come to some agreeable solution," she added. 

Tompkins added that those workers are essential to smaller communities across Canada.

Where bigger corporations like FedEx and UPS can offer reasonable rates in bigger cities, it leaves Canada Post to the smaller communities, she said.

"(Canada Post is) very important to us," she said.

She also agreed that the holidays are an important time of the year for local businesses.

"This is the season for everybody where, hopefully, you've got most of your bills paid and you might actually make some money," she said.

Jennifer Baerg Steyn, owner of Yellowknife Books, said that although the strike has had a minimal impact on the store so far, it has had an impact on some of its smaller suppliers.

"In the cases where the withdrawal of a sale would be detrimental to the supplier, we have opted to support the supplier by paying and waiting until the strike ends to maintain our relationship," Steyn said in an e-mail response to SA国际影视传媒.

And much like Tompkins, Steyn shared her support the right to strike, noting the nature of a strike itself is meant to be a discomfort.

Canada Post has presented the union representing some 55,000 striking postal workers with a framework to reach negotiated agreements, the corporation said. 

A statement issued Sunday said the framework includes proposals to bring greater flexibility to Canada PostSA国际影视传媒檚 delivery model and shows SA国际影视传媒渕ovement on other key issuesSA国际影视传媒� in the labour dispute thatSA国际影视传媒檚 stretching into the holiday season. 

SA国际影视传媒淚t is our hope that these proposals will reignite discussions and, together with the support of mediators, help the parties work toward final agreements,SA国际影视传媒� said the statement, which was provided to media over email. 

It said the framework was presented to the union earlier on Sunday. 

The Canadian Union of Postal Workers said on its website that its negotiators are reviewing the framework documents, and noted the union and Canada Post have both adjusted their demands in the hope of restarting talks. 

However, the statement said there has been no word from the mediator that talks will resume. And while it said the union is ready for a re-start, it said the framework did not appear to take into account the labour ministerSA国际影视传媒檚 comments about the agreement needing to be SA国际影视传媒渞atifiable.SA国际影视传媒� 

The strike began on Nov. 13 and is threatening the key holiday season as Canadians hold off on mailing cards and gifts or search for alternatives. 

A key issue in bargaining has been a push to expand parcel deliveries into the weekend, but the union and Canada Post are at odds over how to make it work. 

Federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon temporarily suspended mediation last week, saying negotiations had not budged, but sending the matter to binding arbitration was SA国际影视传媒渘ot in the cards,SA国际影视传媒� he said. 

On Sunday, MacKinnon said in a social media post heSA国际影视传媒檇 spoken with both sides earlier in the day, reminding them it is their duty to resolve their differences in the dispute. 

He said mediation would only resume if the special mediator has clear evidence both sides have sufficiently modified their positions. 

SA国际影视传媒淯nfortunately, there has been no such evidence to date,SA国际影视传媒� MacKinnon said in the post.