SOUTH PORTLAND – Netflix Inc. CEO Reed Hastings was in Maine on Tuesday for the formal opening of one of the company’s newest “hubs.”

The world’s largest online DVD movie rental service said the new distribution center will reduce shipping times to consumers in Maine. Before the new facility opened last spring, Mainers received Netflix DVDs from a hub in Worcester, Mass.

Sen. Susan Collins, who joined Hastings at the ribbon cutting, said the business is one reason she has been working on postal reform.

“If they don’t have predictable affordable postal rates, it throws off their entire business plan. So if they have an unexpected increase in postal rates, they can’t turn around and increase their subscription rates that they’ve charged,” Collins said.

The postal reform bill will tie postal rates to the consumer price index, making rates more steady and increases more predictable.

Hastings, a Bowdoin College graduate, founded Netflix in 1997. All told, Netflix ships 1.4 million DVDs a day from 40 hubs across the U.S.