AppleScript to Compress Files and Folders

I had the need to select several folders at once in the Mac OS Finder and zip them up as individual archives. This AppleScript to compress files and folders was the solution I came up with. The script compresses each item selected into its own archive, and works with both folders and files.

tell application "Finder"
    set theItems to selection
    repeat with i from 1 to (count of theItems)
        set theItem to (item i of theItems) as alias
        set itemPath to quoted form of POSIX path of theItem
        set fileName to name of theItem
        set theFolder to POSIX path of (container of theItem as alias)
        set zipFile to quoted form of (theFolder & fileName & ".zip")
        do shell script "zip -jr " & zipFile & " " & itemPath
    end repeat
end tell

As always, you'll get the best results when used with FastScripts by Red Sweater Software.