Ship at the lowest price or inflate shipping?

robotron911

Active member
Joined
Dec 19, 2004
Messages
1,711
Reaction score
14
Location
Commerce Township, Michigan
I'm curious on the opinions here. I've sold alot of stuff on this forum and I have always taken pains to both pack with care and to ship at the lowest cost (particularly because I hate when sellers charge ridiculous shipping prices). Hell, I even custom cut down boxes to fit larger items so that shipping costs are lowered for the buyer. To that point, I normally list prices "plus actual shipping costs".

In the last few months, I've had a tremendous amount of people who PM "send me the total with shipping to xxxxx" for an item(s). I pack whatever is emailed about and get quotes from USPS, FedEx and UPS and then send back the lowest quote. For higher shipping amounts, I usually note the weight and size of the package, so the buyer can confirm the amount on their end if they want to. The "buyers" either just don't reply, say "Wow, I didn't know shipping was so expensive" (do you really think it costs less than $25 to send tube across the country), give the "I found it locally" excuse literally minutes after the quote, etc...

I'm getting tired of all the effort wasted. Would you just list stuff with shipped prices, factoring shipping to the most expensive zips and passing it on to everyone regardless of the actual cost?

Would you also start passing costs of PayPal to the buyer? PayPal is for their convenience and when I see the totals I've paid this year, that's money that comes out of my pocket for the convenience of the buyer. My fees to PayPal this year alone added up to $1700. I can buy a decent pin with that money!

What are your opinions?
 
If you're willing to ship, give prices as "shipped to US". Do a shipping quote out to some village in the middle of Hawaii and add that to your advertised price. Specify that international buyers will have to ask for a quote. You won't get many international buyers, besides Canada, which is usually still cheaper than airdropping something in the Pacific islands. When the shipping is inevitably cheaper than you planned, pocket the difference, or if you're feeling like a good guy, give the buyer a "discount".

Paypal... again, if you want to compensate for it, bump your prices. You definitely should NOT be dealing with paypal as a seller, though. When someone tries to scam you they'll happily cooperate with the scammer.
 
I ship either first class or priority in most cases, since those prices are fairly predictable. If it's big or super heavy going across the country, I guess at about $20 for shipping on that item.

If someone has something for sale that says:

xxx amount of dollars
plus paypal fees
plus actual shipping.

I won't waste my time with it. It'll take a week to get a quote.

list it at $50 shipped, be done with it.
 
Do a shipping quote out to some village in the middle of Hawaii...

Hopefully the "village" has package delivery available by something other than canoe. I mean, I hate it when I'm just chillin in my grass hut and the USPS canoe skips by my house.
 
most stuff i sell i figure in approximate shipping and just list a shipped price. anything that doesn't fit into a flat-rate box (like most PCB's) i ship through FedEx Ground which gives me the lowest rate with insurance, tracking number and delivery confirmation all in one. i'll try to inform the buyer and explain why and if they hate FedEx Ground or want it a lot faster all the way across the country i'll work with them, maybe charge a couple of bucks more.

i've found that charging a flat-rate means you get buyers who already know what the total cost is and aren't "sticker-shocked" at shipping. sure there've been a few times when my rough calculations were off but just as often they've been too high as too low and it all evens out in the end. and nobody complains that i've over-charged them.
 
Hopefully the "village" has package delivery available by something other than canoe. I mean, I hate it when I'm just chillin in my grass hut and the USPS canoe skips by my house.

> Location: Kailua, Hawaii

*slow clap*

Are you serious about the canoe thing, or just being sarcastic? I can't tell.
 
If it fits into a flat-rate box, then the shipping cost is the same everywhere and I just list a "shipped" price.

If not, then I say "plus shipping". I have a postal scale, so I can calculate online pretty quick.

If someone can't figure out that a large item costs more to ship, they probably can't figure out how to PayPal either...
 
i list a price with shipping and paypal fees included and figured in so i still make a profit i am comfortable with. i ship a fair amount of stuff domestically so i have a pretty good idea of what the actual cost will be for most of the things i sell. for overseas stuff i ask a ridiculous handling fee to hopefully get the buyer to reconsider, but if they still want it, thats fine. i hate customs forms and have gotten screwed on overseas orders too many times. i refuse to ship to italy at all.
 
I factor paypal fees in to the cost and then calculate shipping. As Mod said, I try to use Priority Mail flat rate whenever possible. Not only is it usually cheaper, unless it is a really light object, but it gives a fairly predictable cost. I used to wait until somebody asked then calculate shipping, now I try to see if it will fit in a flat rate box and if it will I put the flat rate as comment.

ex:
- Beer Swigging III PCB, working 100%, $350 + shipping (USPS Flat Rate: $14, ask for other options)

I do add in the cost of bubble wrap, anti-static bags, packing tape and other shipping materials into the initial cost.

ken
 
I think "Price Shipped to the Continental US" is the best method. Then people don't have to send a million messages to get a deal done.
 
Back
Top Bottom