Shipping My Little Ponies - Frustration Grows

Star Warrior

Star Warrior

Night Hawk author
Joined
Jan 23, 2006
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182
I went to the post office today with a question on why their site was suddenly saying that it would cost $9 to send one pony to Canada when on Friday I sent a package of 2 ponies to Canada for $4. The answer - international shipping charges have gone up an average of $2-$3 starting Sunday! :eevil: I couldn't believe it! I asked them to check the package I have (with the one pony) and they did give me a quote that was slightly less than what was online but still.

I can see this really hurting international business. I was wondering if there are pony sellers/traders in the US that are using a different carrier than USPS. If I can find another carrier that charges less, I'd go for it to save people money! This is getting so frustrating. Even packages mailed within the US are going up. It cost $2.25 to ship a small bubble mailer that weighed less than 1 ounce!

Star Warrior
 
Any country that pays customs fees- USPS is the cheapest. We often pay a % of the value over a set amount. UPS/FedEx will charge broker fees above and beyond normal customs charges for bringing your package over the border and essentially "lending" you the money and paying customs. I only received one package from them (I think it was UPS) the total with all the fees/customs combined was almost as much as the lot itself! I had bid with that in mind and won it cheap for around $100 - there was at least $300++ value in the lot. The shipping service likely turned away many bidders. Normally with USPS it would have been a $5 handling fee and 15% of the canadian dollar value at the time. With UPS I think I paid almost $80-$90 just to get my package.

Being in Canada, we experienced postal increases years ago making it much more costly to ship then someone using USPS. Now with the USPS raising rates the postal prices are pretty comparable from many countries so I don't think you have to worry too much about international orders. We're used to paying higher prices when buying from each other. Plus, many ponies like so-softs were only released within the US line so people living in the UK or Europe often buy those from the US or Canada as they aren't as available from sellers local to them. ;)

Oh- when the shipping prices from Canada Post climbed, lots of people stopped buying single ponies/items from me like before, more however would save up and buy multiples together to save on shipping costs. :)
 
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FantasticFirefly is correct about UPS and FedEx. I learned this the hard way. I had to ship a small package to England and ended up paying around $25 (or more?) to ship it through FedEx. The only reason to ship through either of them would be if you needed a package to get there really quickly. Otherwise, USPS is the way to go.
 
The USPS is BILLIONS of dollars in the red right now: they're going to raise prices on everything. They're raising the prices on nearly everything because they really need to.

It's rough, but the USPS is a bushiness, not a government entity. It needs to make ends meet.
 
Actually, the USPS is owned and run by the US government. It's not a private business. However, it is true that they are loosing money. While I'm frustrated by the rising prices, I want to make sure that everyone knows I'm not hateful toward the people of the post office. In fact, I'm friends with some of them. But it is sad that the high prices have made it difficult for some people. I've had several MLP collectors express interest in ponies I have available only to have to turn away because of shipping costs. I completely understand their position (I've been there myself - very frustrating!) and they've always been very respectful. I just want to make sure that I am giving people the best rates possible. If the USPS is the lowest/best to go with, I'm willing to stick it out with them. Let's just hope the rates don't go up any higher for a while.

Star Warrior
 
Very frustrating indeed. I keep having to tell my quotes "yeah, that really is the price" and not helping sales at all. The postal system can't keep going up like this. Yeah, this helps our economy. Blah! :icon_razz1:

I have to add that our small village post office hired new employees this week for the first time in years (old ones are still there too) so I'm not sure what to think on that. Created new jobs but will people ship more to cover the spending?
 
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I've seen posts on Facebook from small crafting companies trying to figure out how to send their stuff internationally. They're not happy either.

The USPS is regulated by the government, but they don't get one cent from federal funds. All their money comes from the sale of their own products and services. Any money they wish they could use is locked into a pre-funded retirement account for their employees. They'd rather have the government let them run the post office like a normal business, without heavy regulations.

So yeah, I don't like big jumps in price increases either.
 
I think it's sad to see the fall of the USPS. :( I hope this price increase helps them get in the black. I hope it doesn't go up again as well!
 
I actually don't really know if this increase will affect international business as much in the long run, but I can say it definitely affects me. I don't know about other international folk, but this is my personal case:
I strive to look for sellers who have at least more than one pony I wouldn't mind getting, to save on shipping. Because of this, and since I normally only collect what I really, really like (and have enough trouble with useless clutter already), I usually buy 2-3 ponies each time. But I also don't buy in bulk, or lots, simply because most of the time I can't afford to. Sure, the price of each pony gets lower in the end, but 95% of the time the final sum is utterly out of my price range, or would cause me to break the bank, which is out of the question.

So to me, at least in theory, and going by what I've observed so far, the rate increases mean that buying anything from the U.S. is just not feasible anymore. :-( ...To tell the truth, I haven't actually tried buying anything since the rates went up, but I'm not very hopeful...
 
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The raised rates have certainly affected me ability to purchase outside of the US. I wish they would create a way to make it cheaper for people who consistently ship either with better online deals or something.
 
I understand why they had to up prices and if shipping within the US it's not a big difference. BUT the international shipping is flipping ridiculous; it's $7 for me to ship a pair of doll pants from my Etsy store and now my pony sales are zilch because most of my buyers are international.

I really wish they had not upped it so much for the under 1 pound rate, if they had gone up only 25% instead of 60% it wouldn't be as bad.

On a happier note I noticed we have new smilies!!:shockpony: :satisfied::flutter::seapony::Barnacle: Wheeee!
 
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Re:

I wouldn't worry about it too much.

As FantasticFirefly said, many other countries have higher shipping costs than the US used to have, and now it's about even. It's been pretty darn expensive to ship things from Sweden for a long time, and while it turns some people away there's others who are still ok paying for it.

Granted I'm not doing loads of buisinesses, and I can imagen it's more noticeable when you do more sales and a bunch of people suddenly stop buying because of higher shippingcosts. But it's not gonna put your selling to a complete halt. I've managed to sell stuff just fine with our insane shipping costs here so I'm sure you guys in the US will be fine aswell. It might take a little while longer to find people who are ok with paying that shippingprice, but there are people out there who are ok with it - or suck it up at least if they really want the item :p

I'm well aware of high shipping costs from say Canada and other countries and that has never stopped me if I really wanted the item.
It's just been a privilige that it's been so cheap to have things shipped from the US up untill now. One that's now gone and now it's just like buying things from any other country in my eyes anyway.
 
dragonlady said:
I understand why they had to up prices and if shipping within the US it's not a big difference. BUT the international shipping is flipping ridiculous; it's $7 for me to ship a pair of doll pants from my Etsy store and now my pony sales are zilch because most of my buyers are international.

I really wish they had not upped it so much for the under 1 pound rate, if they had gone up only 25% instead of 60% it wouldn't be as bad.

On a happier note I noticed we have new smilies!!:shockpony: :satisfied::flutter::seapony::Barnacle: Wheeee!
Click to expand...

Wait, but I just shipped a padded envelope on Saturday (Feb 2) for $2.07. o_O
 
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