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Shipping prices are insane.

#21
I look at shipping rates everyday for my job, and one thing to alleviate these costs is to never have items shipped to a residence. Ask the person buying your products if they're cool with shipping to a UPS or FedEx store if you're going through those carriers because there's a fee involved with residential shipping. Another expense, which you can't control, is rural fees. They get you on fuel surcharge and a rural fee. So a 10 dollar shipping charge can cost around 28 bucks to ship after fees.
 
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#23
gln1955 said:
Someone has to subsidize Amazon and all the other big online retailers.
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"Free shipping" means that the price of shipping is included in the sale price, and it is the buyer's money that ultimately pays for it.

The exception would be sweet water , it has been discussed here that they take the money for shipping small items that cost less than the actual shipping price , from their selling-staff's commissions.

It is also know that the more volume you ship , the better price you get. So those big companies are most likely getting pretty good rates.
 
#25
AccursedBass said:
Just shipped a bass from CT to TN in a case. $30 for a box, $30 for insurance, $119 for shipping for a total of $179.00. Insane.
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Well, it would cost me roughly $3-400 in fuel, whatever it costs for a cheap motel for a night (if I didn't want to sleep in my van), whatever I spent on food and 2-3 days of driving, if I decided not not to push it and attempt 30+ hrs of driving straight through.
So, I'm guessing 2 days and $500 min. Not to mention another 2000 mi on my vehicle.
To deliver it myself.
$179 doesn't seem like a bad deal to have someone else do it.
 
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#27
Free shipping has everyone's expectations all messed up. Diesel fuel is expensive, trucks are expensive, truck drivers are expensive, jets are expensive, Jet pilots are expensive, sorting equipment is expensive, forklifts are expensive, dockworkers are expensive, tracking equipment and software is expensive. Etc. etc. shipping a bass guitar should not be cheap. It is usually too large to go through a lot of the automated sorting systems, which means it often times has to be sorted by hand, this means people have to do it, and people are more expensive than machines. In addition to that it is generally more fragile and fairly expensive compared to most other packages going through the system, meaning the shipping company is taking more of a risk by accepting it. The potential to damage it is higher, and the potential price of a claim is higher.
 
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#29
Michedelic said:
You should have just gone with USPS on that one.
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Yeah, but that would have required me to drive 2 whole miles to the post office downtown, and it was cold, wet, and rainy, and I was being lazy. And I thought "how expensive could a 1 lb box be?". Now I know.

I remember growing up that a UPS truck delivering to a home in the neighborhood was an unusual, noteworthy event. (And I did not grow up in a small town.) Now I do live in a small town, and UPS/FedEx deliveries here are just as common as they were when I lived in metro areas a few years ago. We all know the drivers by sight, and in some cases by name. The point is that there's no lack of volume in the number of shipments that would justify the additional expense they are charging for packages that do not fall outside the norm for size and weight into areas where they aren't making special trips. This feels like a gouge, pure and simple.
 
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#30
bherman said:
Check out www.pirateship.com. I just shipped a bass from CO to MA in a 52"x18"x7" box in a gig bag, weight was 16 lbs, cost me $69 total - free box from my local music store (I check behind there every week or so and snag boxes when they get shipments in), shipping cost was $53.38. oversize (length) cost was $11.75, $500 insurance was $4.00. It went via UPS Ground, same as if you ship direct with UPS. I recently bought a bass from a guy in Ohio, he double-boxed it. His original quote from UPS was $120, he then went on to use Pirateship and sent it to me for $70 total cost. UPS charges really high rates if you ship directly with them, unless you have a special commercial rate agreement.

If you can't find good boxes for free, go to FedEx or UHaul. They both sell guitar boxes for around ten bucks.
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YEP, this^^^^^^^ For the umpteen Jillionth time, lol. I use them a LOT. USPS or UPS. Their prices are EXACTLY the same as when I ship on Ebay (as an Ebay seller I get excellent freight rates). This is how I ship the things I sell right here on TB. I hope they last a looooooooong time. They also give updates as to if/when rates go up AND.... believe it or not, when rates FALL (yes......still happens).
 
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#32
bherman said:
Check out www.pirateship.com. I just shipped a bass from CO to MA in a 52"x18"x7" box in a gig bag, weight was 16 lbs, cost me $69 total - free box from my local music store (I check behind there every week or so and snag boxes when they get shipments in), shipping cost was $53.38. oversize (length) cost was $11.75, $500 insurance was $4.00. It went via UPS Ground, same as if you ship direct with UPS. I recently bought a bass from a guy in Ohio, he double-boxed it. His original quote from UPS was $120, he then went on to use Pirateship and sent it to me for $70 total cost. UPS charges really high rates if you ship directly with them, unless you have a special commercial rate agreement.

If you can't find good boxes for free, go to FedEx or UHaul. They both sell guitar boxes for around ten bucks.
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Never heard of this service and it sounds too good to be true. There are some horror stories on TrustPilot; seems like half the users give one star and the other half gives five stars, so maybe you've been lucky.

PIRATE SHIPS - PIRATESHIP.COM is rated "Average" with 3 / 5 on Trustpilot
 
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#34
bobcruz said:
Never heard of this service and it sounds too good to be true. There are some horror stories on TrustPilot; seems like half the users give one star and the other half gives five stars, so maybe you've been lucky.

PIRATE SHIPS - PIRATESHIP.COM is rated "Average" with 3 / 5 on Trustpilot
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I've been using them for 6 months, probably shipped 15-20 packages large and small, including USPS, no problems at all. In some ways using them is easier than using the shipper's websites directly. Easier to pay, easier to print labels, easier to track. How they do it is very simple - deep discounts as a result of high volume. My son owns a business that does a lot of business with FedEx, on the order of $150k/yr, 99% via FedEx Ground. They negotiate a new contract every year, his most recent deal with them resulted in rates that are about 30-35% of advertised rates (ie, what full retail customers pay). I assume that PirateShip does the same thing - and has created a business out of it.
 
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#37
bherman said:
Check out www.pirateship.com. I just shipped a bass from CO to MA in a 52"x18"x7" box in a gig bag, weight was 16 lbs, cost me $69 total - free box from my local music store (I check behind there every week or so and snag boxes when they get shipments in), shipping cost was $53.38. oversize (length) cost was $11.75, $500 insurance was $4.00. It went via UPS Ground, same as if you ship direct with UPS. I recently bought a bass from a guy in Ohio, he double-boxed it. His original quote from UPS was $120, he then went on to use Pirateship and sent it to me for $70 total cost. UPS charges really high rates if you ship directly with them, unless you have a special commercial rate agreement.

If you can't find good boxes for free, go to FedEx or UHaul. They both sell guitar boxes for around ten bucks.
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This right here. Pirateship is the only way I ship basses anymore.
 
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#38
bobcruz said:
Never heard of this service and it sounds too good to be true. There are some horror stories on TrustPilot; seems like half the users give one star and the other half gives five stars, so maybe you've been lucky.

PIRATE SHIPS - PIRATESHIP.COM is rated "Average" with 3 / 5 on Trustpilot
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It's not too good to be true. I use them all the time and they're excellent. In fact, I had a bass damaged by UPS and PirateShip had me reimbursed in less than 2 weeks. Here's the thread about it if you're interested.
https://www.talkbass.com/threads/bass-damaged-by-ups-surprisingly-easy-claim-experience-so-far.1589280/
 
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#40
It went up QUICKLY when the pandemic hit, since intense demand meant shippers could practically charge whatever. Doubt it'll back down any time soon, since shipping companies made BANK and boards/shareholders expect those wild pandemic profits now.

USPS is gonna be cheaper, most of the time. Current management is doing some (to me) confusing routing on packages, but it all gets there in the end.
 
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