Why does the price of shipping/handling cost $$$$

[jlift]

I went to detailcity.com to try and order some SSR1 (just need one bottle) and placed it into my cart and applied the discount, but the shipping/handling came to $7.95. I find that shipping/handling, wherever I go for detail products is roughly more than 1/2 of the price of the item. Of course, this is not "true shipping" costs. It's getting prohibitive for me to actually order. Can anyone gie some thoughts on paying this much for shipping/handling? I live in California. I think that to SHIP one bottle of this stuff to me would be less than $3-4, AT MOST. Why does this have to be this way????? I would like to order a lot more online because some of this stuff I just can't get elsewhere (Poorboy's I think can only be ordered online, so you are "hooked" into whatever prices they want to charge).

Frustrated at the costs!

Jack in WC

 

[JaredPointer]

It seems like it's the price you gotta pay if you want certain things. I don't know what all goes into calculating a price on shipping & handling. It makes me wonder sometimes when place A charges $7+ to ship and place B charges $5. Both places package the same way, ship in the same amount of time, etc.

Then again, it's only a couple dollar difference. Nothing I get too flustered over.

 

[wifehatescar]

Save up and buy in bulk. You could go poor buying a bottle at a time.

 

[jlift]

Save up and buy in bulk. You could go poor buying a bottle at a time.

Well, I don't detail for a living, just my own vehicles. So buying in bulk is not an option for me. And to spend that much more in order to save $3 on shipping is kind of silly. )I did notice that if I want one gallon of the product the shipping would be $11.95). A savings for sure, but then I would have a gallon of stuff when I would rather have several other smaller sizes of different products. I don't want to lock myself in to one product. It would probably take me a few years to go through a gallon.

 

[PhaRO]

Most chemicals are shipped using UPS and FedEX. It most likely costs more than $3-4 for them to ship a 1lb package. In addition there is handing costs. Packing material and labor is not going to free.

 

[Focusedonsound]

You may want to try another one of the poorboys distributors. It maybe more cost effective to order some additional products.

http://www.poorboysworld.com/distributors.htm

On a side note. I work for a VERY VERY large mail order/ internet retailer and understand things a bit better so I will try and elaborate.

When dealing with shipping companies gennerally some type of deal is worked out as to using them exclusivly which in turn gives the person shipping a better rate. Allowing them to provide you the customer with a better rate.

Now ..I know with my company we have a shipping structure that looks like this.

All standard orders = $6.95
UPS 2 Day air = $16.95
UPS Next day saver = $25.95 (arrives any time the following day)
UPS Next day Air = 33.95 (Arrives before noon)

Gennerally what ends up happening is that sometimes a customer will order 1 product (like you) and honestly get ripped off on shipping however there are people who will buy tons of product and only pay $6.95.

So in the end its suposed to all equal out for the company however it never does and the company usually always takes a loss in this dept.

As I always like to say "Somtimes your the Fly and some times your the Windshield" you just have to bite the bullet and get what you need!

(It is incentive however to order maybe an additional product or 4 to add to your collection)

 

[Mr. Clean]

Most chemicals are shipped using UPS and FedEX. It most likely costs more than $3-4 for them to ship a 1lb package. In addition there is handing costs. Packing material and labor is not going to free.

jlift, You mentioned "true shipping costs", PhaRO mentioned some of the things which go into calculating "true shipping costs". I agree that it is costly to purchase online when adding in the shipping costs which often outweigh the cost of tax plus gas to purchase locally OTC. BUT, if you can't get what you want locally you have to make the decision...do you want the product or not. I rarely purchase a single item. I will try to combine several products in an order to help lessen the "ouch" of shipping. Maybe check out some other products to add to your order...maybe a couple of nice MF towels, an interior product, tire/wheel product, a wax or sealant etc.

 

[norahcrv]

Maybe if you put your location in your profile, somebody in your area could contact you if they were willing to share an order with you and split the shipping charges.

 

[Jngrbrdman]

Gas is also $3 bucks a gallon right now. When fuel costs double then shipping costs typically go up as well. It is the same no matter what you order that requires transportation. I am shocked that there are as many companies that there are who are willing to absorb the additional shipping expenses and not jack up the price on everything that consumers buy. Gas prices affect everything.

 

[CharlesW]

Some things I always try to keep in mind.
When you buy online, the product is delivered to your door.
Going to the store to pick it up isn't free.
Going to two or three stores when the first one or two are out of the product not only adds to that cost, it tends to aggravate me more than a little.
Giving some thought to the items you want to order can spread the cost out over several items so it doesn't make one product prohibitively expensive.
FWIW, I don't always follow that advice and sometimes end up paying $20, (including shipping), for a $12 product. It doesn't have to be that way, but my impatience somtimes keeps me from waiting until I have a decent order quantity. I think I have it have it now!

Charles

 

[kaos]

Cost for "Joe Shipper" to ship a 1 lb. 8" square box from FL to CA via UPS: $8.70
Cost for Dwayne: Prolly in the neighborhood of 50-60% of that, depending on level of activity and therefore rate offered by UPS.

Cost for an 8" square box: $0.31 at uline.com in quantities of 1000+

Cost for packing peanuts to fill the box: Prolly in the neighborhood of a dime.

Cost for somebody to get a box off the shelf, assemble it, collect the products for an order, pack, close, and label said box: Prolly $1.00 or so?

The alternative, for cheaper or free shipping: Higher prices, and no DC discount.

 

[joe.p]

Some things I always try to keep in mind.
When you buy online, the product is delivered to your door.
Going to the store to pick it up isn't free.
Going to two or three stores when the first one or two are out of the product not only adds to that cost, it tends to aggravate me more than a little.
Giving some thought to the items you want to order can spread the cost out over several items so it doesn't make one product prohibitively expensive.
FWIW, I don't always follow that advice and sometimes end up paying $20, (including shipping), for a $12 product. It doesn't have to be that way, but my impatience somtimes keeps me from waiting until I have a decent order quantity. I think I have it have it now!

Charles

You have said this many times. I was all over the other day trying to find Megs NXT glass cleaner 2- murrays, 1-autozone and K-mart.These exact words you mention in older threads had come back to haunt me. and i still never found the glass cleaner. I settled for Stoner IG,spray bottle this time.

 

[jdoria]

Did anyone think of extra profit? Thats all I think about.

$12.00 bottle of "X" - profit $3.12.
$7.95 shipping + handling - profit $3.00.

Now Mr. "P" made $6.12 on the sale vs. $3.12. Roughly 100% more.

 

[JaredPointer]

Did anyone think of extra profit? Thats all I think about.

$12.00 bottle of "X" - profit $3.12.
$7.95 shipping + handling - profit $3.00.

Now Mr. "P" made $6.12 on the sale vs. $3.12. Roughly 100% more.

Yes, that's what I was vaguely referring to when I said one place can ship for $4.95 when another will ship similar products for $7.95. I think that's what a lot of places probably do, though, and who can blame them.

We're still jibber-jabberin' over a couple of bucks, which would be negated by the time you paid local sales tax and the gas & time to go get it locally.

It pretty much comes down to the fact that if you want a certain product that's only available through mail order, you'll pay shipping & handling costs.

You could always get what you need at Wal-Mart.

 

[wifehatescar]

Well, I don't detail for a living, just my own vehicles. So buying in bulk is not an option for me. And to spend that much more in order to save $3 on shipping is kind of silly. )I did notice that if I want one gallon of the product the shipping would be $11.95). A savings for sure, but then I would have a gallon of stuff when I would rather have several other smaller sizes of different products. I don't want to lock myself in to one product. It would probably take me a few years to go through a gallon.

Didn't necessarily mean get a gallon, maybe get a couple other 16oz size products, etc. Buy 5 bottles once a year rather than one bottle each month seperately.

 

[Focusedonsound]

Did anyone think of extra profit? Thats all I think about.

$12.00 bottle of "X" - profit $3.12.
$7.95 shipping + handling - profit $3.00.

Now Mr. "P" made $6.12 on the sale vs. $3.12. Roughly 100% more.

I work for a large Mail order/ Internet company so I understand how this process works.

Here is how the cost of shipping is figured out.

Im going to use my company as an example however I won’t use the name of the company as I’m not trying to get a free advertising plug!

The cost of picking and packing & packaging materials for us is not included in the cost of shipping that is fixed into the profit margin.

How shipping works

We (for example) have made deals with US Post Office, and UPS. We have had much success some people will say Fed EX is better or Airborne however it all comes down to what kind of deal they are willing to offer.

Now we charge $6.95 For standard shipping on ANY order that means you could be ordering 1 item for $4.99 or you could order 50 items @ $4.99ea we will still ship out your order for $6.95!

So where we might be making a few $$ shipping out the smaller orders that money is quickly absorbed by those orders that are costing us extra $$ to ship out. Generally at the end of the day the difference is to the customer’s advantage and the retailer has to pony up a few extra bucks for shipping.

I used to have pictures of our warehouse shipping operations however I can’t seem to locate them now. However our operations are very very large our warehouse houses in upwards of 1 million different sku’s and on any given day we ship somewhere between 5-10,000 orders. We have 2 80,000sq ft warehouses that hold bulk merchandise which we pull from as needed to fill our primary picking locations. Our Building which houses our Daily operations is a 500,000sq foot building which consists of approx 20,000sq feet of office space and the remainder is made up of shipping operations. The racking in the warehouse has been made to have a second floor so that we can have plenty of Primary picking locations however even with this much space to accommodate we still run out of primary picking locations when we try to bring in new product. We are constantly making our operations bigger to accommodate our customers!

There you have it .... Why it costs $6.95 for shipping in a nutshell!

 

[Mr. Clean]

...BUT, if you can't get what you want locally you have to make the decision...do you want the product or not....

...It pretty much comes down to the fact that if you want a certain product that's only available through mail order, you'll pay shipping & handling costs.

This is the crux of this biscuit.

From my perspective,the cost of picking up products locally is overstated, unless you live out in the boonies. I generally group my shopping trips such that rarely am I out for the sole purpose of purchasing one product. For example, if Steve changed his business model to the point of having his products stocked on local shelves, I would be purchsing OTC vs paying the extra cost of S&H.

 

[Flyin'Hawaiian]

SOME shippers will ship via US Postal Priorty using "Flat Rate" boxes. As far as the USPS is concerned, what ever you can stuff into a "flat rate" box goes for $7.70 or $9.90 depending on the box size used.

Not ever vendor is comfortable using USPS...Their tracking system (if you can call it that) sucks big coconuts.

I have not had a bad experience having stuff shipped to me using US Postal Priority, but now that I've said it, I probably jinx'ed myself BIG TIME!

You may have heard the saying, "Lucky you live Hawaii." Well, when it comes to shipping stuff..."LUCKY YOU DON'T LIVE HAWAII!"

Between my 'Stang (306-twin turbo streeter) and my F150 SCrew I can honestly say I've got more than 3K tossed away in shipping costs only.

Most vendors are decent guys trying to make a living just like all of us. In most instances, they need to pay what their shipping company asks, maybe with a discount thrown in for exclusive use of one shipper over another.

 

[Poorboy]

Cost for "Joe Shipper" to ship a 1 lb. 8" square box from FL to CA via UPS: $8.70
Cost for Dwayne: Prolly in the neighborhood of 50-60% of that, depending on level of activity and therefore rate offered by UPS.

Cost for an 8" square box: $0.31 at uline.com in quantities of 1000+

Cost for packing peanuts to fill the box: Prolly in the neighborhood of a dime.

Cost for somebody to get a box off the shelf, assemble it, collect the products for an order, pack, close, and label said box: Prolly $1.00 or so?

The alternative, for cheaper or free shipping: Higher prices, and no DC discount.

Yes, it can be costly to buy one item at a time, but a lot of the figures guessed at here are WAY off...

First to look at the example quoted above...if it cost the average Joe to ship from Fl to CA $8.70 it will cost Dwayne $7.50 , unless he has a deal I can't find.
Yes, the box from u-line is .31, and I use u-line too, but the shipping to get the box is incredible, especially for me. I just ordered $152 in shipping supplies today and the shipping to me is $57, a couple weeks ago i order $250 in supplies and the shipping charge was $77. So the .31 box is no longer $.31. Peanuts I buy in 20 cu ft. for $24 plus shipping and it's too big to go UPS or FedEx , extra charge... I get 15 to 20 packages per bag, that's about $1 to $1.25 per package and then there is the buble wrap. It's not cheap if you use the good stuff...I use 1/2" stuff so your stuff arrives in one piece no matter what happens along the way, not sure which size Dwayne uses. Tape ..yes it's just a few more cents but it adds up too.
Now to the fun stuff...you live in a rural area of Cincitucky $3.85 surchage to deliver to your home. I just sent a package from NY to PA and my cost of shipping alone was $10.02 without the box, peanuts, bubble wrap, tape, my time and the pick-up weekly fee from FedEx. Yes, if you order just one item and send it to your work address in a major city, I might come out a little ahead, but it doesn't happen as often as you might think. One more example is a member of this board, who will go un-named who is a good customer of mine...he bought 4 gallons plus numerous other items, had a fairly large bill, received free shipping, a t-shirt, a few other goodies and his shipping alone was over $50, so he wins on all accounts.
We (shippers) don't have the time to figure out each person exact cost as maybe someone shipping 2-3 packages a day could, and we have to figure on the average cost to ship a package of certain weight to almost anywhere in the USA without losing our shirts and going out of business which would not benefit anyone. The sponsors of this site try to give incentives in one way or another, but we do have our bills to pay and like to eat too. (I know I do ).
Just one more note, the USPS system does not like taking liquids and they have horrible tracking system.There is also a cost to drive there, and to wait in line, which would also then have to be added to your bill in one way or another.
OK just one more note..use a credit card that gives you rewards or cash back and just having it delivered to your door is also a discount in my book.

 

[Focusedonsound]

Yes, it can be costly to buy one item at a time, but a lot of the figures guessed at here are WAY off...

First to look at the example quoted above...if it cost the average Joe to ship from Fl to CA $8.70 it will cost Dwayne $7.50 , unless he has a deal I can't find.
Yes, the box from u-line is .31, and I use u-line too, but the shipping to get the box is incredible, especially for me. I just ordered $152 in shipping supplies today and the shipping to me is $57, a couple weeks ago i order $250 in supplies and the shipping charge was $77. So the .31 box is no longer $.31. Peanuts I buy in 20 cu ft. for $24 plus shipping and it's too big to go UPS or FedEx , extra charge... I get 15 to 20 packages per bag, that's about $1 to $1.25 per package and then there is the buble wrap. It's not cheap if you use the good stuff...I use 1/2" stuff so your stuff arrives in one piece no matter what happens along the way, not sure which size Dwayne uses. Tape ..yes it's just a few more cents but it adds up too.
Now to the fun stuff...you live in a rural area of Cincitucky $3.85 surchage to deliver to your home. I just sent a package from NY to PA and my cost of shipping alone was $10.02 without the box, peanuts, bubble wrap, tape, my time and the pick-up weekly fee from FedEx. Yes, if you order just one item and send it to your work address in a major city, I might come out a little ahead, but it doesn't happen as often as you might think. One more example is a member of this board, who will go un-named who is a good customer of mine...he bought 4 gallons plus numerous other items, had a fairly large bill, received free shipping, a t-shirt, a few other goodies and his shipping alone was over $50, so he wins on all accounts.
We (shippers) don't have the time to figure out each person exact cost as maybe someone shipping 2-3 packages a day could, and we have to figure on the average cost to ship a package of certain weight to almost anywhere in the USA without losing our shirts and going out of business which would not benefit anyone. The sponsors of this site try to give incentives in one way or another, but we do have our bills to pay and like to eat too. (I know I do ).
Just one more note, the USPS system does not like taking liquids and they have horrible tracking system.There is also a cost to drive there, and to wait in line, which would also then have to be added to your bill in one way or another.
OK just one more note..use a credit card that gives you rewards or cash back and just having it delivered to your door is also a discount in my book.

Steve you make A LOT of great points here my example as stated above is very simalar however on a lil larger scale. Fortunatly for my company being that we are shipping SO MUCH daily. UPS, and USPS drop off a Trailer in the morning, and depending on the season pick the trailer up at noon and drop off a new one for that afternoon. So the cost of us acutally driving to the post office in not there however the cost of having UPS and USPS drop off a trailer each day is factored into that shipping cost.

You also made mention of credit cards! Which made me think of another point. (And yes its somewhat the cost of doing business but still another detail to think about) As a Internet based business you are not left with many options other than to accept credit cards. I don't recall the different percentages for each credit card however I do know that Amex and Discover are among the most expensive and what I mean by "Most Expensive" every time Steve, or Dwayne or someone else.. accepts that credit card they loose a % of that sale. and its anywhere from 2-6 or 7% (im not sure of the exact amount.) It doesn't sound like much but it adds up!

Customer places an order for $100.00 worth of product and shipping they are loosing $6.00 on that sale... doesn't sound like much however it deffinatly adds up!

Just another one of those things that you have to add into "The cost of doing Business" These are all of the little things that you never think about when you say..."I think im going to start up an internet based mailorder busniess"