We need to address shipping policy...Re: 611 Book

Tue Nov 3 17:35:02 EST 2015

OK so let me suggest that a bracket system be used, so the shipping is a bit more than UPSP or UPS etc.  Split up the US into 4 brackets and the rest of the planet is whatever plus 10 percent, with (maybe) the overcharge becoming a donation to the N&WHS?

Mark Lindsey
Stuck in the 1930's.

On Nov 2, 2015, at 10:42 AM, NW Mailing List wrote:

> Jimmy,
>  
> There is no way to know the actual cost of shipping when an order is placed and yet we and every other vendor expects payment before an order is sent. Neither we nor the customer knows if an order can be sent in a single package or require multiple packages. An order for a book or a poster will require two packages. An order for multiple books may require multiple packages. If we were to use media mail than books would require separate packages from other products which takes us into more multiple packages, You also assume that shipping is simply postage and ignore the fact that the order is shipped in some type of container and generally includes some type of packing – neither one of those are generally free.
>  
> As an example, you can buy my books “Billion Dollar Coalfield” or “Coalwood” directly from me or from multiple vendors. My order blanks for “Billion Dollar Coalfield” price the book at $75 plus $7 for postage and packing. I set that price before I shipped the first book. In reality, media mail postage is currently $8.72, the corrugated book wrappers I send the book in are $1.28 each and I wrap the books in 3 feet of bubble wrap which cost me $0.45. So my total current shipping cost of $10.45. It probably averaged about $8.50 when the book went on sale in 2010. If I sell the book on Amazon, I only get $3.99 for shipping so I price the book slightly higher.
>  
> Given the extra cost of packing products the commissary attempts to use as much free packing material as we can get which is why we generally use USPS priority boxes.
>  
> As I noted orders are paid for before they are shipped. We don’t know a customer’s postage cost until a package or packages is ready for shipment. You are suggesting that at point to contact the customer and say your shipping costs are “X” and you only included an amount of “Y” for shipping. Please provide the additional funds before we can ship your order or we owe you “Z” because you included too much for shipping. What makes your suggestion unrealistic is someone would have to load all of the packages in a vehicle, transport them to the post office, stand in line until a clerk is available, have the clerk process all of the packages, determine the postage, and then whoever took the packages to the post office would have to reload the packages and bring them back to the commissary so everyone could be contacted on the actual postage cost and the additional money obtained before the packages could be sent. Once the additional postage was obtained the packages would have to be reloaded and taken to the post office and dropped off.  
>  
> On international shipping we normally check at the post office on the expected shipping rate because of the high cost of shipping. We don’t do that for domestic orders.
>  
> If you go through the process of what is required to determine actual postage and the inherent delays associated with order shipping as customers are notified of actual shipping costs and orders await new payments, it is easier to understand why NWHS and probably every other vendor uses some type of pricing based on order level. Every vendor struggles with the break point for the different pricing levels. We could raise our prices on shipping and certainly break even, but we haven’t chosen to do that because we raised them last year.
>  
> When the BoD discussed shipping costs in a digital age it recognized that a postage deficit would increase, but the actual cost of some products such as drawings could go down if they were sent digitally and the overall margin could be expected to increase. The  goal for the commissary is to increase the margin. That requires a balance between the price of goods sold, postage costs, and digital pricing. You can afford to lose on some items if you make up for it on other items.
>  
> My suggestion is, if you find this an unreasonable policy, you should run for the Board of Directors and, if elected, participate in these type of discussions. They occur at every BoD meeting as the BoD attempts to balance the wants of the members and the requirements for volunteer hours to achieve those wants.
>  
> Alex
>  
>  
>  
> From: NW-Mailing-List [mailto:nw-mailing-list-bounces at nwhs.org] On Behalf Of NW Mailing List
> Sent: Monday, November 02, 2015 7:54 AM
> To: NW Mailing List
> Subject: We need to address shipping policy...Re: 611 Book
>  
>  
> 
> On 10/29/2015 4:39 PM, NW Mailing List wrote:
> In 2014 the commissary had  a loss of $520 on shipping. Through Sept 2015 our loss on shipping is $973.43 which is 1.79% of our gross sales. Our objective is to break even on shipping.
> 
> One of the reasons we have a deficit on shipping is we lose on shipping when we have to send an order in multiple packages. While this doesn’t apply in every case, it does apply in many cases. A second reason is we haven’t raised shipping rates in 2015 even though there have been some increases from the post office. We expect to see continual shipping losses as we send items digitally with a minimum handling charge rather than a shipping rate based on the commissary order amount....Whatever we do, we don’t expect any changes in our postage pricing policy.
> 
> Alex,
>     I find your explanation incomprehensible and I have to question why we are losing money on shipping. Why are we allowing this to happen? Multiple packages or not, customers should expect to pay the actual cost of shipping and not a penny more. It seems that we do indeed need to look into our postage pricing policy and revamp it to where shipping costs are the actual amount.
> 
> Jimmy Lisle
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