Vendors and Shipping-Am I the only one with this gripe?

[Gr8Scott]

Okay,
I want to throw this out there :

One of my total pet peeves is going to a web site and expending all kinds of wasted time and energy desperately trying to locate shipping costs. High shipping can be a total dealbreaker and it just grates me trying to navigate through a bunch of steps that are unnecessary if the shipping is going to be excessive or padded to absorb "handling".

Personally,to me, money is money. I have noticed a lot of times the collective consciousness is like " oh yeah, shipping, okay whatever". I don't know what that's about other than just programming, but I would rather pay a little more for juice/hardware if the shipping isn't so veiled on web pages. If you're engaged in the quest for a perfect all-day vape shipping really add up.

And I salute places like deejstuff that have obviously found a way to trim shipping down to an affordable cost.

Of course free shipping makes it a lot less complicated

So, your thoughts?

 

[xanderxman]

The vendors I deal with charge $6 or less for shipping, which I find very reasonable. If you pay more for stuff just to get cheaper shipping then you are really just subsidising shipping costs with juice costs. The money has to come from the customer. Vendors would lose money if they shipped every shipment free or cheap. I understand free shipping when you order $100 or more in merchandise. But as far as ordering juice samples, I see the need for vendors to recoup shipping costs. Samples are probably the most ordered items for many vendors and they would either go broke or be forced to raise prices if free shipping were a requirement of customers.

 

[BuffaloBob]

Yeah, I hate it when you have to jump thru all those hoops just to find out what the shipping costs will be. I guess they think once you've gone that far you're gonna complete the order....sheesh, some of them require your credit card number before showing you the shipping costs. To hell with that noise.

 

[Absintheur]

TANSTAAFL - if the shipping is free they are making it up in other ways most likely. Most places that have free shipping on any size order generally tend to be a bit higher in pricing. The best deal normally is those who use flat rate boxes, also try to avoid placing small orders, spread the shipping cost out over more items and try to find one vender that has everything you want in one place.

 

[Wolf308]

I've most of the vendors I use do flat rate from USPS, so rates tend to be around $4, give or take.

 

[DancingHeretik]

I tend to expect between $3 to $6 for shipping. But, it's always good to check because I occasionally get a big surprise!

I do understand that shipping is more expensive from other countries. But, what always irritates me is the sales tax. It always catches me off-guard. Like Got Vapes. They ship from Texas, and I live in Texas. So, I have to pay sales tax. That makes everything I buy from them 7-8% more expensive than the list price.

 

[Gr8Scott]

Yeah, I hate it when you have to jump thru all those hoops just to find out what the shipping costs will be. I guess they think once you've gone that far you're gonna complete the order....sheesh, some of them require your credit card number before showing you the shipping costs. To hell with that noise.

And this is exactly the core of what I am saying. If a vendor doesn't understand that aspect I would be suspect of their attention span to customer service all the way around.

 

[Gr8Scott]

. Vendors would lose money if they shipped every shipment free or cheap. I understand free shipping when you order $100 or more in merchandise. But as far as ordering juice samples, I see the need for vendors to recoup shipping costs. Samples are probably the most ordered items for many vendors and they would either go broke or be forced to raise prices if free shipping were a requirement of customers.

Respectfully, I disagree.

The shipping is a business expense. If I gain 30 customers that spend $35 a month that's $1050 every month. If half of those samples are a zero return customer then I have spent (at $1.80) a whopping $27.00 for $525.00 worth of business.(Annually $6300.00)

I would buy a residual income of $525.00 a month for an one time investment of 27 bucks, wouldn't anybody?

 

[pericat]

I live in a relatively remote area and get most things via mail order, so shipping is something I've dealt with a lot. A lot a lot. US websites in particular are bad about hiding their shipping info, including costs. It just doesn't seem to occur to them that it might be relevant to a purchasing decision. It is particularly annoying to have to get through a long order process only to find that they either won't ship to Canada, or what is almost worse, will only ship UPS Ground. UPS Ground always goes through a brokerage process, which doubles or triples the cost of the shipment -- it looks to the sender like a bargain rate, but to the receiver, not so much. At that point I will dump the order, no matter how much I may want it.

That said, a whole lot of juice vendors do not appear to be large enough to make a contracted shipping arrangement, one that would allow them to lower costs to customers, with any given courier. If they are paying standard rates, it's fair enough for them to pass that cost on. What makes me crazy is if they set a flat fee for shipping that I know is twice the true cost.

I buy as locally as I can, and I'm lucky to have good suppliers fairly nearby. The selection may not be what it is in the US, but it is good juice and workable hardware, so I'm not complaining.

Well, not much.

 

[zapped]

A lot of that isnt the vendors fault. Creating an e-commerce site from scratch is both expensive and time consuming.Many web designers use already built plug-ins for their shopping cart systems and thats unfortunately how they were set up by the person coding it. This can be changed but ONLY if you have a web designer who writes his own code and many dont anymore thanks to more visual web development tools like Dreamweaver.

 

[hrlw817]

For me, I don't really mind the shipping, as long as it's reasonable. It's the sales tax that sucks. I live in Missouri, and for those of you that are here and live in Missouri, you know what I mean. We pay sales tax on everything, and there are actually two taxes we pay if you are at a department store, etc. One order I placed, I paid more in tax than in shipping.

 

[CommaHolly]

one of the reasons I like Vape Dudes is the 3.00 flat shipping on juices within the US. That's cheap, IMHO. Whether I order one bottle or 24, the shipping is 3 bucks.

 

[RPadTV]

I actually have a different gripe about vendor shipping. I hate when they generate a tracking number shortly after you order...but don't actually ship the product for days. That drives me batty.

 

[Yves]

Look on the positive side you don't live at the bottom of the world like me....shipping to here is well.... usually more than the goods cost.

 

[r77r7r]

Sometimes there is a link at the bottom of the suppliers' page for shipping costs. I usually search for the coupons first, they often offset the costs well.

 

[Gr8Scott]

Look on the positive side you don't live at the bottom of the world like me....shipping to here is well.... usually more than the goods cost.

Yes, but your country is listed as the least oppressive government on the planet

Like America was once upon a time

 

[Dauyd]

I usually figure out the total price including shipping when I compare prices, so I don't much care if the item is $10 with $7 shipping or if it is $17 with free shipping.

However, if I have to jump through a bunch of hoops to find out what that shipping price is? Then I move on. There are too many good vendors out there to mess around with wasting time like that.

 

[jimrug1]

I usually figure out the total price including shipping when I compare prices, so I don't much care if the item is $10 with $7 shipping or if it is $17 with free shipping.

However, if I have to jump through a bunch of hoops to find out what that shipping price is? Then I move on. There are too many good vendors out there to mess around with wasting time like that.

My sentiments exactly. Too many venders offer shipping info up front to fool with those that don't. Also, I have no problem "reimbursing" a vendor's shipping cost. What I do have a problem with is sending my vendor's kids to college due to over inflated shipping prices to add to his/her profit.

 

[xanderxman]

Respectfully, I disagree.

The shipping is a business expense. If I gain 30 customers that spend $35 a month that's $1050 every month. If half of those samples are a zero return customer then I have spent (at $1.80) a whopping $27.00 for $525.00 worth of business.(Annually $6300.00)

I would buy a residual income of $525.00 a month for an one time investment of 27 bucks, wouldn't anybody?

Why should shipping be a business expense? Following that logic the cost of shipping to get materials in to a vendor's shop should be paid by the manufacturer they buy from. Guess what, those costs are paid by the vendor you are ordering from. I work in a family business and order materials every day. The shipping costs are my responsibility. Are you suggesting that not only should I eat those costs but also the cost of shipping the item to you? What kind of business plan is that? And don't forget the cost of stored materials before you can sell them for profit. Vendors do pay rent for the space that they use to store items until they are sold. If you stop and look at it, shipping can eat into profit quickly.

I have an item that I sell at the family business. We buy the materials to make the item. There is shipping, that WE pay for, on those materials. I then have to store said material in my warehouse, which we pay $5,000 per month to rent, until an order is placed. Then we have to manufacture the item. After that, we ship it to the customer. According to your suggestion, we should eat all of those costs to give our customer the best deal around. I am glad to offer free shipping but I build all of those costs into the cost of the item. Customers will pay for shipping, either in the cost of the item or by outright paying shipping costs.

You see FREE SHIPPING at the end of your order but how do you know it is free? How much does the item you are buying really cost the vendor you are buying from? Having worked in a business, as the person who sets prices, I do not believe in free shipping. It is something to make customers feel better about buying from a vendor and I will not base my decision to buy from a vendor on free or cheap shipping.

 

[BWhare]

I have no objection to paying for shipping. I don't like having to play games to find out what that cost will be. In the past couple of days I ran across a few Asian sites that had what I was looking for. When I clicked on "Add to Cart", the cart was off to one side of the screen and the item floated majestically over to it... and lo and behold, the shipping was clearly added to it quite magically. It took all of the guesswork and mystery out of the process. To me, that's a very nice thing to deal with and kudos to the folk that figured out how to build a shopping cart that works.