Best methods to ship. Third part sites? Sendle.com? Stamps.com? Click and Ship USPS?

AmericanEDC

AmericanEDC

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Admittedly I'm confused about the best method to ship knives, but really anything if selling on the exchange.

I've been sending with Priority, insured for value using Click and Ship from the USPS website. But I'm wondering if I could be saving a bunch by instead sending in my own packaging and taking to the post office. For example a 9" x 6" envelope which would be perfect for say a tactical pen sale cannot be prepaid from home using the Click and Ship on the website. I have a scale and wanted to send it first class insured.

How about other services like Sendle.com? Does anyone use a third party shipper site like stamps.com?

I'd really love to hear what people are doing, best practices. I may have self made boxes as well, that I can easily takes dimensions and weight on.
 
Stamps is convenient for first class but you’d have to ship 4 packages a month just to break even on the fee against click and ship USPS priority. I’ve found that if I’m shipping small envelope-sized items, going in to the post office is more convenient than any online membership. It’s once in a blue moon I even ship a non-knife item.

If you sell a lot of pens and scales in envelopes (like multiple shipments a week), a membership to a 3rd party site might make sense. For me, I’m fine with a UPS account, a click and ship priority account, because I only sell or trade knives.

But to add more options, there’s always eBay. Shipping discounts, better reach. If I was getting started with a business and wanted to build my rep, I’d probably just start there and take advantage of the shipping discount.
 
King of the Cheese said:
Stamps is convenient for first class but you’d have to ship 4 packages a month just to break even on the fee against click and ship USPS priority. I’ve found that if I’m shipping small envelope-sized items, going in to the post office is more convenient than any online membership. It’s once in a blue moon I even ship a non-knife item.

If you sell a lot of pens and scales in envelopes (like multiple shipments a week), a membership to a 3rd party site might make sense. For me, I’m fine with a UPS account, a click and ship priority account, because I only sell or trade knives.

But to add more options, there’s always eBay. Shipping discounts, better reach. If I was getting started with a business and wanted to build my rep, I’d probably just start there and take advantage of the shipping discount.
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Thank you. I'm definitely not a high volume shipper, so that answers a lot of my questions there. A nice lady at the post office said I should come there for a quote when she saw how small my item was in a huge priority mail bubble envelope. I had even folded it over. There were confused that you could not do that shipping from home. Also it seems like shipping on ebay (seller fees) and even FB Marketplace is significantly discounted verses what I can find out there. Sendle is cheap but I have NO IDEA what carrier it goes to. They do not divulge it. I'm not sure you can even insure. I need to gut their website...will head off to try that.
 
King of the Cheese said:
Stamps is convenient for first class but you’d have to ship 4 packages a month just to break even on the fee against click and ship USPS priority. I’ve found that if I’m shipping small envelope-sized items, going in to the post office is more convenient than any online membership. It’s once in a blue moon I even ship a non-knife item.

If you sell a lot of pens and scales in envelopes (like multiple shipments a week), a membership to a 3rd party site might make sense. For me, I’m fine with a UPS account, a click and ship priority account, because I only sell or trade knives.

But to add more options, there’s always eBay. Shipping discounts, better reach. If I was getting started with a business and wanted to build my rep, I’d probably just start there and take advantage of the shipping discount.
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I've successfully used Sendle.com for personal stuff. You may want to look into it. Appears that everything is covered to $150. Prices are way cheaper. I may place this shipping method in a listing. I searched the forum and came up with nothing.
 
Why are you posting in this sub-forum? Is this in response to a transaction that was Good, Bad, or Ugly?
 
topfuel6 said:
Why are you posting in this sub-forum? Is this in response to a transaction that was Good, Bad, or Ugly?
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Thought I was posting in services and support have no idea how it’s here. I don’t recall ever even looking in this sub forum.
 
John Phillips said:
Someone told me PirateShip was a much better option over Priority Mail. Can anyone vouch for PirateShip?
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I can tell you this…I just dove into their site over the weekend, reading everything I could and watching videos. I’ll be using even for my eBay sales from the weekend. I’m packaging an item right now in fact and will use them for the label.
 
John Phillips said:
Someone told me PirateShip was a much better option over Priority Mail. Can anyone vouch for PirateShip?
Click to expand...

PirateShip allows commercial pricing on priority mail, which is surely less expensive than that offered on usps.com. I have shipped about a dozen or so in the last year and they have been stellar all along.
 
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I have been using Pirate Ship for a few months. It is 100% reliable IMO. Best rates are based on package size and not weight. It is commercial rates for USPS.
Off the top of my head guess is 20-30% saving over going to the PO and mailing a package priority mail. Packages can ship via most carriers and they will
calculate best way, but you can choose. Print out your postage label from your computer and fasten it to your box, and take it to the carrier. Cubic rate USPS
is much cheaper if you're sending relatively small packages. Packages are NOT shipped by Pirate Ship, but by traditional carriers. They do not handle any packages.
 
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