You software guys have it made, now that the days of selling physical disks are over, you do not have to deal with shipping.
I am breaking up with USPS International shipping. - Rant you can skip it this section. TL;DR USPS seems to no longer want to ship international.
Since November shipping has gotten much harder and harder for me. really the last 12 months. The last few months have bled all the profits out of the business and really made this feel like work for the first time since this all started. International sales are extremely high in comparison to domestic lately, the issue is USPS has made a habit out of not shipping them. I can not even tell you how many international packages come back with just 100% BS reasons for not shipping or no reason at all.
I get packages back for āforbidden itemsā (what could possibly be forbidden about an LR hardware kit?) No specifics given. 90% just come back with no stickers. Some say āno air freightā (no batteries or liquids involved). Some say āincomplete documentationā (computer generated, all info is there, including HS codes for every item). I could go on and on but I am getting frustrated even writing this up.
I have tried talking with several different people from USPS to figure out what is happening and in person, over the phone, or email I get nothing of any relevance. I once brought one in had them try to figure out why it was not delivered, they reused the same exact label, shipped it again (despite me saying it would not work) only for that same box to show back up at my door saying a completely different BS reason it would not ship.
Each time a box comes back that is an instant $46-$120 lost, then I need to spend time~5-10 minutes repacking and shipping them again so that loss doubles to another $46-$120 plus time. Now I can spend 25+ minutes filling out the USPS claim form. That gets me a phone call from a private phone number when you donāt answer that the case is closed, no money refunded. If you have a business with your information public I can assure you, you will never answer a single one of the dozen or so private number phone calls you get per day. So next up is appeal the closed case (another 10-15 minutes of paper work online), this time for some reason they do not call you they just either accept or deny it again. At that point if they accept it I have gotten anywhere from $3(?) up to nearly all of my shipping refunded, that refund comes in the form of a paper check in 1-3 months time.
Needless to say every returned box damages my reputation (Every returned package equals at least 1 email from the customer saying āwhy has my item been delivered to California USA??ā) because of the much slower shipping, nearly an hour of time lost in paperwork and repacking and new international shipping paperwork, and always guarantees I lose money on the transaction.
My solution
Step 1- For most orders I have now been using UPS, funny not a single returned box yet. The downside is I have to rework the shop to make the labels, use different boxes, and either pay for a pickup or take them to a UPS store. Unfortunately, that means I think I will only be doing international shipments every other day. Or maybe even just twice a week.
Step 2- I have a 200 unit test run of Lowrider kits being made by the LDO motors crew, and I will be having those shipped internationally from China, directly. This helps with my workload, shipping times, and import fees for the customer. This also saves from me paying the first import fee to the US where normally I would pack them up myself but that cost goes into paying to have them kitted up directly. If this goes well the selection can be expanded, and if it goes really well The inventory can be spread around many fulfillment centers around the globe to further decrease fees and shipping times. For me, this equals slightly less profit, in trade of less work packing and shipping. We will see if the international shipping from another company makes any extra paperwork for me. This step is still about 3 weeks out fro the test run.
My apology
This loss of profit has been slowly inching higher and higher since last year and that really makes staying positive and fun hard at times. I will be in a great mood and a box shows up as a return and that is just incredibly irritating. I have been a bit more distant just to make sure when I am around I am in a great mood. With that being said, I am sorry for being around a bit less, but I promise you I am still very much in love with this project, and all the people that hang out. I just had to spend all my effort trying to find a solution for this.
With the US-Canada tariff situation it may be cheaper, unless youāre already marking items you ship as products of China.
