Home › Forums › Shipping: The Final Frontier › USPS Doing a Study on the Cost Effectiveness of Continuing to Provide Free Boxes
- This topic has 14 replies, 12 voices, and was last updated 4 years, 5 months ago by Lukastreasure.
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10/31/2019 at 3:27 pm #69871
Stumbled across this earlier today. Seems the USPS is starting to conduct a study to evaluate the cost effectiveness of continuing to offer free boxes / shipping supplies.
Think it said they would be releasing the findings in March. Any one want to guess the findings of the study? With the USPS running in the red for so long, who would say that they would not save money by discontinuing the costs associated with giving away all those boxes and supplies. Especially when so many people double box or splice together boxes for oversize items.
Will be interesting to see what they decide. If they do, I am sure that will be a big deal for everybody to sound off over.
mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art in Atl.
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10/31/2019 at 3:53 pm #69872
I once received a heavy piece of equipment that was entirely packed with Padded Flat Rate mailers. After that, I knew the days of free supplies were limited.
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10/31/2019 at 4:36 pm #69875
They aren’t free…they are built into the price already….
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10/31/2019 at 9:56 pm #69900
They should lower the price of the shipping cost and charge a small fee (.25) per box/envelope.
I like free, but I left a Halloween Trunk or treat a few hours ago. One of the people passing out candy had an entire set built with priority boxes.
- This reply was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Paul.
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10/31/2019 at 11:05 pm #69903
The good news is that you can provide input to the USPS on this.
There is a 1 question poll on the right side of the page and you can provide comments towards the bottom of the page.
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11/01/2019 at 9:22 am #69908
They really do need to lock down free priority supplies to people with USPS accounts and some proof of use of the supplies. They should also go behind the counter at the post office.
Fed Ex won’t give you free supplies unless they see you are actually using them.
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11/03/2019 at 6:40 am #69958
I’ve always wondered why sellers use these in the first place. I’d be interested to hear from anyone who uses them regularly, when they are cost effective.
When we first started eBay we read about these free supplies and stocked up on them. After a few thousand sales, I’ve only had a handful of situations where shipping in one of them saved the customer money (game box shipped to Hawaii for Mahjong set). I usually use the “free” shipping supplies I pick up from the road on trash day or from business dumpsters. Between what I find and the boxes I get from eBay with my subscription, I just don’t see the need.
And, like has been noted, I see so much abuse of the free supplies it has to be a huge waste for USPS.
Just this week I was looking at the space these boxes are taking up in my storage and thinking it was time to return them to USPS.
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11/03/2019 at 8:20 am #69960
If you go to the USPS website, and click on shipping supplies, free shipping supplies, and then boxes, you will find numerous boxes that are not flat rate. For example, if I get one of their 12x12x8 boxes, I can ship whatever in it and pay the normal priority rate; it does not have a flat rate price.
Take a look because you are missing out! Plus, it looks like they might not be around much longer.
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11/03/2019 at 11:13 am #69962
The flat rate boxes are rarely cost effective for me but all of the other free USPS priority boxes which ship items by weight instead of a flat postage rate are great. I use them daily.
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11/04/2019 at 12:01 pm #70025
@ Julie B, I’ve never noticed the non-flat rate boxes on their store previously. Either I didn’t look long enough or they were out of stock when I did. Just ordered a few sizes. Thanks for the info.
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11/03/2019 at 8:16 am #69959
I am still a full time letter carrier and have noticed several things about the boxes. 1. They have started to modify the boxes and seem to be half as thick as they were. You almost have to double box them. 2. People order these by the bundle and never ship with them, they use for storage. 3. My wife ordered some for her poshmark and they take up to a month to get here and are shipped by some third party packaging company. For my ebay store I do my darndest to stay away from priority mail so I rarely use the boxes.
From my vantage point I fail to see how they are cost effective. It has always been about “free attraction”.
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11/03/2019 at 11:06 am #69961
Lazybeatnik – Are you talking about just the free flat rate boxes or all free priority boxes? I use them every single day. The flat rate boxes aren’t cost effective in most cases for me but the other types which are only available via order from USPS are great. I use the 14x12x3 all the time as well as the 7x7x7 and the shoebox size.
As far as flat rate boxes, sometimes the Regional A which I consider to be a quasi-flat rate has saved me quite a bit of money on shipping when items are heavy for their size. The padded priority envelopes are great for clothing items that are over a pound.
I guess I better stock up on these boxes now before they’re taken away.
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11/03/2019 at 12:35 pm #69963
I agree Julie: We use a lot of the Priority Mail boxes. Only used a Flat Rate a few times in years. With our discount regular Priority is always less costly so we keep a supply of about 12 various sizes in stock.
We have a one page shipping supply inventory sheet and have a minimum / maximum level set and when we get to the min. level then order more by either the 10 or 25 pack.
I also have not seen any where that Pirateship saves me anything either. PirateShip is only USPS and do not offer any FedEx services. So PS is good for us on items under 5 or 6 lbs, which is about half to 2/3rds of our shipments.
At about 6 lbs. FedEx is less costly and we have a full service FedEx office just a few miles up the road. We have a whole column of built in shipping prices into our SixBit program and have a custom field for cubic inches. When we hit 6 lbs. we drop in the FedEx prices. But guess what???? We pack in USPS boxes because FedEx takes packages in USPS boxes with thier label on it. Maybe because of the “last leg” arrangement FedEx has with the USPS. Maybe Lazybeatnik knows for sure.
Also by using flipper tools Dimensional weight calculator we have all of the fedEx and USPS oversize shipping rates built into SixBit and as soon as that cubic in. goes over 1,728 cubic inches, we apply the Surcharge rates. His calculator tells us which pound level to use to charge for the wieght and oversize package. But again the USPS boxes can be used.
So in short, the USPS boxes can be used for both USPS and FedEx, so yes we will use the boxes as long as they are available.
And yes, we also cut down the USPS reg. priority boxes to shave a little weight off the box but in most cases we do it to try to keep the size under the 1,728 cu. inches. Then when we have to go oversize, we also splice together two reg. priority boxes and create a larger size box. Again, any size, smaller or larger, will go by either USPS or FedEx and USPS boxes in any cut down or spliced together size will go via. both. And all of this seems fine by both companies.
So yes, we are hopeing that the USPS sticks with it’s program of free boxes for the priority program and for use with FedEx as long as they still have their partnership together.
As for the “3 to 4 month study”, well I think I can say, yes it is a cost to the USPS, but are they recouping the costs via any added shipping upgrade purchases by shippers, is what I guess they have to figure out. Bottom line is if they are bleeding money in that program, and adding to what they already may be loosing to competition they may have to stop offering the free boxes.
Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art in Atlanta
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11/03/2019 at 12:41 pm #69964
The Regional boxes would be the biggest loss for me. The long, thin A box is almost perfect size for oversized books. I do really hate the abuse of free supplies and hope they shift to a FedEx or low pay ($0.25 each) model, but I wonder if a more likely solution is that USPS phases out free boxes entirely.
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11/03/2019 at 6:06 pm #69986
Simple solution would be for USPS to charge for shipping the boxes to you, but not for the boxes themselves (also keep them behind the counter at the retail locations and limit the number of boxes per customer). For people who are actually using the Priority mail boxes as intended, a small shipping fee would not be a big deal, but it would probably stop most of those idiots who are abusing the system.
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