One of the most confusing things for new sellers is shipping. And just when I had shipping down pat...the darn post office went and upped their rates. Grrr. From the time when rates went up in May until mid June, I didn't raise my shipping prices because I hadn't felt up to tackling it. Also in that time I was making very consistent sales. Most consistent, in fact, than ever before in the history of my shop.So, realizing I was losing money on every item I shipped, I got my rear in gear and updated my shipping prices. No sales for 6 weeks. I only recently made that connection, while talking to some people in one of my street teams. It was like a lightbulb went on. However, I've been busy, and thus not really able to deal with it just yet.
Then the other day I sold two cards (yay!) and I got a firsthand look at what my shipping was playing out as. Yikes! No wonder sales dropped off. I'd probably hightail it out of my shop too!Needless to say, I plan on lowering my shipping costs. The plan is to weigh various combinations and fiddle with PayPal and the USPS websites to find something more reasonable. I will try to get on that this weekend.
Just goes to show that simply plunking the weights into the USPS online calculator wasn't enough.
Yeah, I've had trouble figuring out postage too, even though the Finnish PO is more simple than the US one sounds like. If it's any concolation, I suspect everyone has. ;) I'm soooo happy about the kitchen scale I got a while back, it's made things a lot easier.
ReplyDeleteyeah, shipping calculations can be a real bummer :(
ReplyDeleteCongrats on your sales though!
the new postage rules make what used to be so easy now sooo difficult - you have my sympathy! and, while I love Etsy, it tough when you have to edit every single item in your shop whenever you change shipping - good luck!!
ReplyDeleteoh shipping was such a pain!! I hope you get everything figured out soon and USPS leaves well enough alone =o)
ReplyDeletehttp://sweetspicestory.blogspot.com/
Morrgan--I have a scale, I've just been so confused by the new regulations. Sometimes I can send it as first class, sometimes its a large envelope, sometimes it's a package--and now they all have different rates! UGH! : )
ReplyDeleteThanks Liz! ^_^
Bonny--If I ever get admin's ear, that would be the thing I would ask for--shipping profiles that automatically update...ah... : )
Sweet Spice--Hopefully, it seems like they keep raising rates more and more often. It had only been about a year and half since the last rate hike! Boo.