Get rid of the postage charts, please!
Oct. 22nd, 2005 10:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
frandroidIn a recent thread in this community, people discussed about how insane it was that one distro wasn't charging for postage. Someone else mentioned Pander, which used to include the shipping price in the zine cost towards the end of its run.
(The following discussion has nothing to bear with distros that have a fully automated ordering website and thus shipping is calculated automatically.)
I've had this chip on my shoulder for a while, so now I will release it: most zine distro shipping schemes are insane.
I will explain why. First, you have to take into account that a lot of people out there are mathematically illiterate, or innumerate, to take from the title a very good book on the matter. When I see schemes like "add up all the weight in ounces, then look up the total in the chart, and oh by the way, add $0.29 and 2% if you pay with PayPal", it makes me cringe. I mean, I am exagerating a little bit, but you know who you are. Doesn't that sound pretty complicated to you? I mean, not in a "rocket science" kinda way, but in a "this would be SO MUCH EASIER to buy at a store" kinda way.
I don't think that people who don't include your requested shipping cost in orders are malicious. Rather, what happens is that they can't figure out the shipping scheme. Many times, that can happen because the scheme is too complicated, or that some people are barely "numerate". Personally, I am very rarely am missing postage with my orders. Here's why.
The shipping scheme on my distro is pretty simple, although I wish it was even simpler: $1 for every three zines. (All shipping costs in this message in Canadian dollars; it costs 50 cents to mail a letter, 85 cents to ship a slightly bigger letter, and $2.40 to ship a large letter one pound or under) That is fair for most orders, but not all. On one zine, $1 is usually more than my postage cost. On two or three zines, I am usually a bit on the losing side of this transaction, although not very much, depending on the size of the zines. From 4 to 9 zines, I am kinda hanging in there. After that, I'm making mad profit, which is totally unfair.
Wait, did I say I do unfair pricing? You bet I do.
A lot of people doing zine distros are animated by the rather self-less purpose of "getting zines out there." Hell, I am too. None of us are making any big bucks. I mean, how many people live off the income of their distros? Not many, other than that Portland one. My suspicion is that it is this noble purpose that leads people to have such complicated shipping schemes. My guess is that they don't want to overcharge anyone, since they already make a "fat" 40% or 50% profit on the zine. But it doesn't have to be this way.
Customers have no idea of "what's fair". They can compare various distros and if one is charging 2 bucks per zine for shipping, something's wrong. But other than that, most people don't care very much about whether they pay 30 cents or 41.3 cents shipping on zines. The cost is trivial to most people. They would rather pay a little more and not have to count everything. On my distro, they don't really pay more anyway; on half the orders, their dollar or two is actually still losing me between 25 and 75 cents, which I recoup from the large profit margin. Of course, on large orders, I'm usually making 1 or 2 dollars extra profit. On a 30 dollar order. Like, big deal. And it happens that most people who have put in 30-dollar orders on my site become repeat customers, until they've ordered over half the stock on my site. Obviously, they think that the zines are great, and the price is still a bargain.
There are some adjustments I make on some zines. For large zines (those that are more like magazines), I'll pad the price a bit since they'll bump up my shipping cost on any order. For books and videos, I have a 5$ flat fee, and I adjust the book price a bit according to weight. The profit if someone orders more than one book/video (or even just one, for books) is more than enough to cover all the shipping costs. I must say that I don't do much business with books and videos though.
When I added PayPal on my site, orders increased by 30% or so. This is all new business I would never have had if I didn't have PayPal. So I just suck up the PayPal cost. That 29 cents + 2% is actually bringing me profit*.
I think simplicity is key. PayPal makes things simpler. An easy shipping scheme will make things simpler. I've actually had people say that it was much easier to order from my site. So make your life and your customers' lives simpler: adopt a simpler scheme, charge an extra 50 cents or a dollar if you have to, and get rid of the postage charts, please!
*: on that particular order. I'm not really making money on my distro, more like breaking even, just this year, after running in the red for 5 years or so. The red part is mostly due to overstocking and neglecting the distro...
(The following discussion has nothing to bear with distros that have a fully automated ordering website and thus shipping is calculated automatically.)
I've had this chip on my shoulder for a while, so now I will release it: most zine distro shipping schemes are insane.
I will explain why. First, you have to take into account that a lot of people out there are mathematically illiterate, or innumerate, to take from the title a very good book on the matter. When I see schemes like "add up all the weight in ounces, then look up the total in the chart, and oh by the way, add $0.29 and 2% if you pay with PayPal", it makes me cringe. I mean, I am exagerating a little bit, but you know who you are. Doesn't that sound pretty complicated to you? I mean, not in a "rocket science" kinda way, but in a "this would be SO MUCH EASIER to buy at a store" kinda way.
I don't think that people who don't include your requested shipping cost in orders are malicious. Rather, what happens is that they can't figure out the shipping scheme. Many times, that can happen because the scheme is too complicated, or that some people are barely "numerate". Personally, I am very rarely am missing postage with my orders. Here's why.
The shipping scheme on my distro is pretty simple, although I wish it was even simpler: $1 for every three zines. (All shipping costs in this message in Canadian dollars; it costs 50 cents to mail a letter, 85 cents to ship a slightly bigger letter, and $2.40 to ship a large letter one pound or under) That is fair for most orders, but not all. On one zine, $1 is usually more than my postage cost. On two or three zines, I am usually a bit on the losing side of this transaction, although not very much, depending on the size of the zines. From 4 to 9 zines, I am kinda hanging in there. After that, I'm making mad profit, which is totally unfair.
Wait, did I say I do unfair pricing? You bet I do.
A lot of people doing zine distros are animated by the rather self-less purpose of "getting zines out there." Hell, I am too. None of us are making any big bucks. I mean, how many people live off the income of their distros? Not many, other than that Portland one. My suspicion is that it is this noble purpose that leads people to have such complicated shipping schemes. My guess is that they don't want to overcharge anyone, since they already make a "fat" 40% or 50% profit on the zine. But it doesn't have to be this way.
Customers have no idea of "what's fair". They can compare various distros and if one is charging 2 bucks per zine for shipping, something's wrong. But other than that, most people don't care very much about whether they pay 30 cents or 41.3 cents shipping on zines. The cost is trivial to most people. They would rather pay a little more and not have to count everything. On my distro, they don't really pay more anyway; on half the orders, their dollar or two is actually still losing me between 25 and 75 cents, which I recoup from the large profit margin. Of course, on large orders, I'm usually making 1 or 2 dollars extra profit. On a 30 dollar order. Like, big deal. And it happens that most people who have put in 30-dollar orders on my site become repeat customers, until they've ordered over half the stock on my site. Obviously, they think that the zines are great, and the price is still a bargain.
There are some adjustments I make on some zines. For large zines (those that are more like magazines), I'll pad the price a bit since they'll bump up my shipping cost on any order. For books and videos, I have a 5$ flat fee, and I adjust the book price a bit according to weight. The profit if someone orders more than one book/video (or even just one, for books) is more than enough to cover all the shipping costs. I must say that I don't do much business with books and videos though.
When I added PayPal on my site, orders increased by 30% or so. This is all new business I would never have had if I didn't have PayPal. So I just suck up the PayPal cost. That 29 cents + 2% is actually bringing me profit*.
I think simplicity is key. PayPal makes things simpler. An easy shipping scheme will make things simpler. I've actually had people say that it was much easier to order from my site. So make your life and your customers' lives simpler: adopt a simpler scheme, charge an extra 50 cents or a dollar if you have to, and get rid of the postage charts, please!
*: on that particular order. I'm not really making money on my distro, more like breaking even, just this year, after running in the red for 5 years or so. The red part is mostly due to overstocking and neglecting the distro...
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Date: 2005-10-22 03:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-22 04:45 pm (UTC)