Home » Blog » Reduce And Reuse For "Green" Shipping And Handling
Reduce and Reuse for "Green" Shipping and Handling
I have recently conducted a study of the cost of shipping and handling nanobugs products sold in the online store for the first half of this year and the amount we charged our customers. This action was stimulated by the increase in postage levied by the US Postmaster in May and our desire to be fair and profitable in our business. The outcome of the study was that our shipping & handling costs are generally appropriate and will only need adjustment on 2 of the 5 categories PayPal allows for shipping costs. Quite frankly, I don’t know how companies can offer “free shipping” and still come out ahead. They must be utilizing a different business plan, and using shipping losses as marketing costs. Or…. They are increasing their price of the item Or….if they are paying huge amounts to store their inventory and so they take a loss on shipping to offset the higher cost of warehousing. After determining the appropriate shipping costs for the second half of this year, I set out to look for ways to save money and materials to ship more efficiently. The “handling” part of the “shipping and handling” includes the expenses of preparing an item for safe delivery to the customer. Transporting orders to Mail Plus for shipping is becoming more expensive as the cost of gasoline rises. But I live close to the shipper, I drive a VW Beetle and can coordinate drop-offs with other business activities in order to conserve gas. Shipping boxes and return address labels are essential for effective shipping plus they contribute to branding and image-building. However, there is still room for experimentation with materials. Sometimes we use a US Priority Mail “flat rate” box if the items in the order are heavy and will fit in the flat rate box. Those boxes are free – incorporated into the flat rate. If it is profitable, we use flat rate boxes. We generally ship via US. Priority Mails because their prices are competitive and they claim 2-3 day delivery. Packing materials can be reusable items and we attempt to reuse whenever possible. I have several firm rules, however. The materials must be clean, look clean and smell clean – preferably used only for shipping clean items like medications. I do a bit of temporary work at the Peoples Health Center here in Lincoln - facilitating their medication assistance programs. They receive insulin vials in styrofoam coolers with gel paks to maintain appropriate temps and prevent degradation of the insulin. Problem is – the clinic receives 5-8 of these coolers each week and they are just discarded after this one-time use. (and that is just one clinic – just think of the hundreds that are shipped every day across the country!!) I think every employee at the clinic has taken one or more of these coolers home to reuse for fishing worms, little league snacks, transporting groceries for the store on these hot days, etc. (don’t worry – not all of the uses for the same cooler!) In an attempt to keep these items out of the landfill – or at least postpone their destiny, I have considered shipping nanobugs card collections in them – hoping that receiving customers will reuse them too. If you have ordered recently from us, you probably received your items (especially the card collections and/or playing cards in a box with a plastic air bubble and or a piece of white foam. These materials are reused from pharmaceutical shipments, too. I am writing this blog today, I guess, because I am a little embarrassed to be utilizing styrofoam and other plastics for shipping materials since I have always claimed to “live green” and ambitiously recycle whenever possible. I want nanobugs customers to know that generally we are reusing packing materials for shipping and carefully evaluate the previous use to maintain cleanliness and contain costs. “Doing the right thing” is often a complicated process, don’t you think? (Please comment)
Write a comment
- Required fields are marked with *.
|
|
| Back to Blog Homepage.
