Postage cost and packaging cost?

[L.A]

Hi I'm a new business starting up and I would like to know where's the cheapest place to buy boxes to send my parcels? Also is it best to go with Royal Mail or another company to send packages as I am thinking this is going to eat into my profit?

Thanks

 

[Mr D]

Hi I'm a new business starting up and I would like to know where's the cheapest place to buy boxes to send my parcels? Also is it best to go with Royal Mail or another company to send packages as I am thinking this is going to eat into my profit?

Thanks

Cheapest place to buy? Good question.
Depends what you want and if they stock it.

I will dig out a couple of companies in the morning (when on laptop), you do need to check companies to see if they stock what you want and in quantities you want. Pointless buying a minimum order quantity of 100 if you want 4.

Best with Royal Mail or another company? The answer is yes.
Again depends what you want. Royal Mail are not the cheapest for all users.
If you do a thousand orders a year or more (or plan to) then an online business account with Royal Mail and using click and drop can work. There are times a courier (including parcel force) can work out cheaper than using Royal Mail account. And times sending a parcel is expensive.


Best way I find to deal with postage us have the buyer pay it. Build it into your pricing either within item price (so free postage) or else sufficient postal charge added on so that you are not paying it out of profits - the buyer is paying it.

If that makes the item too expensive to sell then look around for better items to sell.

 

[Mr D]

Packaging companies -
Kite
Zeus

 

[haryj]

Hi I'm a new business starting up and I would like to know where's the cheapest place to buy boxes to send my parcels? Also is it best to go with Royal Mail or another company to send packages as I am thinking this is going to eat into my profit?

Thanks

Hi,

Your obviously very new to all of this, as this info is very easily available. No worries we all start somewhere!

Packaging materials etc, to start of with i'd go with ebay. Tons and tons of suppliers, all different types of qualities and value for money. Once you go into more demand you can easily find yourself a wholesaler here in UK or alternatively self import from china.

Shipping platforms, Royal mail at the moment are expensive, there was a time for small time sellers they were just as competitive. It also depends on your items/products. Heavy, bulky, lightweight, high valued items, delicate items, high risk items (chemicals) and etc..

When i used to sell on ebay, i used my hermes for majority of my stuff, odd occasion it was DPD and Royal mail/DHL for international.

Most shippers will work of your monthly sending quantity, obviously the more you send the better discount they will offer. A lot of people these day's on ebay, selling for example car parts, are using DPD. I pressume they must have a good deal for low volume sellers, as a lot of sellers i've seen were relatively small.

It may also take you time to find the right shipping company, only time will tell, try not to get comfy with just one, always fish around!

Best of luck with it all!

 

[Jason Howard]

We use Despatch bay for large items which is excellent. We also use Myhermes now as i think the lower end are unbeatable

 

[QPLAST]

Consider the time spent in despatch, if a royal mail is near or convenient to your work place, then go for it.

At the beginning I will focus on the
1. quick delivery
2. Convenience
3. Customer satisfaction

Once your volumes goes up. U can look for cheaper option.

With respect to packing, again you have multiple choice.. if your volumes are in 1000s then, it's worth looking for cheaper options.. if you consume only in small quantity, then you should consider the inventory cost/storage

Hope this helps

Cheers, Deepak

 

[L.A]

Hi thanks for all your input. Yes I'm new to this. I would search on Google but I don't want loads of rubbish coming up in search

 

[scstock]

We also use Kite

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Do you have an idea on volumes .Knowing this always helps