TeamLiquid Hoodies Info - Page 51

On June 30 2012 16:32 Lucid971 wrote:
Haha, I wish they would hurry up and take my money already :D On a side note: I'll probably get a large because I like my hoodies to be a little loose. As far as size reference goes, I'm 6'3" and 155lbs. and I've fitted other American Apparel gear before and Larges seems right.

On July 01 2012 02:53 Veezy wrote:
Im 5'11'' 170 lbs and im getting a large, AA clothes are always more fitted than other brands, so if you are 6'3'' 155lbs I mean you gotta have some shoulders and a medium will be wayyyy to small, get a large. Also dont forget you'll have a t shirt or some cloths underneat the hoodie, it does count for something!

On July 01 2012 23:39 Alryk wrote:
Man... I'm exactly between small and medium... what to choose D:

On July 02 2012 00:47 KadaverBB wrote:
I cant take it anymore, give me those hoodies damnit

On July 02 2012 04:50 Noobity wrote:
So, I'm making this post as a kind of primer for those of you who've never shipped anything. Mostly, it's to explain a lot about how shipping works internationally, but some of it is to explain how shipping works domestically.

The main reason I'm making this post, is because I don't want TL to end up getting a bunch of crap because of the cost of shipping their goods.

First thing is first, I've been working primarily in international shipping for about 3 years now, intimately familiar with plenty of the aspects of the US BIS, and most IATA training. I can tell you a few things for certain:

1) shipping is not cheap (companies offer free shipping at either tremendous cost to themselves, or through long-standing contracts)
2) customers who have to pay shipping are never happy
3) couriers suck to work with

So what does that mean for you? Well for starters, don't assume that shipping costs nothing and should be given to you for nothing. This is one of the most common things I've seen regarding shipping for internet-based companies. Because they tend to be smaller, shipping costs for them tend to be extremely high. You might not think that it's reasonable to charge $12 in shipping for a $60 item, but that's about cost for these companies, and offering it for any less would cost more in the long run. I'm using the $12 and $60 estimations with USPS Flat Rate Boxes within the states, and my assumption that these hoodies are going to end up costing about $60.

What is unfortunate is the number of customers they lose out on because of these costs. For everyone saying "Well I'd pay the $60 for the hoodie, but the $12 shipping is too steep" you're hurting these companies , requiring that they eat some of the shipping costs themselves. In a lot of cases, the profit margin for items like those being offered tend to be low. While I can't speak for TL, I've known plenty of companies to manufacture and sell sweatshirts at a $5 profit each, simply to get their brand set up. When that $5 profit is taken away because they need to offer discounted shipping, they lose the ability to pay their employees, or other outstanding fees.

There are a couple ways for TL to handle this particular kind of issue. Their first option is to simply choose a shipping method, and have customers pay those shipping costs as they come up. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. "We're using the USPS, they charge $10 for every 2 lbs, so it's $10 per hoodie". Now I'm of the opinion that this is the best way to go. By being completely out and open about the cost of shipping, and having customers pay that amount to receive their goods, you're simply stating "this is how it is, take it or leave it". This sucks as a consumer, because you want to believe that your plight is known and acknowledged. You feel betrayed when there's nothing you can do about it.

They can also offer, say, discounts on shipping. Say you order 5 hoodies, they're guaranteeing the sales of at least 5 of their hoodies, in order to discount the cost of shipping a bit to that customer. First and foremost, there are always bigger boxes, and the boxes available are never the exact size of what you're shipping (in the vast vast vast majority of times). Because of this, shipping can be reduced because with the majority of couriers, the larger/heavier your package is, the less you pay per billable lb for that package. I would be extremely surprised if they did not go out of their way to offer discounts for large orders, but how big those orders need to be is often one of the more difficult things to determine.

A huge problem revolves around the paying customer not understanding shipping costs. While I don't have extensive experience using ebay, the experience I have has shown me that in order to keep up a business on eBay, part of what you absolutely have to do is offer "reasonable" shipping costs for your goods. Unfortunately, these "reasonable" shipping costs tend to be considerably less than I was able to find available to myself without having paid for accounts with the courier I intended to use. So much cheaper, in fact, that I was unable to make any sort of profit on the goods I was selling, as a lot of that profit was going back into shipping costs. Regardless of profit, it simply wasn't worth my time to make those sales, as I wasn't really getting any money for my time. Generally, for this particular exercise in eBay sales, I was spending approximately $4-$7 out of pocket for $25-$30 sales. I also didn't have a website to upkeep or employees to pay. If I did I would have gone out of business.

Because TL doesn't ship constantly, and doesn't ship high volumes of goods consistently, paying for a UPS account for instance simply isn't worth it. In order for them to break even on many of their sales they would need to increase the cost of the goods themselves, to pay for the account itself, while saving the customer money on shipping.

Another humongous problem is international shipping. There are a couple things that are huge when dealing with international shipping that a lot of people don't understand. First of all, shipping methods internationally are either extremely long, extremely unreliable, or extremely expensive.

For instance, the company I work for, we ship all of our goods express and by air. Because of this, shipping costs are extremely expensive, but the goods will get to the customer very quickly (approximately 2 business days to the UK, 3-5 business days to Australia, after leaving our warehouse) and there are reliable claims processes in place through our courier in case the goods are lost or damaged. Other methods available such as the USPS are extremely unreliable.

We ship using the USPS to Russia, for instance, because Russian customs is extremely difficult to get goods through that are over $75 in value for some reason, unless you use the USPS from the USA. We have our customers acknowledge a disclaimer before shipping those goods, stating that we are not responsible if the goods don't arrive at the customer's destination because government postal services tend to lose goods, like, a lot. The paperwork also tends to be harder, but the shipping costs are usually cheaper.

The final option for international shipping is usually sea freight, which can take (without exaggeration) months to get to their destination. This tends to be reliable and cheap, but difficult to access for vendors who are not shipping huge bulks of goods or extremely heavy items. Unfortunately, this is another area where well known and profitable businesses are able to reduce shipping costs at a loss simply because they are making so high a profit margin in the first place.

Duties and taxes are also nearly always charged for goods that are shipped internationally. With few exceptions (notably, duties aren't charged for any goods valued under $1000 AUD to australia) you are going to be paying possibly extreme taxes or duties determined by your local customs when the goods arrive at their final destination. An example of a country with a ridiculous tax is Mexico, where anything originating in China that arrives in Mexico is assessed with a 1000% tax (one thousand percent, not a typo). This is something many Mexican residents don't know about, and because those taxes need to be paid before the goods are released from customs, those goods tend to be abandoned. Some couriers like the USPS can at times bypass those duty and tax fees if possible, but it is extremely rare and something that the international community doesn't tend to understand.

My point to bringing up highly profitable businesses, is simply that TL is not that, and it is unlikely they will be that any time soon. When ordering goods from small companies you need to understand that there are fees that they simply can't lower without hurting their overall bottom line. Some big vendors will ship goods DDP (Deliverable, Duties Paid) and just eat those duty fees, and in some cases the taxes as well. A company like TL simply can't do that.

I don't personally know what TL plans to do with the cost of the hoodies, how they're handling shipping (if they're opening or using a UK based warehouse, I highly suggest you wait for that before ordering if you're not in the USA), and how they're going to make this a profitable venture. But I do know that they're working hard to give you all the best opportunity to get their goods they can. I simply ask that you let them know, reasonably, any issues that you may have with their plans, and try to address possible fixes to those issues if you happen to have any.

Thanks for reading the wall of text, take care!