As its getting more expensive what are the views on ‘included’ postage or adding postage after? I used to use evri but now their costs vary depending on region so selling a spindle to Scotland with ‘free’ post would significantly affect my limited profit
There’s no such thing as free postage. It’s just a marketing ploy. If you offer free postage you have to higher your overall prices to cover it.
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Absolutely was going to say the same thing. PLUS you will have to pay Folksy 7.2% of that postage cost as separate postage is not included in the fee calculation.
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I prefer to see postage costs seperate.
If they are factored into the price and someone orders say 3 items they are actually paying 3 postage fees whereas when they are charged seperately the cost can be set per item with an added extra but reduced price for aditional items or free delivery for additional items.
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Free or postage included is not fair on the customer and reminds me of fleabay. The customer ordering multiple items ends up paying more.
I have used a flat rate for ages, no one complains I. Fact notice people order more. Sometimes with small parcel goes over but happy to bear that.
I would love Folksy to have scaled postage rates based on value and an option to have free postage over a set amount. I know I can refund but think that is unprofessional.
Most of the larger brands charge flat rate, customers know the cost of postage and that it has to be paid.
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I’ve tried both and I haven’t noticed a difference in sales either way. For most if my items I now separate postage from the item…this also means that I don’t get charged fees on the pp element of the sale.
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Thanks all, that is what I thought but was advised elsewhere that it might help sales. Will also now use PO as they are slightly dearer but same cost anywhere
Les
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Sorry, replied to wrong place.
I was going to say that I charge a flat rate of postage - regardless of number items bought, postage stays the same.
This works for me as my items are relatively light in weight, might not work for someone selling multiple heavier items. I would say it may encourage customers to buy more than one item.
And as @JOYSofGLASS noted, if you include postage cost in the price of the item, you’ll be paying Folksy commission on that included postage cost. (If postage cost is separate, you don’t pay Folksy commission on it).
Last point - as a buyer I generally look at the overall cost (item + postage if separate) to see if I think it’s value for money. I would only be put off if postage costs were ridiculously high - though I agree, Royal Mail costs heading that way which is a concern!
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It’s been useful to get feedback, I had a Shopfront review done by the Folksy team as i changed from monthly to annual and it was very informative, got me thinking about all aspects of the shop.. I do not ‘do’ social media so rely on sales through the site
Mine is set at 3.95 for tracked 48, free for additional items, tracked covers up to £150 compensation so I do sometimes pay the second postage myself or upgrade to special delivery and again I pay the extra but I don’t mind if the order is over £150.
My cards and patterns go cheaper (can’t remember what they are set as ). To be honest I havn’t had an increase in sales at all sìnce i brought the postage down on my high end items last year so it proves it doesn’t matter whether the postage cost on high end is £3.95 or double that price. Last year my postage was higher and additional items were charged at 1 or 2 pounds extra and I had more sales last year.
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I started with a separate postage cost.
When I removed the postage cost I did not increase the cost of my items, so my items were genuinely free postage. I found that having free postage improved sales although it was a significant cost to me because I send everything tracked.
When I put the postage cost back on, sales stopped.
As a buyer, I do not look at the item price and postage cost as separate things. I look at the total cost of the item arriving at my door. If I believe the total cost is reasonable, I will make the purchase regardless of whether there is a separate postage cost or not.
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Some of my postage can cost quite a lot. Glass is heavy and some of my pieces are large. I’d rather be completely transparent about postage costs but when I have offered free postage it’s not made any difference to sales. And as Folksy don’t charge fees for postage on here the sensible option, for me at least, is to charge postage
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Postage is in my price ( only recently about a month) , i decided to give it a try to see if it made a difference, and yes i decided that on some items i would not increase my price to cover that cost ( why? because the shop sales is very slow and far between, so though reduce some items while i’m changing listings), I also found this post on the folksy blog, its 10 yrs old, but may be of interest.
I could change back to adding postage seperately if i find there is no difference to sales.
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Mine is set at a flat rate of £3 never affected my sales and often find customers buy more to make it worth their while. They even buy a card for 2.00 and pay the £3 flat rate. If a customer wants it they will pay.
The other thing is I object to paying commission on the postage part takes even more profit out of my sales, having separate means safe apart from the bankers.
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mine was flat 3.95 for the £40 spend and then special delivery for the higher prices Used to be 6.95 and RM just kept going up and up, i think what RM charges is putting buyers off, ( not saying they don’t deserve to charge for their service, but its gone up by about a third this year) hence trying the included side.
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I use to send everything 2nd class signed for until royal mail decided the compensation should go down to £20 so I now use Tracked 48 post with cover of £150. I do sometimes send special delivery but I pay the extra myself and only if the £150 cover is not enough.
I reduced my prices last year when I switched but sales are down this year so it didn’t make any difference. I believe on high end items customers are happy to pay a higher postage rate than on smaller, cheaper items. I think special next day delivery is just short of £10 now, the prices have really shot up the past couple of years, I don’t think it matters on high end items but it is really hard for those sending cards.
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I noticed today that the weight limit of RM48 large letter has gone up from 750gm to 1kg, and the price has stayed the same (£2.70). That’s a good news story!
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Postage on multiple different items
I sell a range of low profile boxes. They are all different but are the same size and cost the same amount. If a customer wants to buy, say three, different boxes I would like to charge a primary rate for the first one and an additional rate for each of the rest. But they are separate items in my shop so how can I apply an additional rate for the extras?
When you list an item, you specify the postage cost for that item and then specify any additional cost for any additional item in your shop. The additional postage cost applies to all items in your shop, not just the item you are listing.
It’s fairly easy Chris @chriswyattoriginals, but you may need to do bit of averaging.
At the moment you are charging £1.55 postage for most of your boxes (but I note that other listings are different - I’ll come back to that at the end). In all your listings, the Additional items column is blank (in the image below). As you have worked out, if a customer buys 2 or 3 items from you at the same time, they pay 2 or 3 X postage.
You need to add a figure in the "additional items" column in your listing. It applies to any attotional item from your shop, not just multiples of the same listing. You can physically do it by editing each listing, or bulk edit postage from your dashboard.
You need to decide how much extra you want to add for each additional item, and add that as a Additional cost. It’s just the extra cost you enter, not the total.
Example - using additional postage costs I made up
So, if you need 75p extra if you are posting two boxes, you enter 0.75 in the column for additional postage in all of the listings it applies to. But be aware, it will add the same additional cost of 75p for each subsequent box added that specifies that amount. So a customer buying 2 boxes pays £1.55, plus 75p. Three boxes would be £1.55 plus 75p plus 75p.
But in reality, adding a 3rd might not be the same - it might just be an extra 50p - or even bump it by an extra £1 if it goes into a higher postage banding. Adding a 4th box would be different again.
You can’t adjust for this, so go with an average, or an amount that covers you for the worse case scenario of possible order combinations. Customers are always grateful for combined postage, and won’t mind that the amount isn’t exact as long as it’s reasonable. And you can always refund if it’s really too high.
Listings with different postage prices - again with invented additional costs
I see that your listings for filled boxes are £1.80 or £2 postage, and you also have a set of 3 with postage at £3.50. You can have different additional costs for each of these different products. So your set of 3 could have an additional cost of £1.50, your filled boxes could have £1, and your single boxes could have the 75p as above. The system takes the item with the highest primary post value first, then adds the additional cost for the second item, and then the additional for the third / fourth etc.
So an order for a set of 3, a filled box and a single unfilled box would be £3.50 standard postage, plus additional £1 and an additional 75p, using my invented figures. An order for two sets of 3, plus a single unfilled box would be £3.50, plus £1.50, plus 75p.
Hope this makes sense and I haven’t confused you. Shout if you need anything explained better.
Personally, I don’t charge extra for multiple items - I have postage costs based on letter/large letter/small parcel, and I put a zero in the additional box so it’s a flat rate on the largest no matter how many items are bought. Most of the time I can fit in 2 items in the same parcel, and as I’m saving money on only 1 set of packaging/paperwork and business cards for multi-purchase orders, I have a little leeway in my overheads to absorb the occasional excess postage. But I appreciate your boxes are less flexible in how they are packaged.
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