Shock pricing for the simplest items.

[SADLK]

I don't know where $31 came from but if you pm me I will ship to you for free. I have been working on my shipping model to get the cost closer to the actual.

Great job Dutch. Proof that there are great people on this forum!

[Marwood]

I've ordered a fair bit of stuff from various vendors delivered here to Oz. All in all, I've found the shipping charges to be pretty reasonable or even surprisingly cheap. Crazily, it's often cheaper to order 'mainstream' gear directly from the US, EU, or Asia and cop the postage than it is to buy from shops or online vendors locally.

I had the same experience as mattmacman with one particular cottage vendor's shipping calculator, but on contacting them they offered to ship at a reduced rate for the small item I wanted since it could be shipped in an envelope rather than in a carton. Unfortunately, that email exchange put me on the wifely radar and an edict was issued preventing any and all gear purchases.

[Hangandy]

I hear your concern with pricing. I keep reminding myself that these items are specialty or craftsman items. I've had DogBones and Figure 9's and they were okay (not great but okay). I have very few luxuries in life. But when I'm on an exercise in the wet cold with little to no light and I can save an extra minute setting up my tarp, and know my Flyz will hold up (I find Fig 9s finnicky and prone to slippage with zingit) it's well worth the extra few bucks.

Dutch's products are like a Wayne Gretzky rookie card, a cold coke on a hot day, and a '69 Dodge Charger on Route 66 in the Spring all rolled into one genius product. It is also manufactured right in good old North America.

If he didn't charge a fair production cost (I wonder how many hours of laser precise grinding goes into the construction of each Tarp Fly) I doubt Dutch products would be as readily available. It is simply a fair market reflection. I was always curious at College that a book of only 50 pages could cost $80, until I figured out that there was only a market of 300 people and someone had to cover the setup cost for the printing of the book. I bet if you put it all together you would find Dutch has been working at minimum wages to make these things available.

I completely understand you spending less at first. If this wasn't my biggest hobby I would probably do the same. But I'd be a richer man if I could sell all the cheap stuff I picked up in my early hammock days. Shock cord, knotbones, the wrong surgical tube, figure 9's, paracord, oversized cord locks... I suspect I will be using my Flyz and Zing-it STLs and even my 30D Hennessey Hex-fly (I still see Cuben is still too pricey) for years to come.

And hopefully not, but just maybe, one of my future grandkids will say, "Hey Gramps, that's a sweet tie-off you got there on your hammock, where did you get it? Those things are collectors items. They're original Dutch Flyz in titanium and I could get 10 000 Euros (which will actually be worth a little then) for one. Would you leave it for me in your will?"

And then we'll gather round the campfire and sing traditional Shug songs and they'll listen to me tell of how I actually communicated with him in the early days of the Hammock Forums, years before he became the supreme benevolent emperor of the Earth which was shortly after the fall of the Canadian World Dynasty of the early 2020s.

And they'll all fall gently to sleep later on from their Shugen Fiber Hammocks with the sleepy calls of, "Goodnight Grandfather, All's quiet in sector 13!"

The future's so bright

[born2roam]

Just some eurocents in here...

All basically has already been said but I'd like to give some positive examples too.

1) 2QZQ and me had quite extensive email correspondence about shipping, cost, insurance etc all initiated by them (as stated on their website). I shipped three HH, ZQ magic later it was back. Only thing was the import tax fight I lost but that is my national problem, service from 2QZ2 was GREAT

2) Clikstand was send to me and there was a shipping price difference (cheaper) that they reimbursed with the paypal invoice and an email notice!

3) Same thing about ridiculous (in our customer's eyes) international shipping cost from another cottage company online calculator, I asked first and got a very quick answer about true shipping cost (or a good indication)

WAY TO GO PEOPLE!

Now for the tax things to change

Since I have a few items on the wish list (saving up) from different HF vendors I will surely first contact them, ask them for help, pay for their products and services and go with the flow...

Grtz Johan

[bindibadgi]

Crazily, it's often cheaper to order 'mainstream' gear directly from the US, EU, or Asia and cop the postage than it is to buy from shops or online vendors locally.

I find that's almost always the case.

One thing on my wish list has remained at $1,200 in the US for the last fifteen years. In that time, the very cheapest I've seen it in Australia was in a "crazy" sale at $2,000 (online only), but apart from that anomaly, it has always sold for $4,500 here in Australia. I could fly to the US, stay a week, buy the thing and fly back with it and still come out with change, even after paying the import duty! It is made in China too, so it has to be shipped to America!

As another example, I found that it's cheaper (including the postage) to buy an Akubra hat from America than from Australia. Now for a product which is made in Australia by an Australian owned company, that is painful to see!

I guess all that is to say that I suspect if anybody is charging more than they ought to, it's right here in Australia, not anyone in the USA.

[kiwigrrl]

Wifely radar is on Marwood!!

[Lepmeister]

Wifely radar is on Marwood!!

You crack me up

[DavyRay]

Wifely radar is on Marwood!!

They can't login here, can they?

[Balkan boy]

Regarding international shipping,

Once I added how much money I spent on shipping over two years and I nearly cried.
On the other hand, I learned to live with it. Nearly all of the things I buy from abroad I can not find locally and if I can it's much more expensive.

As mentioned, USPS is the best solution. Envelopes and small packages can cost from 5$ to 15$ but, for example, a hammock and tarp would be around 30$.
http://postcalc.usps.gov/
If I order from UK I use Royal mail.
All these 'national' services work well, albeit a little slower.
In my country UPS and FedEX are a bunch of bandits.

As Te-Wa said, labeling the package for lesser amount smooths out many things. Some vendors do it but some are stubborn and insist it's a fraud. (It isn't)


Cheers.

[birdygal]

I have shipped custom Bed quilts to other countries Australia usually cost me $65, Canada charges almost $35 through Mail I stopped selling overseas because of the shipping, I did have to get insurance maybe that was an extra cost but I have had the US mail loose a quilt so I always make sure I have insurance on them It cost $109 to ship 1 bed quilt and 2 lap quilts to Australia a year ago they were insured for $600