For a few months now, we no longer offer free postage on ipsopresto.com. We have radically changed our policy by linking the amount of shipping charged to the weight of the order and the distance traveled. The amount of shipping costs can vary from 5 to 100 Euros.
We thus largely break codes of the profession (once again….) Which consists in invoicing very strongly the small orders (12 euros for some) and to offer the expenses of delivery for the larger orders. This may seem logical at first, but this policy actually has several inconsistencies.
First of all, a customer who only wants to buy a few products is taxed with a ridiculously high delivery amount compared to the amount of his order. Conversely for larger orders, the amount of shipping costs is generally low as a% of the total amount and therefore acceptable to a customer. Small companies are therefore largely penalized.
In reality, this policy dates from a time when transport was "worthless". Now today and probably even more tomorrow, transport has a real cost. Saturation of highways, increase in fuel prices, heightened competition, ... everything contributes to an increase in delivery costs. No one escapes it and to maintain an illusion of free, distributors pass on the associated costs in the price of products. Today, many transport companies are disappearing because they cannot apply tariffs covering their expenses. We can blame the 35 hours, the countries of the east or the big groups but we can also wonder if we should not change logic and pay for transport at its real cost.
For this, we should no longer consider the shipping costs as a constraint in the mail order but as an offer of service. Thus, at ipsopresto.com, in parallel with the new price list, we offer deliveries by appointment, deliveries to the floor for the highest products or deliveries with assembly.
One could object that the Franco has an interest in the environment since being associated with an amount to be reached, the customer tends to group his purchases. This would be true if the amount to be reached was high, but it is generally around 100 Euros, which represents a "small" expense for a company. In reality, the more transport will be perceived as a service with an associated cost, the more orders will be grouped and anticipated, which will also limit truck rotations.
We campaign for the end of the free trade because what has no price has no value and what has no value is not considered. However, the profession of transporter and the limitation of pollution are subjects to be considered. Do biofuels and other “clean” energies come back to concerns every time the price of a barrel peaks?
However, we remain the "cheapest of the pro purchase". In fact, we are constantly offering more attractive prices than elsewhere, in particular thanks to the use of the Web, which enables structural costs to be reduced. Also, although we no longer offer free shipping, our customers are largely winners because the overall bill remains much lower than our competitors.
This post is the longest ever published on this blog, but it is a small contribution to the value of transport!
http://ipsopresto.typepad.com/ipsopresto_weblog/2006/09/rflexions_sur_l.html