Scott Catalogues

Hi to all

It sort of has to do with stamps.

It is no wonder some book shops in Australia are going broke.

I just ordered the Scott Specialized Catalogue 2011 form Amazon and all up including courier it cost me $109 US. It will get here by the 18th March. Here in Australia, book shops have quoted me $250.00 and that is paperback as well. Who would buy books in Australia when you can get them for a third of the price including postage in the USA.
Unfortunately, they do not want to be competitive. Another example is Borders (Gone But here) had a magazine at $27.00, they said it cost so much because it was air freighted. I can get the same Magazine by Airmail or courier for $18.00 from the USA, I think it is a just a case of profiteering. They are ordering more than one copy, so the cost in freight would not be so great. This is why I tend to buy Stamp publications overseas. I would love to shop local, but I just can not afford to continually pay three or four times the OS price.
All comments welcome.

Regards,

Horamakhet.

Some things are hard to figure out..one of my jobs in retirement was working for a magazine distributor...we put the magazines in the supermarkets,convenience stores,drugstores etc: The magazine companies paid us to put the magazines out..all they cared about was circulation so they could tell their advertisers..they did not care about the sale of the magazine..only that we distributed it..we scanned the magazines in and scanned out the unsold ones and billed the stores...the store made perhaps 10 percent on the magazine they sold..the distributor was getting paid at both ends...i don't know why they only paid me a few bucks an hour...in those days I could make money on the mileage driving between stores !!

Be careful not to be hasty with your assumptions.
Businesses go broke for a reason,
Local shops are subject to GST
Exhorbitant rents charged by landlords
High rates of pay and conditions.

I agree in the main with what you are saying
but closing up, or going broke due to "profiteering" does not compute.

With your example you did not include
your time as an employee with sickness benefits
and maternal leave.

I don't know who is getting hosed worse in this one... I ordered something off of ebay. It was some sort of cable for my daughter. Not too expensive and not extreamly heavy. About 3 ounces. The company charged $1.22 to ship it air mail from China to the U.S..

Now according to mailing standards which post office has the Lions share of expenses for the mailing. And would 1.22 cover the actual costs?

I've been noticing that china has been doing more and more stuff not only at dirt cheap prices but like VM stated the shipping is below what is feasable to actually ship. Now for a long time the prices were somewhat inflated for China but more and more they are coming down.
In my tackle business I have imported supplies ranging from a few Kilos up to 50 kilos and had things sent by EMS Courier and the rates are about $15-$20 per kilo. Sounds like alot but considering the components were many 1000's of pcs per Kilo the per pc cost translated very low.
However I do believe China post and most of Gov't or Corporate China knows how to win and make money globally. If China post reduces its charges for any out of country mailings of manufactured goods (Chinese manufacturers get a 10-15% Gov't kickback for exports) they realize it is strengthening their economy. Lets face it how much does a postal worker in China make and for the size of the country they only have to fill a plane and get it to its destination continent then USPS, CAN Post Au Post gets to do all the work. I've also noticed simular low rates from India - I also collect gemstones and recently had a package heavy enough to cost more than I paid for its contents delivered with signature. If I sent the same size package back to India full of dirt Canada Post would have charged me more than I paid for the lot . We wonder why their are deficits in all our postal systems.
I know I can't or shouldn't complain since I choose to buy items from these countries but we are dealing with a Global market in all aspects and our standards of living , health care , tax rates, and so on simply we can't win. Brick and mortar shops that have to pay the overhead and can not adapt will suffer .
Sorry if that is doom and gloom and to far off stamp topic but its been happening for years.

International shipping from China isn't too expensive.

21g. - 50g. 8.20 yuan (about $1.24)

51g. - 100g. 10.40 yuan

I second the 'doom and gloom.'

Those rates for regular mail are inline. Can post rate for regular letters up to 50G is $2.50. Once you include something in say a bubble pack it no longer falls into a standard letter category and for up tp 100G the rate is $4.10 , 100-200G is $7.20 and 200-500G $14.40 . 500G is only 1.1 lbs where I see the same weights from overseas still coming in at only a couple dollars. The rates to deliver within a smaller country or we'll say to hong Kong International airport are well within standards. My thing is once the bags upon bags are dropped off at USPS or CAn post here in North AMerica there is nothing left to offset the cost to deliver to you and I. I think even back as far as reagan there were tariffs on anything coming in but I don't see that being a stopper any longer. And if you look at the 100's of thousands of individuals and small business' that sell online I would bet not more than 1/10 of 1 percent of their goods go to go to these countries. They have MFG wrapped up, They have shipping wrapped up , They especially have overhead and labour wrapped up . Where do we fit in that equation? Left over scraps to fight for. To put another stamp twist into this that has been brought up many times -- you wonder why people use glue sticks on uncancelled postage !

The marketplace for today's consumer is 1,000x larger than it was even 40 years ago. Today if you want to buy a book you turn on your computer and there are thousands of used book stores competing for your business. 50 years ago, if you wanted the same book, you maybe had a handful of sellers to choose from, if you were lucky to have that many in your town! Competition drives prices down and that's good for everyone - not to mention that with thousands of planes in the air at any given moment, postage has perhaps become the cheapest (real $ terms) in the history of the mail (don't quote me on that one, but I have a good feeling about it!)