Could it hurt the hobby? I made roughly 25 trades this past week! A little background check on me. 18 years young, college kid. With NO help from family. All college is paid for by me. I save a bunch for college and spend a little on cards. After shipping out 25 trades, it cost me $52 and change... is there ANY way to ship lower? These are US funds by the way.

Shipping costs do suck. $52 for 25 trades seems a bit higher than what it costs me though. What type of shipping do you generally use?

I ship via USPS.

Just like 1st class of whatever it is...without DC or anything? I would say generally my shipping costs are about $1 a trade..maybe a little more

I pay $1.96 per bubble mailer i send out plus bubble mailer and supplies, roughly costs me 3.50 a trade

just regular.

i ship penny sleeve, top loader, team bag, in bubble mailer. i can't afford trading, it is crazy

hmm that is crazy lol..trade with people closer to you?

It is kinda tough when you start making 15-20 trades in a month, and dont have alot of extra cash to throw around (on top of the cost of the cards themselves)

i trade half to USA and half Canada. Lets say 15% of money i make go to cards. I spend maybe half of that on just shipping. I refuse to get out of the hobby. I can enjoy it even if I can barley afford it. I just cannot be going out getting a Bryan Little The cup RC patch like i want to

Yea, it is a good hobby despite the costliness lol..I have found that the shipping costs are offset largely by the simple fact that my PC is literally about 10,000% better than it would be without the trades that I vae made in the past 15 (or so) months

Yea i don't mind. My collection has risen 193782782% since I got back in about 3 months ago. It just stinks having to pay for my college (about $85,000) after it is said and done. But this and me woman make me happiest. I'll never leave it.

It's a shame that a college education costs as much as it does in the United States. I definitely wish you well with it and hope you make it through to the other side without too significant a debt load.

Regarding the hobby, you may have to restrict how freely you trade, and cut down on the number of deals and aim for bigger/trades to save money. Rather than doing a bunch of small trades for smaller cards, aim to make a handful of larger trades involving larger numbers of cards. I went through a period where I'd trade for anything that I felt I needed. It gets silly spending $2 to ship a $3 card to the US because somebody has an insert out of a set I collect. So I've really cut down on that sort of thing. It may mean you don't get to 100 trades quite as quickly, but guarding your hobby dollars wisely has other benefits.

Shipping cost are crazy. Did a trade to help out a set collector of older Mcdonalds. Around 30 cards mostly base. Packed them in a couple snap shut cases put in a bubble mailer. Almost 10 bucks to mail within the province. Asked if it would be cheaper if i package different and mail as a small parcel. Was told it wouldn't as they went by weight. Next time if there is a next time i will mail them in 2 bubble mailers

Try reusing your supplies. All the supplies (team bags,toploaders,penny sleeves) that I buy I use only for my PC items. Whenever I make a trade or buy from Ebay I use the supplies from those to ship out my trades and sells from Ebay.
I also used cardboard to protect whatever I shipped out. But now I use the old bubble mailers. I cut them up and put the cards inside of them. It's lighter than cardboard and saves a little money. I also found that if you mail out bigger lots of cards (50+) it's a little cheaper to mail in a smaller box that a buble mailer. My clost is filled with small boxes.
Hope this helps and good luck with school.

Here how I do it, first go to a library near you. This is where I buy bubble mailer from Hefty. Cost 29 cents for #000 and 39 cents for bigger one #00. Saving on the bublle mailer is key. Buying them online is expensive. Buying them in a post office is also expensive. I pre-order box of 25 enveloppes.

Mainly the cost is:
bubble mailer 0.29
penny sleave 0.01
teambag 0.04
top loader 0.06
total 40 cents plus stamp usualy 0.96 or 1.15

Add taxes on stamp and enveloppe and I am under 2$/ That is in canada.

thanks for all the help! I bought 500 bubble mailers for $48. Then they charge at least $2 to ship. I think when I go in I'll see if there is a cheaper way

$85,000 ?....good lord man, I hope you got a federal grant to pay for this...if not, you should have.

hha yea i guess i have a little. But not naerly enough for a young lad like me... crazy

Could it hurt the hobby? I made roughly 25 trades this past week! A little background check on me. 18 years young, college kid. With NO help from family. All college is paid for by me. I save a bunch for college and spend a little on cards. After shipping out 25 trades, it cost me $52 and change... is there ANY way to ship lower? These are US funds by the way.

To get back on track, yes, I say that it can and probably does hurt the hobby. Especial for those in Canada. Recently, Canada post introduced the "Light Packet" Shipping option which is meant for most non-letter objects and costs 100% more than mailing as paper. WE are expected to drop 4$ per card shipment to the US.

Since they are really the only postal service in town, its hard to deal with, but there is a current work around and its about shipping smarter and working a bit harder.

First: Check your postal guide on pricing and restrictions. I can't speak much for the US, but in Canada one can ship paper like objects like photos (ie: cards), as regular letter mail. Don't let the postal clerk tell you otherwise. Just say, photos or paper product.

Second: Thin out your packages. As long as your package is thinner than 2 cm (3/4 inch in the US), you can ship using the "oversized envelope" option (large letter in US). Again, don't let the postal clerk tell you otherwise. If they get huffy, don't confront, just say the denomination of postage you'd like to buy, put it on yourself and mail away.

Third: Lighten up your packages. The Canadian cut-off for price hikes are 100g, 200g, 250 g, and 500g (US resident will have to chime in for them, but I bet cut offs are by ounce). If you are in this hobby for the long term how much money could you save by buying a 20$ digital scale? I bought one over 2 years ago and it paid for itself in 4 months.

Fourth: Ship smarter. Here are some handy tips on how to accomplish all of the above:

anything thicker than a 10 ct card box is thicker than 2 cm when placed in a bubble mailer
That being said, with adequate protection it IS possible to ship 100 cards in an oversized letter mail. More than that is pushing it.
The bubble mailer needs to be only big enough to hold the cards. Cut off excess paper and bubble and tape the side shut if you are near the cutoff.
Re-use old bubble mailers. All you need to do is tape a sheet of paper to the front. This saves you the cost of the mailer and is better for the environment, rather than buying a new one
Make smart trades if you need supplies. Run out of GU top loaders? make a trade for a bunch of GU
Run out of team bags? Team bags a fancy speak for "plastic bag + taped shut". Here are some alternatives: Re-used team-bags, the bags that 100 ct penny sleeves come in, the bag that the team bags come in, old pack wrappers (as long as they can fit a top loader in the interior), penny sleeves for over sized cards - these can often be bought for cheap from stores since they don't sell well.
Sandwich your cards. For 9 cards (or equivalent thickness), here's the cheapest way to send securely every time: two decoys, three top loaders and 5 penny sleeves and 1 team bag. Take the three highest value cards put them in penny sleeves and top loaders. Three cards can fit in a penny sleeve (be careful when inserting). Sandwhich the cards as follows and place them all in a team bag: Decoy - Top Loader - 3 in sleeve - Top Loader - 3 in sleeve - top loader - decoy. Then, tape the team bag securely shut so that none of the cards can move. You just protected the corners of 9 cards. If you use thin, but stong decoys, you can get up to 15 cards this way, but its a push.


All the best in your hockey mailing budgeting!

Here a few ideas and this is just me. I usually recycle my bubblemailers to help on that front of cost. As for shipping one card to a few it usually around a $1.41. If your sending a few cheap base or freebies I would do a PWE. You just need to ask them to Stamp on the PWE HAND SORT!! That way it won't go thru the machine. Of course that for very low low end trades (stuff you can easily replace) or possibly stuff your sending for free.

p.s. I know many that say they never had trouble with PWE while others will not trade with you if your sending that route. Of course $52 a week is a lot of dough to be throwing at the postal service.

DON

I recycle my mailers.. so a roll of tape is 1.00.. scissors are already here.. cut the package open nicely.. you can get the large sized recipe cards for 1.00 a pack (about 100 in a pack)

It cost 1.18 CDN for me to mail a package to canada and 1.96 to mail to USA

only time i use a new bubble is if it is a trade of higher bv (over 40 bv for example)

and I always use loose stamps not the printed ones..

not saying i do this but SOMETIMES they do not cancel the stamps.. then the person gets free shipping on their next trade

If you ship USPS, then most of your costs will be supplies as postage is usually less than a buck. That said, it's hard to complain about the cost of shipping because we all want to receive our cards in a bubble mailer, in a penny sleeve, in a top loader. Costs would be minimal if we would all ship using plain white envelopes, but we all know the dangers of that.

Postage is what it is. That said, the only way to reduce costs is find cheaper supplies. Someone earlier said they re-use bubble mailers. That sound like a great idea. I buy alot of cards off eBay and re-use the penny sleeves and top loaders.

I'm sure you could get bubble mailers, in bulk, off the internet from an office supply company real cheap. If you don't need that many mailers, maybe you can hook up with a couple of buds and share an order.

Yea, it is a good hobby despite the costliness lol..I have found that the shipping costs are offset largely by the simple fact that my PC is literally about 10,000% better than it would be without the trades that I vae made in the past 15 (or so) months

Agreed, mine is so much better after dropping a lot of deadweight

$85,000 ?....good lord man, I hope you got a federal grant to pay for this...if not, you should have.

That's why I went to community college for 2 years and then a state school, lived at home the whole time :smokin:

My problem IS postage... not supplies. And reoddai is amazing with his post. thanks everyone

Postage is what it is and will always go up from time to time. I'd say prioritize you trades and do the ones for more expensive cards. That way you are at least getting a better value for you shipping cost.

Also, where do you go to school that it will cost you $85,000. Is that just undergrad or does it include education past that?

If i add up all the cost, and the going rates of college going up. It will be $85,000 roughly. Do I have grants, yes, is it 85,000 worth. no. So one thing I am doing is cutting back on trades, there is no reason for me to being pay for all my college, so now it is time to just cut back and get through college so i can make the big money!