PhaedrusZen 55 Posted March 14, 2015 This is a side job for me, but it's a full-time endeavor most of the time. ( I put in 56 hours a week, averaged, at my other job, plus whatever it takes to get my orders done. Yesterday was a 24 hour shift, followed by 11-12 hours of vinyl cutting at my home office today). Everything I ship is first class with delivery confirmation, and I ship in either 9x12 flat mailers or 2" tubes, ranging from 9" long to a full 24" long. I'm with Skeeter on the smaller decals. The bigger the better, as long as it's not too much of a crazy, complex welded design. (I'm still developing my skills). A lot of what I ship in the mailers is actually as long as 3-4 feet, but can be folded between breaks in the design so it fits well in the mailer. Some of the sites I use pay through Paypal, but I get paid after the fact through Dwolla (I work as a independent contractor for a friend, I guess? I could make more on my own, but I'm happy to let them handle their portion of the business and just take care of the cutting/shipping.) I've called Paypal customer support fairly recently (before we switched to Shipstation, and if they used to create APO labels, they no longer do so, and I had to go to USPS to create those labels, which was an entirely different kind of pain in the butt. I wish I could have seen some of those intergration aspects you're talking about Skeeter, but I always had to download all my orders from the website I received my orders from as a csv. file, upload it to paypal as a bulk shipment, create the labels and then I had to get creative on ways to get the tracking out of Paypal, as I never found a csv. download for tracking numbers. I ended up opening the recent orders window (can't remember what exactly it was called) copy the information, then paste it into a spreadsheet that I had to format so I could re-upload to the deal site to get tracking entered for my orders so I could get paid. It might be worthwhile for someone like myself or other relatively new cutters, if someone put together a tutorial for how to navigate some of those aspects in Paypal that I, for one, couldn't find or figure out. Their forums only ever turned up garbage for me personally, and customer service was generally less than helpful... =/ I might try to do something similar for Shipstation once I get a little more comfortable with it. They have pretty good customer service, so I've always been able to talk to someone and trouble shoot through whatever I was trying to accomplish, but it'd still be nice to have some condensed information for those looking into it, or trying to troubleshoot on their own. I looked into it a bit, and I'm not sure, but I think we're using the Platinum plan through Shipstation which allows 5 users and 5 different managed websites, as well as manual channels for websites that aren't supported yet. It's Just under $100/month, which is $20/ month for me personally, to use it. I know it's $20 more than Paypal users, but It's worth my money for what I do & how I use it. =) (BTW, I'm never trying to piss anyone off, least of all Mz Skeeter, since she's saved my bacon more than once, either directly or from her previous contributions/insights on this forum. Just giving my dissenting opinion on this subject. ) 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MZ SKEETER 4,709 Posted March 14, 2015 (BTW, I'm never trying to piss anyone off, least of all Mz Skeeter, since she's saved my bacon more than once, either directly or from her previous contributions/insights on this forum. Just giving my dissenting opinion on this subject. ) LOL .... I'll try not to piss you off either..... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sal316 166 Posted March 14, 2015 Someone help me put the octagon away, they made up. 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
CajunCustom 29 Posted March 15, 2015 I normally sell on etsy , up untill recently i just went to the post office or my daughter did , basic postage is 2.32 with a tracking number , but almost everytime my daughter goes to the post office they do not know of this method say you have to pay for tracking etc etc , i got so tired of the usps incompetence i just bought a DYMO LabelWriter 4XL and with a click i can print a stamp out thru etsy with tracking for 0 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DCMoney 91 Posted March 15, 2015 I don't make single decals that small..NO MONEY.... I do 1 type of design small 3"x 6" just to use up scrap. And I got some 6" w x 50yrd rolls of Avery Chrome cheap..So I also make that design in chrome also.. They go into 6" x 9" manilla envelopes.Ship for $1.93 with tracking. ..I don't sell a ton of those small decals. But I still make a profit from those, with tracking, because the vinyl is scrap anyway.... Your using your vinyl from the rolls to make your small decals. I am not...I am using left over vinyl, from other orders already done, that I already got paid for. . .I save scraps from bigger orders. .. .My next regular smallest would be probably in the 12"-13-14" Length. The rest bigger....up to 12ft.. But I have done 16ft long... This is where I have the niche' over others. I make big decals..You guys can fight over that little stuff..Your working way harder than I am... We all got to start somewhere, and since I'm not even 30 yet you've got a lot of years on me. Appreciate the advice and insight. Who would have guess a question about stamps.com would cause such an uproar... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MZ SKEETER 4,709 Posted March 15, 2015 We all got to start somewhere, and since I'm not even 30 yet you've got a lot of years on me. Appreciate the advice and insight. Who would have guess a question about stamps.com would cause such an uproar... I started with large decals from the git go....I wanted to make money!! As it was to make my living for me.......I didn't know anything about this forum when I started in 2006. I taught myself everything, Trial and error.. 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DCMoney 91 Posted March 16, 2015 I started with large decals from the git go....I wanted to make money!! As it was to make my living for me.......I didn't know anything about this forum when I started in 2006. I taught myself everything, Trial and error.. How often do you ship large decals? Do you ship them in tubes rolled up? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MZ SKEETER 4,709 Posted March 16, 2015 How often do you ship large decals? Do you ship them in tubes rolled up? My business is large decals, I am very busy. .Middle of Feb thru Nov is much busier, because of weather. I use these type of boxes from Uline.com. Long opening.. In different sizes. Lengths. They are very sturdy...The box price and shipping is figured into the decals.... Uline is a great company to work with. I get my boxes next day thru UPS. Decals are rolled loosely. I do also use some of the USPS triangle, shipping tubes, for decals that are wide, but not long. http://www.uline.com/Product/Detail/S-4240/Corrugated-Boxes-200-Test/24-x-6-x-6-Long-Corrugated-Boxes 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pshawny 410 Posted April 22, 2015 it comes down to convenience and streamlining. If you have a significant volume of items to ship, its integration capability is amazing. Plus the other big auctions sites actually inflate the postage prices and give you a "discount" off that inflated price. I use stamps.com, runs $15 a month + postage. I also use Shipworks, that runs $20 a month. with the two combined, I can come into my shop in the morning, and I have a stack of order packing slips that are paid and ready to be shipped. Then with 3 mouse clicks, I can print off all the shipping labels for all the orders ( mine are usually all the same weight ) . A process that previously would have taken me an hour or two now takes 5 minutes. It will then mark all the items shipped on their respective sites, upload tracking information and send the confirmation emails. I have on average 40-50 orders, collectivley, across 4 sites per day. I look at it as I hired a shipping employee for $35 a month. Why both stamps.com and Shipworks? Do you find that Shipworks saves you more on USPS? Do you also ship with FedEx and UPS? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
