More Turn to Internet Retailers for Holiday Shopping

Retail sales figures may be down this year for many retailers. We are told customers are buying less. But, there is one strong trend that we are seeing that is very positive. There are definitely more buyers purchasing on the web this year!

How can that be when overall retail sales are down? We are seeing a 2-5% increase in unique people tracking packages daily as compared to last year’s volumes. This means that even though volumes shipped are down as a whole, more people are turning to the web for their holiday shopping than ever before. We feel this is a very strong indicator for the future of the Internet retailer.

We also continue to receive reports from some of our clients that they not only have more customers buying this year, they also report increased sales. In fact, clients who used our CPS flat rate calculator to employ our flat rate and free shipping strategies were among the majority of those reporting increased sales. We find this very positive, too.

Yet Another Reason to Consider Flat Rate Shipping

As stated in a recent article at InternetRetailer.com, the U.S. Postal Service web site is still having problems with its web shipping tools. This release also states malfunctioning USPS web tools failed to report the USPS price causing more expensive rates of other carriers to be displayed for those that rate shop on their sites. This caused a measurable increase in shopping cart abandonment. This is yet another example why flat rate or even free shipping is better than trying to use real time rating at the time of order processing. Not to mention the fact that these shipping methods can even help you close more sales and increase the amount purchased!

Now that we are getting to the end of the holiday shipping season, we are getting reports from several retailers that have used our suggestions on how they handled shipping this year at their web sites. Those businesses that decided to try flat rate or free shipping had very positive things to say. They are using the techniques outlined in our free whitepaper found at BusinessShipper.com. The same retailers that have had good results are telling us that even though they see the negative effects of the economy on how much people are spending, they are also seeing more customers buying on-line! Just think how these businesses would have done in a more positive year…

Important Holiday Dates for Shippers

As we end up 2008 and begin 2009 there are some important dates that all shippers should be aware of. The following are the last days domestic holiday packages can be shipped for on time Christmas deliveries with USPS:

December 16, 2008 Parcel Post
December 20, 2008 First-Class Mail/Priority Mail
December 23, 2008 Express Mail

USPS International delivery schedule can be found at the link below:

http://www.usps.com/holiday/shippingcalendar.htm?from=home_ftpromo&page=holidayintlmaildates

UPS and FedEx pickup and delivery information can be found at the links below:

http://www.compass.ups.com/article/article.aspx?id=2289

http://www.fedex.com/us/holiday/shipping/lastdaystoship.html

In addition to holiday delivery schedules there some other dates that are rapidly coming up. In January many carrier rates and services will be changing. The following are the dates these changes take place.

FedEx

January 5, 2009 Rates, Fuel Surcharges and Services change. For more on these changes visit:

http://www.fedex.com/us/rates2009/index.html

UPS

January 5, 2009 Rates, Fuel Surcharges and Services change. For more on these changes visit:

http://www.ups.com/rates/

USPS

January 18, 2009 Rates and Services change. For more on these changes visit:

http://www.usps.com/prices/pricechanges.htm?from=home_ftpromo&page=newshippingprices


All Harvey Software CPS shippers will receive the rates and service changes by download and will automatically reflect the new carrier changes.

Make sure to mark calendars with all these very important dates!

We here at Harvey Software all wish everyone a happy holiday season and a prosperous New Year!