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If you can pick up eggs locally, then yes, that's the way to go.
One supplier on the 0% hatch is actually very good, sent me 6 extras later at no cost, and was careful in packing. But all the air cells were damaged in transit. Over half were ruptured, all the others were mis-shaped from being bounced around. And, who knows what temperature extremes they may have been exposed to. The person I bought them from has had very high hatch rates with some customers. It depends on what happens on your particular mail route, from Point A to Point B. When they get tumbled around with machine sorting, that's what happens.
The other, with the 8 infertiles, I won't get eggs from again. I'd bought from her last year, the eggs were badly packed, many broken, only 1 hatched. She sent these at shipping cost only, which was nice, but sent a bunch of infertile eggs. I can't say she did it on purpose, but I'd think she'd be aware of any fertility problems. I asked her to pack them differently, and she did, and this bunch arrived in good shape, but I think it made her mad that I told her her packaging wasn't as good as it could be. She claimed that she almost never got reports of broken eggs with the way she packed the first time, which I find hard to believe.
Another package I received had no damage, eggs in great shape, from all appearances, and I still only got 7 chicks. 7 exceptionally nice chicks, I might add, of breeder stock lines, not hatchery, a breed I want very much. That's the thing, some of the breeds I want are not that easy to come by. Many of the eggs in that bunch died early, or were fully formed and failed to pip. That may have been my fault, though, I had some temp/humidity issues with that hatch. I think if I got more from her later, I'd have a better hatch. But I have 3 males and 4 females, so I'll just breed my own, now, and later get a few from another source to increase the gene pool.
