What's a fair price for Serama chicks?

[SeramaLife]

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Sounds goodfor me too,since I agree with you for the most part.

 

[YB192004]

Personally, I do not mind paying a little extra for shipping as long as I get what I want to me safely. I did aware of the 50 bucks flat rate to ship from east coast to west cost at the time I purchase my birds.

An extra 10 - 60 bucks to get some birds from a reputable breeder, with the kind of birds I'm looking for available, for the same price as a non-reputable local breeders that refuse to show me pics of their for sale is not that big of a deal to me.

A straight up front and honest seller like Bluegrasserama (reputable breeder or non-reputable i did not know at that time....No offense Bluegrasserama)will always get my bussiness....all the birds she sells are from her birds not from eggs hatched order online like a few of the local so call breeders around here and she has great price on her birds too.

Unfortunately, she did not have any available and refused to sell me any of hers breeder pairs back then.

Out of desperation, I asked Jerry S. to make an exception on sell me his young pair (almost 5 months old) without guarantee on the out come. I paid 260$ include shipping for them. What I got might not be a gem to others but they are to me, I can always improve my flock throu breeding.

 

[TommyVT05]

YB192004,

I can't agree with you more.

For everyone else who is tuned in,

If you read my thread and perhaps some of the others closely, I am not pinky on just a $10 or $20 difference but I am just opening eyes to those who might be overcharged from USPS because of little things like "insurance", "signature confirmation", etc. Things like that add up and if its unneccesary, don't let USPS charge you and end up charging buyers (indirectly) more than they need to pay for shipping. Its pretty high enough these days...

My posts and replies are strictly to help others; not to poke at anyone or offend anyone but it seems that it might have already since I have seen a few that have "picked sides", if you will.

Without further problems, I am just want to remind everyone that

1.) If you can reduce the shipping (anyway you can without risking the animals that are being shipped), go for it. Don't pay for what they call "luxury" additions to the shipping if its not necessary.

2.) Upon judging about the price of certain birds / fowls being too much or too little, be aware of where the bird is raised at and in what conditions. I.e. Seramas here might run $35 on avg. for chicks and $10 on avg. in the west coast for the same grade. So...keep that in mind and it will keep you from having a head-ach as well as others : )

That is all...

God Bless and Take Care!

- Tommy

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[BluegrassSeramas]

I'll be back! I have a lot of questions/comments about the hatchery stuff!

I just wanted to clarify that when I explained what my 50 flat rate shipping cost included--it was ONLY the actual cost of the box (that I pay) and what USPS charges me for Express shipping. My customers can see what USPS charges on the box. We also discovered that it is actually a little more than 50, so Im also paying some out of pocket only charging 50 for the box and Express.
Some one who is charging a flat rate of 60 for something that ships Express at 4 lbs is actually getting all of their shipping costs covered, and possibly making only 2-3 extra bucks for the cost of gas, time, shavings, feed, fruit, vitamins, DE or whatever else they send. (I think that is very fair, IMO)

I dont add extra insurance or anything to make it more expensive, Express already has insurance and thats good enough for me. I think they have some weird policy about insurance on Lives anyway. Never lost a bird so I dont see the reason to add it and make my customer pay more. (That is just ME though, if anyone wants extra insurance, they can ask) The nearly 40 bucks that was on my receipts is just for plain 'ole express shipping. Nothing fancy.

SOOO...my last thing was to ask you, Tommy, If you still thought that 50-60 bucks for shipping out a pair of (4-6 month old-NOT overweight) seramas was totally overpriced?

Also, I still didnt see how you are shipping birds for 20 less than everyone else (and calling 50-60 overpriced.)
You are saving 7 bucks on the box cost (wherever you are getting them for that cheap without buying in bulk)..... but where are you saving the other 13--when you ADD insurance?
Did you ever say that you were shipping breeding aged birds or chicks? Im sure that chicks would weigh much less, and are you using the 'single' horizon boxes?

Thanks! Im just learning, maybe I can save 20 bucks on shipping too! All my paypal payments stay in that account, and I pay shipping out of my own pocket maybe a few times a week. (55-170 bucks) When Im done with Paypal, I figure out all the fees, and order a check that costs me 7 bucks and THEN I still have to split it with my breeding partner. So saving money on shipping would help my personal pocketbook out!~Jessi

 

[TommyVT05]

Jessi,

Perhaps the thread got redirected around too offten that whatever I had to say got lost in its own suggestions. Haha. No problem. I want to help out anyways so I don't mind repeating myself...

So here is the breakdown right?

1.) Box = $6 alone. Shipping 20 of them at a time comes out to about $8 each.

So in total Box = $8

2.) That leaves it $2 to round it off to $10. With $2, I account for bedding, extra orange, watermelon for water, etc. and I have noted before that I actually UNDER-estimate by assuming all of this is only $2, but anyhow, just making things better...

That makes OVERALL Box = $10

3.) Shipping Express, no signature required, no insurance usually runs at about $28 - $38, $40ish tops (Usually when I ship at about 7llbs.

So round EVERYYTHING off, shipping box plus 6+ lbs weight will be $10 + $45 (highly rounded up) would lead to a grand total of : $55

NOW, keeping that in mind, a pair of 4-5 month old Serama in the box with beeding and all should come out to around 3-4lbs so the rate SHOULD be less correct?

Give it a $5 difference which will lead to $50 TOTAL but remember the number we worked out earlier is ALSO rounded up so THIS value is ALSO rounded up...

DO you sort of see the break-down now?

So! In general, I see the misconnection between the assumption of my rate vs. yours and others.

It is NOT the rate that is different, but its rather the charge for the box and its supplies. So I under-charge my customers mainly there with the exact cost of my $8 box and just $2 for supplies, gas, etc. when it should be more like $5 for all that which rounds up to about $15 for Box...

If you do that, it all comes out about right. $15 + $45 shipping = $60 for larger orders : )

And yes, I do ship chicks to adult birds using the 'SINGLE' Horizon box. Chicks for me are between the ages of 1-2 months old. I don't ship chicks any younger than 1 month old unless buyer request it and if that is the case, I require a minimum order.

- Tommy

PS: Do you have any of the "sqeaky" Serama right now? They seem very interesting. Perhaps I should get some so I can breed them while in the apartments of my medical school. Haha

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[BluegrassSeramas]

I still dont get how the Government ran USPS charges you for "Shipping Express, no signature required, no insurance (and that) usually runs at about $28 - $38, $40ish tops (Usually when I ship at about 7llbs.)., ...when Im getting charged $37-$39 bucks for 4lbs....
Do you have any recent receipts? Have you not shipped in a while and rates have gone up this year? I need to figure this out!


Sooooo lets just say..........the shipping is the about the same(nearly 40 bucks) for 4lbs USPS Express for both you and me (without any of the other extra insurance and sig.conformation charges) ------BUT you know where to get boxes (that includes shipping costs to you added) for only 8 bucks, then you round it up to 10 for other 2 bucks to help with the other additional costs, whereas Im paying 15 for boxes (that includes shipping costs to me added) and not adding anything extra to cover the other additional costs and losing a few bucks when the total cost of boxes and shipping is actually costing me nearly 55 bucks--and I only charge 50.

So what I need to do now is find out where you are getting cheaper Horizon single boxes for and I can knock 5 bucks off my flat rate and make 2 bucks to cover fruit etc costs.

To answer your other question:
When we raise birds from the "squeaky" line, we have to raise them to full adulthood. I wont be selling any of them (if we have any extra!-I really like the type on this years boys) until next spring. Mr. Wonderful and Napoleon are both squeaky..you can see their pics if you search my posts....and we are selling eggs from those lines, but we havn't figured out the genetics of it yet. We line breed them, but not all the roos come out squeaky like their parents, so you have to raise them up and take a chance!

 

[TommyVT05]

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