[HN Gopher] Postal Arbitrage
___________________________________________________________________
Postal Arbitrage
Author : The28thDuck
Score : 208 points
Date : 2026-01-12 17:41 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (walzr.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (walzr.com)
| ekropotin wrote:
| But the cost of Amazon Prime have to be factored in as well
| happyopossum wrote:
| No, for anyone considering doing this it does not have to be
| factored in as it's a sunk cost.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| Only if you weren't already paying for Prime. If you were, then
| it's irrelevant as this usage adds no marginal cost.
| moralestapia wrote:
| "If you already pay for shipping then shipping adds no
| marginal cost."
| OkayPhysicist wrote:
| well, yeah. That's what the phrase "marginal cost" means:
| if it costs $x to do something N times, and $x + $y to do
| something N+1 times, $y is the marginal cost.
| babelfish wrote:
| Riley Walz is easily one of the most creative people in tech
| today.
| cypherpunks01 wrote:
| Yes, Jmail.world and the entire Jmail suite is mind-blowingly
| impressive, apparently Walz and @lukeigel co-created it.
| languagehacker wrote:
| Isn't postal arbitrage how the original Ponzi scheme started?
| wat10000 wrote:
| Indeed. Ponzi attempted to buy International Reply Coupons in
| countries where they were cheap, then exchange them for stamps
| in the US and sell the stamps for much more than the purchase
| price of the IRC.
|
| Of course, it didn't work. There wasn't anything fundamentally
| wrong with the arbitrage scheme, but the profit per coupon was
| way too low to make it feasible as a business. Ponzi pivoted to
| paying off older investments with new investments, and the rest
| is history.
| munificent wrote:
| I would delight to receive birthday cards in Maruchan Ramen form.
| sixothree wrote:
| As is tradition.
| bee_rider wrote:
| A cheaper option (if we're going to do away with the restriction
| that the post card should be sent _by_ the sender) would be for
| the recipient to hook their printer up to the network, and just
| send bits.
|
| It is better, actually, you can even scan a real hand written
| post card.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| We could even make a standardised protocol, where anyone could
| send messages to any connected printer: like letters, except a
| facsimile of the original document is produced. I'm struggling
| to think of a catchy name for this, though.
| kennywinker wrote:
| It's not a fax unless it's from the facsimile region of
| france. What you're describing is just sparkling email.
| sudobash1 wrote:
| You can even still do fax machines if you really wanted to.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| owning a printer is never the cheaper option.
| itintheory wrote:
| I think it depends. I bought a Dell 1700 laser printer for
| the low price of $0 at a second hand store about 19 years
| ago. They said it was failing to pull paper from the tray,
| and I could have it if I wanted. I fixed the rollers
| responsible for feeding (turned the rubber wheels inside
| out), and used it for another 10 years without issue. Sure,
| toner costs some money, but an off-brand toner cartridge is
| $25, rated for 3000 pages. I have also needed to replace the
| drum, and at one point picked up a second 1700 into which I
| had to put the old drum and toner after some failure or
| another.
|
| I'd estimate I've put in $200 at most, and probably put
| 15-20k pages through it. Still prints just fine. It doesn't
| have color, or networking features, but I can share it on the
| network from the connected computer. I'm not sure they make
| anything this reliable these days, but I bet there's quite a
| few old laser printers floating around still.
| rationalist wrote:
| I'm sorry the ink cartel hurt you. May I introduce you to the
| world of laser printers?
|
| My color laser printer has definitely been cheaper than me
| driving to the store hundreds of times to print thousands of
| color prints.
| systemerror wrote:
| Don't give money to amazon that is better spent on an amazingly
| efficient postal service. Amazon is subsidized by imaginary money
| until they put all their competition out of business(including
| USPS).
| Fwirt wrote:
| My honest question is: If you pull shenanigans like this, isn't
| it actually making Amazon burn through said imaginary money,
| thus hastening its demise? The cost of delivering a potato has
| to be on the order of at least a couple dollars.
| relaxing wrote:
| Amazon will close your account before you can impact their
| bottom line.
| crumpled wrote:
| I think they let you (not YOU necessarily, but the
| proverbial you.) get away with stuff because they know your
| habits and you probably make more money for them than you
| realize.
|
| I can almost guarantee that everyone mentioned in that blog
| post is a habitual Amazon user. They're all renewing Prime
| each year at full price and making a ton of regular
| purchases. The family has even turned on the FOMO by making
| Prime a family social network with social pressure to stay.
| I see it as a self-own, personally.
|
| Edit: I'm taking part of this to the root of the thread
| roncesvalles wrote:
| I don't think Amazon is losing money. It's really just that
| efficient.
|
| E.g. an Amazon van rolls through my street multiple times a
| day. What is the marginal cost of them stopping at my house
| and dropping off a potato?
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| At your house it might be fractions of a cent.
|
| At my house, it's a 140 mile round trip between the
| fulfillment center ("are you feeling fulfilled yet?") and
| the drop off location.
|
| OTOH, there's likely more of "you" than there are of "me"
| ...
| ajdlinux wrote:
| Assuming it's the US we're talking about, the federal
| minimum wage is $7.25, which means that if every worker
| involved is paid at the minimum wage, you incur a cent of
| labour costs every 4.97 person-seconds. AFAICT, most
| Amazon workers are paid substantially higher than the
| federal minimum wage. And that's just labour costs.
|
| While Amazon is efficient, "fractions of a cent" is
| probably the wrong order of magnitude for even the most
| efficient order.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| I hate USPS, and will not be doing anything to benefit them
| until they offer a way to limit my deliveries to once a month,
| and opt out of anything that has "or current resident"
|
| At the very least they should charge more for bulk mail, not
| give out discounts.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Unfortunately bulk mail is the only thing paying the bills.
| That and being a last mile delivery service for Amazon.
| umanwizard wrote:
| Which is a totally valid reason to hate USPS.
|
| The USPS is a government-run spam delivery service that
| there is no way to opt out of. Those of us who do banking
| and other administrative tasks online would be better off
| if the government shut it down completely, or better yet
| subsidized it slightly so it doesn't have to deliver spam
| to survive.
|
| But as it is, I don't see any good reason to have any more
| respect for USPS than I do for any other spammer.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| Yes, exactly. I wish the post office were subsidized and
| acted in the interests of the public. But it is not, and
| does not.
| jonpurdy wrote:
| In Canada, you can place a red dot (or write no unsolicited
| mail) on your mailbox and they will withhold delivering
| anything not directly addressed to you.
|
| I was shocked when I moved to SF and found out there was no
| way to opt out of unaddressed mail (or "current resident").
| vidarh wrote:
| Can you explain? Amazon is wildly profitable, and while AWS is
| far higher margin than their retail businesses, everything I
| can find suggests their retail segment also has a healthy
| operating margin.
| sambaumann wrote:
| Turns out, at least in my area, for the grocery items you need to
| buy at least $25 worth to qualify for the free shipping.
| modeless wrote:
| Yeah, this is misleading. You can't send a lime for $0.25. It's
| $3.24 minimum.
| s0rce wrote:
| I checked the lime listed and it seems to be a regular amazon
| prime item for me (norcal) and not the grocery you described,
| which we also have.
| modeless wrote:
| Did you press the buy button? The shipping fee is $2.99
| s0rce wrote:
| Ah, you're right. Sneaky.
| andy99 wrote:
| I canceled prime ~8 years ago because where I am, half the
| stuff I wanted was considered an "add on item" that could only
| be shipped free if you had > $35 of other stuff, which is a
| complete scam because you get that without prime.
|
| Maybe that was just for me (in a large Canadian city at the
| time) or maybe they don't do that anymore?
|
| I haven't considered getting prime since, it would be a lot
| more interesting if it actually provided the shipping terms
| they advertise.
| sciurus wrote:
| I checked the first five items while logged in with Amazon
| Prime. They all required a minimum order of either $25 or $100
| to get free shipping.
| sanex wrote:
| Just sent my friend a bag of gravy mix, thank you!
| netsharc wrote:
| Ah, luckily the climate doesn't mind that oil was extracted, a
| phone case was produced out of it, shipped from China, to end up
| not even being used but just as a "greeting card".
|
| Why yes, I am fun at parties.
| xxpor wrote:
| The oil used for shipping from Shenzhen to Long Beach is
| completely trivial compared to what the truck used getting it
| from Long Beach to Pasadena.
| MinimalAction wrote:
| I'd love a napkin math calculation at this.
| hi-wintermute wrote:
| I did some napkin math on this as I recently picked up a 3D
| Printer and wondered the environmental comparison to print-
| at-home vs pick something up at the store and I was
| surprised. Had some help from Claude but "last mile
| delivery" is absolutely where the majority of the kWh is
| burned in the supply chain.
|
| Container ships use ~0.015 kWh per ton-km[1] and a car is
| ~1.35 kWh/km.
|
| If you go to the store and end up getting >10 things it
| becomes "worth it" from an energy standpoint. Anything less
| printing at home seemed to be more economical... Not an
| expert though just saying it opened my eyes to how
| inefficient "last mile delivery" energy consumption is.
|
| [1] https://www.withouthotair.com/c15/page_95.shtml (old
| reference)
| shagie wrote:
| > Not an expert though just saying it opened my eyes to
| how inefficient "last mile delivery" energy consumption
| is.
|
| One of the oddities of home shopping and delivery is that
| it can be _more_ efficient.
|
| https://www.npr.org/2024/09/10/nx-s1-5020321/food-
| delivery-m...
|
| > In 2022, researchers from the University of Michigan
| and Ford Motor Co. modeled a single 36-item grocery cart
| to compare greenhouse emissions from an e-commerce
| grocery delivery and a traditional trip to the store to
| get the same items. Gregory Keoleian and colleagues at
| the university's Center for Sustainable Systems found
| that using an electric vehicle to pick up groceries could
| cut emissions by as much as half, compared to a gas-
| powered vehicle.
|
| > They also found that home delivery could be an even
| better option. That's because with a delivery vehicle,
| orders are often clustered, with a driver dropping off
| not just your groceries, but also hitting neighbors
| during the same run. "Delivery is actually going to be
| more efficient in general than driving yourself in a
| gasoline SUV to the store to pick up your groceries,"
| Keoleian says.
|
| The mentioned paper is
| https://css.umich.edu/publications/research-
| publications/car...
|
| ---
|
| https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/what-if-more-people-
| bought...
|
| > A recent USDA survey found that in 88% of U.S
| households, people hop in their car to buy groceries,
| driving an average of 4 miles to their preferred store.
| ... All these car trips result in carbon pollution: over
| 17 million metric tons of CO2 come from car tailpipes
| just from driving back and forth to the grocery store.
|
| ---
|
| https://csanr.wsu.edu/how-do-grocery-and-meal-kit-
| deliveries...
|
| > While it is common for the consumer to associate
| convenience in the food industry with increased
| greenhouse gas emissions, this is not always the case.
| Results from a 2013 University of Washington study
| indicate that grocery delivery has the potential to
| reduce carbon emissions anywhere from 20 to 75 percent
| (Ma 2013), while another study out of Finland found the
| potential for grocery delivery to reduce emissions by up
| to 87 percent (Siikavirta et al. 2002).
|
| ---
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/blog/shop-online-
| sustaina...
|
| > Buying goods online can be better for the environment
| than in-store shopping for one fundamental reason: With
| online shopping, a single truck or van can replace
| multiple car trips, by multiple households, to stores. It
| helps to think of it this way: In most of the United
| States, almost every purchase means putting a vehicle on
| the road--either your own or a delivery company's.
|
| ---
|
| Some others:
|
| https://blog.sevensenders.com/en/ecommerce-carbon-
| footprint-...
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20250302115526/https://sustai
| nab... (this one is quite comprehensive also including
| the difference in packaging)
|
| And those articles come with their own citations to other
| articles.
| shagie wrote:
| https://climate.mit.edu/explainers/freight-transportation
|
| > While nearly three-quarters of the world's cargo is
| carried by ocean-going ships, road vehicles like trucks and
| vans make up the majority, 65%, of freight's emissions.
| Most ships burn fossil fuels and emit carbon, but they
| carry large amounts of freight at the same time, making
| them the most efficient way to move cargo. Road freight,
| however, can emit more than 100 times as much CO2 as ships
| to carry the same amount of freight the same distance. Road
| transport is also a fast-growing sector--80% of the global
| increase in diesel consumption can be attributed to trucks.
| E-commerce and home delivery are two reasons for this
| growth.
| cinnamonteal wrote:
| The distance from Shenzhen to Long Beach is some 300 times
| the distance from Long Beach to Pasadena, depending on
| where exactly in Pasadena and which route you take. The CO2
| emissions factor for a truck is some 10-100x that of a
| container ship. The exact ratio depends on what kind of
| truck, and what scope of emissions are being included. The
| more one accounts for, the more it will favor the boat. But
| overall, the emissions from the oceanic leg of the trip are
| probably anywhere from 1-3x those of the truck.
| shagie wrote:
| From the data at the end of
| https://climate.mit.edu/explainers/freight-transportation
| +----------+------------------------+---------------+----
| ------+----------+ | Mode | Freight (bn
| tonne-km) | CO2 (Mt) | CO2/Frgt | Vs. Sea |
| +----------+------------------------+---------------+----
| ------+----------+ | Air | 303
| | 155 | 511 | 79 | | Rail
| | 10,842 | 170 | 15 | 2
| | | Road | 26,807 | 2,230
| | 83 | 12 | | Sea | 101,486
| | 657 | 6 | 1 | +--------
| --+------------------------+---------------+----------+--
| --------+
| conductr wrote:
| You have to normalize for package volume. There's one
| ship involved, how many delivery vehicles and other auto
| related logistics until that whole shipload has reached
| its final destination?
| OrderlyTiamat wrote:
| The distance the boat has to cover is 11800 kilometers, and
| the truck covers only 54 kilometers. Taking that average of
| 12 times more usage from the table of sibling comment means
| the ship is still 20x worse.
| BrenBarn wrote:
| But what if you apportion the fuel usage over the items
| transported? Presumably the ship carries far more items
| than the truck.
| OrderlyTiamat wrote:
| This is already taken into account: Shagie's table is
| based on [1], which is per kilogram-kilometer
|
| [1] https://climate.mit.edu/explainers/freight-
| transportation
| crumpled wrote:
| I'd send a free text message to a family member, offering them
| money in exchange for them not sending me trash from Amazon.
| einpoklum wrote:
| I call, and raise you my own sardonic answer (not this one, the
| top-level one). :-\
| robrain wrote:
| I'm in the same corner of the parties with you.
|
| Also I'm passionately opposed to feathering billionaires'
| nests, even with fractions of pennies of profit.
|
| This story is funny, but also so so sad.
| sudobash1 wrote:
| I feel I should point out that USPS has a lower rate for
| postcards (currently $0.61), so the threshold might be a bit
| lower.
|
| I know that this is tongue-in-cheek and would be pretty funny to
| receive, but it isn't an apples-to-apples comparison. The
| experience of getting a little message printed on receipt paper
| is nothing like the experience of receiving a note or card in the
| mail. Through the mail you receive something physically from
| someone with their handwriting and some personality to it.
| Getting the Amazon message is more like printing out a text
| message on crummy paper.
|
| Also, I don't have Prime, so it definitely isn't cost competitive
| for me anyway.
| hatthew wrote:
| I agree in general, but as a one-off thing I'd very much enjoy
| getting a lime with a message saying "this was cheaper than
| sending a letter myself"
| hoistbypetard wrote:
| I've started sending paperbacks instead of greeting cards
| when someone I know needs a get-well-soon card. In stores
| around here, greeting cards are often $7ish + postage. I can
| frequently ship a paperback with a gift receipt for $5 total.
| I include a gift message on the gift receipt, and choose a
| book I think someone might like to read while they're out of
| commission.
|
| I guess it's a bit like postal arbitrage, if I accept the
| cost of greeting cards themselves as part of the cost of the
| activity.
|
| To the extent that anyone has commented much, those who have
| commented had very positive reactions to what amounts to a
| book recommendation and a copy of the book I'm recommending
| along with a little note.
| dizhn wrote:
| Reminds me of the old collect call trick. Rather than state
| your name when prompted you transmit a short, perhaps even
| coded, message. Then the receiving party declines the call.
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| _" You have a collect call from
| MomWe'reAtTheArcadeCanYouPickUsUp?_
|
| _Would you like to accept the charges? "_
| umanwizard wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JxhTnWrKYs
| bombcar wrote:
| I've used something like this list to get "over the hump" for $35
| to reach free shipping without prime.
|
| It's horribly annoying to have a product that is $34.99 and you
| want it, but it'll cost shipping unless you get the damn
| Volkswagen screw; and then Amazon ships them individually anyway.
| mystifyingpoi wrote:
| Just play their stupid game. My wife does this all the time,
| buys random items just to go past the free shipping range, then
| the item goes into trash (or is returned, if possible).
|
| Even sellers started doing this, but instead of selling random
| items, they sell "extra hardened packaging material"
| conveniently at $1, $2, $3... prices. Of course when item
| arrives, no extra material to be seen. When questioned, one of
| them said "well, the package had cardboard box - that's it,
| wink wink, please do not report us".
| deviation wrote:
| Here in Ireland, a stamp is 1.85eur.
|
| So. Many. Possibilities.
| pkaye wrote:
| Wow didn't realize its much more expensive in some places
| outside the US. I'd think the smaller land area would make it
| cheaper.
| _trampeltier wrote:
| This story comes to my mind.
|
| A pizzeria owner made money buying his own $24 pizzas from
| DoorDash for $16
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/18/21262316/doordash-pizza-p...
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| If you want to fight the VCs, you _have_ to pull stunts like
| this. If they want to destroy local infrastructure because
| "free market", in an attempt to secure monopolies for
| themselves, then let them operate in a free market.
| supertrope wrote:
| VC Fund My Life!
| jaggederest wrote:
| The appropriate musical accompaniment:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbH-U2b_EsQ
| BrenBarn wrote:
| I was hoping this would be a rickroll.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| > then let them operate in a free market.
|
| I think you meant to say "operate in a market that is
| regulated in precisely the way they want it to be".
| caminanteblanco wrote:
| Thanks for sharing, i enjoyed reading it, although it is
| paywalled: http://archive.today/H5FRo
| mhink wrote:
| Note: the Verge article links to this blog post, describing the
| situation in more detail:
| https://www.readmargins.com/p/doordash-and-pizza-arbitrage
| sprinkly-dust wrote:
| Thank you, this was a fun rabbit hole to dive down. That blog
| also has a well-argued article about Zero Interest Rate
| Policy which relates to the doordash story:
| https://www.readmargins.com/p/zirp-explains-the-world
| ryanjshaw wrote:
| They could have made another $5 per 10 pizzas after order #1
| by just delivering the pizza to themselves and sending the
| same boxes back out in the next delivery, and so on.
| scottmcdot wrote:
| Is there a simple way to search for everything and order by price
| descending? I'm in Australia so those items aren't much use.
| m-hodges wrote:
| lol everyone in the comments is taking this way too seriously
| johnfn wrote:
| Somewhat off-topic, but when I click on "Case-Mate - Case for
| 2009 LG Xenon - Marsala"[1], the "About this item" section simply
| states:
|
| About this item
|
| - Do
|
| - Not
|
| - Buy
|
| - This
|
| - Product
|
| What on earth is going on here?
|
| [1]: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09D51KNQM
| crumpled wrote:
| Jeff Bezos has more money than the Federal Trade Commission.
| That's how we pick the winner in any conflict.
| jp191919 wrote:
| You can pre-order it...
|
| I actually used to have(maybe still have?) a LG Xenon
| TheJoeMan wrote:
| To the author, would you consider changing the "key photo"? I
| sent the weblink to a friend, and the key photo in iMessage is
| the pregnancy test and they got the wrong impression about the
| site/prank. Pick the lemon or can of beans perhaps?
| crumpled wrote:
| I can almost guarantee that everyone mentioned in that blog post
| is a habitual Amazon user. They're all renewing Prime each year
| at full price and making a ton of regular purchases. The family
| has even turned on the FOMO by making Prime a family social
| network with social pressure to stay. I see it as a self-own,
| personally.
| chatmasta wrote:
| This is just being rude to delivery drivers.
| rationalist wrote:
| I think they would prefer to deliver small items than large,
| heavy items.
| kazinator wrote:
| Why stick to strictly under $78? Something that costs $2 with
| free shipping has a built in $0.78 discount if you consider its
| free postcard function.
| kazinator wrote:
| Has this person tried it?
|
| Doesn't Amazon shipping have to go to the billing address on the
| credit card?
|
| Being able to purchase on a credit card and have it sent anywhere
| makes it that much easier to use stolen credit cards.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Pretty sure if you buy something as a "gift" (which is what
| allows the inclusion of a message) then you can send it to a
| different address. I rarely use Amazon and never have used it
| to send a gift so could be wrong.
| umanwizard wrote:
| You can send things to other addresses regardless of whether
| it's a gift or not.
| toast0 wrote:
| You have to provide the billing address for the card. But you
| don't have to ship there.
|
| Plenty of people ship to the office. I buy stuff for my parents
| from time to time. When I'm on vacation, I might ship to the
| hotel or a friend I'm visiting or ...
| AnssiH wrote:
| > Doesn't Amazon shipping have to go to the billing address on
| the credit card?
|
| No, I've had stuff shipped to plenty of addresses.
| kazinator wrote:
| It looks like the billing address restriction was a "thing"
| years ago, but is simply too impractical for modern day
| e-commerce. People want to do gifting, or get things
| delivered to temporary accomodations like vacation spots.
| They are relying on approaches like heuristics (sudden
| purchase for something expensive going to an unusual
| address), plus CVV verification to help ensure that the
| purchaser physically has the card (still allows theft, but
| adds a layer).
| umanwizard wrote:
| > Doesn't Amazon shipping have to go to the billing address on
| the credit card?
|
| No and that would be crazy. I'm not aware of any e-commerce
| site that has a restriction like that.
|
| > Being able to purchase on a credit card and have it sent
| anywhere makes it that much easier to use stolen credit cards.
|
| Well, it's probably one fraud signal among many, but it's
| absolutely not generally prohibited. I've sent things from
| Amazon to other people (or to myself while staying in a hotel),
| and other people have sent things to me, many times.
| mystifyingpoi wrote:
| In Poland, OLX (basically equivalent eBay) commonly has
| promotional campaigns, where you can buy something from a select
| category with 1 PLN shipping to box machine (around $0.30).
|
| So people figured out, that you can abuse it to send anything to
| anyone in the country. Just create a fake listing for 1 PLN, let
| the receiver "buy" it (there is some extra service fee, but like
| $1) and there you go - probably the cheapest shipping possible,
| much cheaper than regular ~$5-7 box machine package.
| corentin88 wrote:
| Same thing in France with Vinted
| graup wrote:
| Last time I checked (a few years ago), it was cheaper to send
| letters and small packages from South Korea to Germany than from
| Germany to Germany. The delay was also not that big (maybe 1-2
| weeks instead of 3-5 days). I already envisioned an arbitrage
| business for this: a simple page where people upload their non-
| urgent letters as PDFs, and I just print and mail them from
| Korea.
| Sesse__ wrote:
| This is already a thing; political parties sending out their
| mass mailings from Poland to Norway.
| blauditore wrote:
| I'm super surprised there is still free shipping for small
| things. In (some) other parts of the world, they will charge
| significant delivery furs for anything below $50 or so. It
| basically changed during Covid, and since every shop is now doing
| it, there's no competition on that.
| ck2 wrote:
| A more recent question I have is how Amazon is skipping DeMinimis
| fees which are now massive on 50 cent or $1 items from their
| "Amazon Haul" which come from overseas
|
| It arrives in a few weeks by Amazon's own carriers, not
| USPS/UPS/FedEx
|
| Who is paying the $80 DeMinimis fee on the $1 cable I got last
| week from China?
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Is it always $75 minimum, or is it alternatively 90% ad
| valorem?
| einpoklum wrote:
| > _You 're not only saving money._
|
| That's right, you're also cementing Amazon's control of the US
| economy. Both by doing more business there, and by spending time
| on that site which will lead to you doing even more of your
| business there. Not to mention having to be an "Amazon Prime"
| person to begin with.
|
| This may sound weird to some, but - you should really avoid using
| Amazon where possible.
| gowld wrote:
| Debunked in the first click:
|
| $0.25 - Lime - Amazon Fresh -FREE 2-hour delivery on orders over
| *$100*
|
| Other products have similar shipping restrictions, or the prices
| are higher than claimed.
|
| Also, most of the cheapest products (at least before tariff
| effects kicked in) don't allow customized messages that postcards
| allow, for obvious reasons.
| pruetj wrote:
| Funny seeing this. I've been working on a site to allow people to
| send a letter as cheaply and conveniently as possible. I actually
| think letters (physical) are a great way to make an impression,
| often times much more so than an email. Had never considered
| sending an actual object lol.
|
| At current scale (which is very small), the cheapest I can get it
| down to without losing money is $1.55 per letter (postage, paper,
| print, envelope, stripe fees, misc. hosting fees, etc.). Sadly, I
| have no way to compete with a $0.25 lime!
|
| If you're curious, https://mappymail.com
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| What if you also start providing the 0.25$ lime feature as well
| (by making use of the amazon prime itself as well?) xD?
| focusedone wrote:
| All of these items appear to have received the HN hug of death.
| They're all showing as unavailable for me, who just wanted to
| drop a friendly lime hello to a friend across town.
| jervant wrote:
| There are also things on eBay with a starting price of less than
| a dollar with free shipping that never get bids. I "won" two
| auctions like this the other week for brand new USB-C cables,
| each of them costing me 13 cents shipped.
|
| I have no idea why sellers would do this with eBay fees and USPS
| small package shipping costing well over 13 cents.
| jackfranklyn wrote:
| The DoorDash pizza arbitrage comparison is apt. Both cases expose
| the same fundamental thing: venture-subsidised pricing creates
| artificial market conditions that clever people will exploit.
|
| What I find interesting is how long these windows stay open.
| You'd think someone at Stamps.com or UPS would notice the pricing
| anomaly, but large organisations are often too siloed. The team
| setting international rates probably doesn't talk to whoever
| monitors small parcel economics.
|
| The author mentions making a few hundred dollars - but the real
| question is scalability. At what volume does this become
| attractive enough for the postal services to close the loophole?
| There's probably a sweet spot between "not worth their attention"
| and "actually profitable."
| alexfoo wrote:
| The USPS have been on the receiving end of it themselves back
| in 1916 when someone mailed a building:
|
| https://postalmuseum.si.edu/object/npm_2022.2007.1
|
| https://about.usps.com/who-we-are/postal-history/bank-of-ver...
| notherhack wrote:
| The lowest I found is two clip-on CAT5e cable termination jacks
| for $0.80 + 0.08 tax. Available in a rainbow of colors and
| shipped free to Seattle by Sunday if you order in the next 10
| hours. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08T63ST97
|
| Or 3.5oz filet mignon flavor dog food for $0.84+tax with FREE two
| day delivery. https://www.amazon.com//dp/B07VBFLCKT
|
| Beat that!
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