You might say 'Amazon's international site'. You would be wrong. While Amazon does have facilities in Vietnam, they have about 1/3rd to 1/2 of what is available on the US site... closer to 1/3rd, and there is no discount in shipping, and each item is shipped separately.
So what's a miser to do? Well, you use a International shipping service, like Planet Express (no shit, that's the name). http://www.planetexpress.com
If you sign up with my code https://planetexpress.com/?ref=91870 I get $5 if you do. Since none of you cheap fucks are donating to the site, sign up with my link. Once you sign up and make a deposit you get an address to mail items to. This is 'your' address, and you get a bin that holds your stuff.
So, how do you save? Well, it takes money to save money. You HAVE to sign up with a PREMIUM mail box. This premium service allows you to consolidate your individual packages into ONE box, and pay ONE shipping fee. Now a premium mailbox is $10 a month. After the month, it goes to the 'normal' mailbox. But the first tip is you CHOOSE THE OREGON MAILING ADDRESS. ITS SALES TAX FREE!!!!
I bought $150 worth of stuff on Amazon. If I ship it to my home in PA I incur ($150*6%) $9 in taxes. So right off the bat I paid for the 'premium' mailbox service. As I shop online and boxes show up at 'my' address I get an email and a photo of the package and the tracking number, so I can easily look up what arrived.
Now to mail 9 individual packages would mean 9 shipping charges. That's stupid. Put all the crap in ONE box and ship that, right? That's where the premium mailbox service of 'consolidation' comes in. You select what packages to include in the consolidation, and also if you want to ship the entire box, just the outside retail box, or strip everything and just send the item inside. I chose 'keep retail packaging' so they have the directions and instructions etc.
Here are my many packages:
- p1.jpg (47.86 KiB) Viewed 5471 times
And here they are consolidated:
- p2.jpg (24.13 KiB) Viewed 5471 times
Now there is a small fee per box. It cost me an additional $23 for them to open each package and put them in the new box. Now you may cry 'THATS NUTS!' but trust me, it works out in your favor in the end.
After I added the customs declarations and address in Vietnam it was time to get a total for consolidation and shipping. The CHEAPEST option was USPS at about $70 for up to two weeks delivery. But I chose FexEx Express at $84 with a 3-5 day shipping time. Plus the items are insured and I have full FedEx tracking, PLUS it gets there in 3-5 days.. for $14 more than the cheapest option.
All told its costing me $107.36 to mail a 14x14x6 box weighing 9lbs to Vietnam in 5 days.
Now I know that people are saying 'I can get the packaged shipped to my home, save the $23 consolidation costs and mail it myself!!!! FOR LESS!!!!!! Well, MAYBE. I live in PA. So by shipping the package FROM OREGON I save 2800 miles worth of postage. If you lived closer to the West Coast then your shipping might be less, but simply mailing ONE box from Oregon is cheaper than mailing that same box from PA. Because it's simply closer to the destination. How much do I save? Well, from what UPS/FedEx's website told me it would be about $30 more to mail from my home. Plus I don't have to find a box, shipping tape, customs forms, deal with a shipper that's not sure about customs/international mailing etc etc. Even if is costs the exact same, I am still happy with the service and not having to mess with all these boxes.
