Sellers of Fragile Goods Impacted by USPS Ground Advantage

Some astute sellers discovered the USPS’s decision to roll out Ground Advantage is having an impact on the availability and cost of bubblewrap and certain other shipping supplies, which could impact sellers of fragile goods that must be carefully packaged before shipping.

Vickie and Mark of Avante Avenue sell on multiple venues including eBay, Mercari, and Poshmark. On Monday, they published a video describing the changes they were seeing – they could no longer purchase the quantities of bubblewrap and air pillows they had carefully researched as having the best value for their needs.

Vickie discovered that some suppliers who previously shipped large packages of lightweight bubblewrap via USPS First Class Package Service (FCPS) and who must now ship them USPS Ground Advantage were making adjustments because of the higher costs of Dim Weight pricing. (Parcels smaller than one cubic foot – the equivalent of 12x12x12 – are immune from Dim Weight pricing.)

Dim Weight pricing did not apply to FCPS, but on July 9th, the USPS consolidated FCPS, Parcel Select, and USPS Retail Ground into one offering called Ground Advantage, where Dim Weight applies.

Note that this is not the first time USPS changes to Dim Weight pricing impacted shipping supplies – in 2019, the US Postal Service expanded Dim Weight to all Priority Mail zones and expanded Dim Weight to Priority Mail Express and Parcel Select Ground – and it changed the Dim Weight divisor from 194 to 166 – meaning higher rates.

We checked in today with Jason Archambault of Fastpack Packaging Inc., who confirmed he had to make some adjustments when Ground Advantage rolled out last month.

“We used to be able to ship smaller 100 ft rolls of bubble wrap and 2 cu ft bags of peanuts via First Class mail, (to name a few) as they were both under 1 lb and did not trigger any size or dimensional surcharges. When Ground Advantage rolled out, we did have to resize some items, to find the best shipping rate possible, as these products became very expensive to ship based on their size.”

Archambault explained he resized his 100-foot rolls of bubblewrap to 70-foot rolls (and lowered the price accordingly) to stay under the new Ground Advantage size restrictions. “We also had to cut our 2 cu-ft bags of peanuts, and was able to leave the 1 & 1.5 cu ft bags.”

He said he offers a 3.5 cu-ft bag of peanuts but it ships via Fedex, so it wasn’t affected by the USPS ground Advantage changes.

Archambault also noted that he has seen the cost of supplies themselves going down in price as the market gets more competitive. “For example, we are able to currently offer many Shipping Supply items at prices not seen in 5+ years, I would guess.” But he said the continual rise in shipping costs from all of the major carriers does make it tough for all suppliers.

In the comments section of the Avante Avenue YouTube video, sellers discussed equipment that allowed them to make their own air pillows and other tips. (Note that Avante Avenue includes affiliate links to some of the products they mention.)

If you purchase lightweight packaging material that is delivered in large packages, let us know what you’re seeing and feel free to share your own tips.

Ina Steiner

Ina Steiner is co-founder and Editor of EcommerceBytes and has been reporting on ecommerce since 1999. She's a widely cited authority on marketplace selling and is author of "Turn eBay Data Into Dollars" (McGraw-Hill 2006). Her blog was featured in the book, "Blogging Heroes" (Wiley 2008). She is a member of the Online News Association (Sep 2005 - present) and Investigative Reporters and Editors (Mar 2006 - present). Follow her on Twitter at @ecommercebytes and send news tips to ina@ecommercebytes.com. See disclosure at EcommerceBytes.com/disclosure/.