Shipping Cost Almost as Much As The Brisket

[RAmorris]

My wife and I are having overnight guests from out of town later this month and I wanted to smoke a USDA Prime brisket. I can only get Choice where I live in Winter Haven, FL, so I contacted Mr. Brisket in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. They had USDA Prime packer briskets for $5.99 per pound. He said they could freeze one and send it two-day delivery with FedEx. So I ordered one that was 12-14 pounds. I didn't check the shipping costs, and I should have. The reason I didn't was because I remembered that the shipping costs from Snake River Farms in Idaho were not very expensive, but their brisket was. Anyway, my 14.85 pound USDA Prime Brisket shipped from Mr Brisket yesterday, for arrival tomorrow. The brisket cost $88.95. The shipping cast was $86.90, giving a total cost of $175.85. I called Snake River Farms in Boise, Idaho, and their three day shipping cost to me for a 12-14 pound brisket would have been $9.99. Their two day shipping cost would have been $39.99. A 12-14 pound Wagyu brisket from Snake River Farms would have been $149.00. Add the $9.990 shipping and it would have been $158.99. Or, add the $39.99 shipping for two-day delivery and it would have been $188.99, only $13.14 more that from Mr. Brisket and for Wagyu. I called Sanford Herskovitz, the owner of Mr. Brisket, to ask him why he didn't tell me the shipping would cost that much before shipping it. He said he was with a customer and would call me back. That was over three hours ago and I haven't heard back from him.

[Troutman]

Sorry for your experience brother. I guess the "buyer beware" saying comes to mind. What I would do is this. You can rail on the guy over the phone or send him a nasty email saying that you are a member of the AmazingRibs.com Pitmaster club of over 16,000 members who are going to find out about his trade practices. If nothing else, if he chooses to ignore that then let us know, we can certainly blow up his in box if he chooses to otherwise "be with another customer".

[JPGators17]

Have BBQCentralShow call him out on it the next time he's a guest on the show.

[BBQCentralShow]

I would never not ask about shipping costs on anything...especially food. I would also never assume that shipping costs for one company are the same for another. Maybe call back and ask for Hank Kornblut and explain it to him and see if there is some kind of resolution that could be attained since it wasn't communicated to you at the time of sale. That being said, you didn't do your job as a consumer very well either...I'm sure you don't want to hear that, but, it's true!

[JPGators17]

Oh man, that's terrible, sorry to hear that. I assume there's no Costco in Winter Haven, but next time you want a Prime brisket, I'm in the Orlando area and can get you one from Costco at $3.49/lb currently.

[Potkettleblack]

Labor costs money. You can train someone to cut and trim brisket flats, but it's a skill, and it has an hourly rate, maybe a union rate, and the overhead associated with grocery/retail butchery.

Trimming wastes money. You take 4 lbs of $3/lb brisket off in fat, that's $12 that needs to be recovered in cost. If it was a 15 lbs brisket, you now have 11 lbs of flat and point to sell. It was $45, so just the waste alone bumps the per pound to $4.09/lbs. Add the labor, and voila.

[JPGators17]

I guess I'm underestimating the processing costs you just laid out. I wouldn't have thought they'd have to more than double the price per pound in the store to accomplish that, but as involved as you described it to be, it's not as far fetched.

[Potkettleblack]

I would have too. $90K education in operations management, costing, and other businessy things, and I'm as skeptical, but do the full math on processing before calling folks out. But yeah, on the surface, going from $3.99 to $7.99 a lbs seems shady.

[Jerod Broussard]

I've checked Lobel's numerous times, and the shipping kills the order everytime.

[ComfortablyNumb]

Shipping is expensive, period. Premium services like next day or two day are even more. So how come one place can give you 'free' shipping or at a fraction of another place? Volume and the deal they make with the shippers, the more you ship the greater the discount.

[Troutman]

Yea or they roll part of it into the cost of the product to offset the shipping, if they are savvy.

[klflowers]

That pretty much sucks. I hope you get some satisfaction. Like Troutman suggested, you can leverage all of us here at AR. We got your back.

[jfmorris]

I hate to say it, but I ship a lot of stuff (not meat) using both Fedex and UPS. Anything faster than ground is pretty pricey, and in line with what you paid. I've 2nd dayed many 10-12 pound packages and paid close to $100 in shipping each time.

As others said, you could get the cheapest membership at Costco and drive to it from Winter Haven to load up, and have come out ahead. Might be something to consider if you have a deep freeze and do a lot of brisket.

[parkerj2]

I used to work in the small package business, and SRF probably does enough volume to get their prices down via discounts. Mr. Brisket is probably a mom-and-pop that rarely does that kind of thing.

Their price will always be higher, as they don't have the level of business to bring their shipping rates down. He should've told you the cost, but it's the nature of that business.

[Troutman]

I had a sporting goods business for a few years and sold 80% of my merchandise over the internet on my own website as well as Amazon and Ebay. What we discovered over time and watching the way people buy, was that the companies that sold their merchandise with free shipping trumped everyone else's sales who charged for shipping, even to the extent it cost a little more. It drove me nuts, so we were forced to provide free shipping and roll part of the offsetting cost to the merchandise. We still had to watch that as not to exceed by too much the overall price cutting ourselves off at the knees. It was cut throat. It's the reason why the big boys get bigger (ala WalMart and Amazon) and the mom & pops go extinct (like me ).

What pees me off is when they don't make that adjustment and don't tell you the shipping until you're all but checked out. They should make it known by using a shipping approximate like some sites do. It's perfectly legit to not disclose it up front but a shabby business practice imo. I think that's the rub here. But again, buyer beware.

[jerrybell]

It's unfortunate you had a bad experience, but I don't think the shop owner had bad intentions. He provided the service and product you requested. He didn't think to caution you about shipping cost, the same as you didn't think to ask the price.

[Santamarina]

Ouch!!!Tonight I’m extra thankful that I’m about 15 mins from Costco. Prime packers every day of the week for $3.79/lb or less (I’ve seen it as low as $2.99/lb)!

[DavidNorcross]

Anxious to see how this turns out for you. I agree with others, if this is the charge then you should have known that well in advance. Good Luck and sorry this happened.

[Nuke em]

You said you could get choice. Go to that place and ask them or other meat markets or grocery stores (preferably a manager) around you that sell brisket and ask them if they could get them or special order it for ya. Worth a shot. If they can get choice, then there shouldn’t be a prob getting a higher select grade.
Some places around me even have home delivery

[Papa Bob]

I don't know if Costco will do this but I was at Sam's Club buying some Saint Luis cut spare ribs for a competition and was talking to the guy that ran the meat dep.t they didn't have any prime whole packers he said he could order them and I told him I couldn't take a whole case and by my surprise he said I didn't need to buy the whole case I could take what ever I needed go through case pick out what I wanted and he would sell the rest pretty cool

[jlazar]

I bought about 18 lbs of prime tri-tip recently from Creekstone Farms. They were priced at 3 2-2.5 pieces per bundle. Bought two of the bundles so the total would be over $100. Over $100 = free shipping. Total package weight, including the foam cooler and coolant packages, was about 32 lbs. Again, delivered at no shipping cost to me. I will continue to use Costco for Prime Briskets and Ribeyes and HEB for sales on Ribeyes and such. But will consider Creekstone again for specialty cuts and sale items.