For the past two weeks this has been the question we hear most often, by email and in the comments under our ads, which is enough for us to stop answering it one message at a time. The question is always some version of the same thing: the shipping figure at checkout is higher than expected, and people want to know whether it is a real cost or a padded one.
It is a real cost, and here is exactly how it is worked out.
It ships from Korea, and it is priced by weight
We make this gear in Korea and we ship it from there. There is no warehouse in the United States holding stock, so every order crosses the Pacific as its own parcel.
The carrier prices that by weight, in bands. Your order lands in a band, and the band sets the figure. That is the whole mechanism, and it explains the part that surprises people most: adding a second set does not add a little to shipping, it can move the order into the next band up.
- It is weight, not box size. The fence folds flat, so a bigger order is heavier rather than dramatically bulkier.
- It is banded, not linear. Two orders of slightly different weight can sit in the same band and cost the same to ship.
- It is the carrier's rate. There is no margin in it for us to trim, which is why we cannot simply lower it when asked.
We would rather tell you that plainly than pretend there is a discount we are withholding. If the number is more than the order is worth to you, that is a fair call to make, and we would rather you make it before you pay than after.
The separate line at checkout is import duty
This is the part worth reading even if the shipping figure does not bother you.
When goods enter the United States from abroad, import duty applies. On a lot of international orders you do not see that at checkout at all. It arrives later, as a courier holding your parcel and asking for payment before they hand it over. That is the experience most people are braced for, and it is the reason a foreign checkout makes people nervous.
We do it the other way around. Duty is calculated and shown as its own line at checkout, before you pay. You see it, you pay it with the rest, and the parcel is handed to you on arrival.
So the number at the bottom of the checkout page is the final number. There is nothing further to pay on delivery.
What that means when you are comparing
If you are weighing this against something shipping from inside the US, compare the full checkout totals rather than the product prices. A domestic listing that looks cheaper on the product page may or may not stay cheaper once shipping is added, and an international listing that shows no duty at checkout has not removed the duty, it has only moved it to your doorstep.
Our totals are visible before you commit. Put a set in the cart, enter your address, and the figures are all there to look at without going any further.
Two things readers asked next
Does a bigger order ship free at some point? No. The weight goes up with the order, so the shipping does too. We do not have a free-shipping threshold on these products.
How long does it take? Transit is the ordinary international timeline rather than domestic next-day. The product page carries the current estimate, and that is the figure to trust over anything a blog post written today could tell you.
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