We have long-standing customers in Germany who regularly order from our online shop. This is precisely the target group that is heavily affected by the price increases in the transport industry. Because the transport costs have risen drastically, so has the postage for packages and shipments. Until 2 years ago, 10 EUR postage was the exception and free shipping was usually offered for purchases over a certain amount.
But now the tide has turned and service providers such as the post office, DHL and GLS have significantly increased their parcel prices. Among other things, the following prices are currently payable at the post office for parcels from Austria to Germany :
- at the counter: 25.00 EUR
- Self-postage on the Internet: 16.39 EUR
Max. 10 kg weight, medium-sized package, excl. VAT, excl. packaging material, optional plus package collection 2.90 EUR
These extremely high transport costs, even for small orders, put many Germans off. We are also noticing a decline in internet orders from Germany. Previously, every third customer had honey delivered to Germany, but today it is only every fifth customer.
But now we have noticed a carrier who has not increased his prices in the last two years. And we were able to successfully complete a test shipment to Germany with him.
Hermes Europe GmbH still offers shipping costs for small packages of EUR 9.90 . Hermes is a subsidiary of the Otto Group, the well-known Otto Versand. We have stored the data in the Welthonig webshop and German customers can have their orders sent by Hermes up to a goods value of EUR 1,500.00. The system automatically recognizes whether the goods value is below or above the goods value limit. Larger orders are still sent by post.
We hope that by implementing Hermes we can provide an incentive for small German orders.
We hope our German customers continue to enjoy browsing our webshop and expect one or two orders to be shipped via Hermes.
Link to the collection times and shipping costs at Welthonig