Shipping to Canada

[drcollie]

Getting cushion replacements sent is easy enough to do. The issue with ships into Canada is if there is a warranty or mis-order problem with the piece. In the states, I use Sun Delivery Service and they will pickup for me, but I can't get the pieces out of Canada and back to the States efficiently or affordably as I only have a conventional trucking line to go into Canada.

For example, lets say we have a sofa going into Canada and because most customers don't want a curbside drop I have to deliver to a Moving and Storage company who unpack the piece and take it into the customer's home for an additional fee. So its unpacked, the cartons cut up in the unpacking process, the pieces taken inside and then....uh-oh, this wasn't the right finish on the legs on the sofa. Customer ordered Cherry and I mistakenly put the standard Mahogany Distress on the legs. Customer demands the sofa go back and the correct finish put on or a new replacement sofa sent in lieu of an allowance to keep it 'as is'. That requires it going back to the maker in some manner.

In the states, I would call Sun Delivery and have them pick it up and return to the factory. Its my mistake in the ordering, so I have to pay Sun appx. $ 300 to get the sofa, and then another $ 300 to re-deliver when fixed. That's a $ 600 outlay. OK, I can live with that on a $ 3,500 sofa. Painful, but well...stuff happens and i have to take care of it.

in Canada, I'm totally hammered because the furniture has to be repacked into boxes and the original containers were destroyed. So the moving and storage company has to go in and get it ($ 200) repack it ( $ 200) it has to be re-shipped back to North Carolina on the truck line ($ 350), then when corrected $ 350 back to Canada, then another $ 200 to the Moving and Storage company to take back out to the home plus the customs hassle, and that comes to $ 1,300 on that $ 3,500 sofa. Well past double the cost to recover the item.

I've had a lot of difficulty in ships into Canada, seems like 3 out of 4 have problems of some sort. Examples: A) I have customers freak out on me because of the Canadian taxes on their orders. I get angry complaints that they are excessive and want me to pay a portion of the taxes even though I make it clear that I do not know what the final taxes, duties and brokerage fees will be. I have no control what the Canadian Government is going to charge and have no desire or intent to learn the tax laws/fees as I don't seek out Canadian customers in the normal course of business. B) Because I don't have a blanket wrap service (white glove) into Canada, some customers elect to have the truck do a curbside drop to their house. They damage the furniture moving it into their house then claim it came that way out of the box. When you've been doing this as long as I have its pretty easy to tell moving damage from factory defects. C) Canadians tend to demand full piece replacements for simple fixes that can be done locally. I don't know why that is - but fixes seem to be unacceptable as a rule. I won't send a new sofa into Canada and pickup the existing one if a bun foot has a poor finish on it, when I can ship a $ 20 bun foot and with three screws and 5 minutes worth of work its all taken care of.

Its really not fair to my Canadian customers to have to impose these restrictions, but its a simple matter of business risk/reward. I have too much exposure shipping into Canada and am unwilling to have that exposure any longer. I know my prices are quite a bit less than the stores in Canada, even after paying those high taxes to bring in from the states. If you're willing to accept limited recourse in the event of a problem, then I will still ship into Canada, but be aware that you will have more rights of return buying locally in-country.

And yes - you should never buy leather based on photos when samples are easy to get to you, there always is a difference between photos and the real thing.