I want to talk about something a little different today — not florals, not design, but the business side of things. Specifically, shipping.

If you’ve ordered from us recently, you may have noticed we raised our free shipping threshold and adjusted some of our shipping rates. I wanted to talk openly about why, because I think it’s a topic a lot of small businesses (and honestly, a lot of shoppers) don’t fully understand.

Nothing Is Ever Actually “Free”

We live in a world where people are accustomed to free shipping, and I get it — I look for it too when I’m shopping somewhere else. But here’s the truth: shipping is never actually free. Someone is always paying for it.

Most companies handle this by quietly raising the price of their products to cover it. You still “get” free shipping, but you’re paying for it either way — it’s just baked into the price tag instead of shown separately at checkout.

We could have done that too, and to be fair, we already do build some of our basic packaging costs — boxes, bubble wrap, tape — into our product pricing, the same way most retailers do. But going further than that, and inflating prices enough to offer blanket free shipping the way a lot of companies do, would mean charging you more for the actual product just so shipping could say “free” at checkout. I’d rather not do that. I’d rather keep our product pricing fair and let shipping be shipping — visible, honest, and adjusted only when it actually needs to be, instead of buried in a bigger markup. That’s the whole reason behind this adjustment — not because we wanted to charge you more, but because we wanted to keep being honest about where those costs actually go.

What Actually Goes Into a Shipping Cost

This is the part that surprises people the most, so let me break it down.

It’s not just the postage itself — though that alone has been climbing steadily, and rural shipping rates in particular have gone up even more than standard rates. On top of that, there’s:

• Boxes, in a range of sizes
• Bubble wrap and packing materials
• Tape
• Packing slips and stickers
• The labor time it takes to actually pack every single order carefully

I’ll put it this way: our annual bill for packaging supplies alone could buy a genuinely nice car. That’s not an exaggeration, and I don’t say it to complain — it’s simply the reality of running a business that ships physical, sometimes fragile, products.

We Don’t Profit From Shipping — And Some Months, It Costs Us

This is something I think a lot of customers don’t realize: the shipping fee you pay at checkout isn’t really profit for us, even on the orders where it comes close to covering things.

Here’s an honest, simple example: say a customer pays $7 for shipping, and the actual postage costs $5.95. That extra dollar or so can help chip in toward the box, bubble wrap, and tape for that order. But since we already build some baseline packaging cost into our product pricing, that little bit of shipping “cushion” may or may not fully cover everything else that goes into getting an order safely to your door — it depends on the order.

And when you zoom out and look at the full picture every month — free shipping orders, shipping shortages on smaller orders, rural surcharges — we’re still coming out well behind. Some months, we’re covering a significant amount out of pocket, above and beyond what customers pay in shipping fees combined. That’s not a sustainable pattern long-term, and if I’m honest, we let it go on longer than we should have because we didn’t want to pass that reality on to you. But at some point, a business has to be able to cover its actual costs — otherwise it’s not a business, it’s just an expensive hobby.

It Also Depends on the Product

One more honest layer to this: how we handle shipping isn’t identical across everything we sell. For our finished arrangements and design pieces, shipping is built into the price of the item itself — with the size and care those pieces need, it’s just easier for me to price it that way from the start. For something like a swag or a wreath, I add a set amount onto the shipping cost instead.

It doesn’t work out perfectly every single time. Sometimes I land right on the actual cost, sometimes I eat a little extra, and sometimes that added amount ends up covering the box on top of the label. But on average, across enough orders, it balances out. That’s honestly a good lesson for any small business selling more than one type of product — you don’t have to use the exact same shipping approach for everything you sell. It’s completely fine to build shipping into the price for some products and charge it separately for others, as long as you’re looking at the average outcome rather than expecting every single order to land perfectly.

Advice for Other Small Business Owners

I actually had a customer reach out to me recently for advice — she’s getting ready to start selling online herself, and shipping was one of her biggest question marks. So if you’re in that boat too, here’s what I’d tell you:

Know your real numbers before you set a policy. It’s not just the shipping label. Factor in packaging materials, any rural or oversized surcharges, and the time it takes you (or an employee) to pack each order.

Decide deliberately whether shipping gets built into your price or charged separately — and be honest about which one you’re doing. There’s no wrong answer here, but there is a wrong way to do it: pretending it’s “free” when it’s really just hidden.

Don’t offer free shipping just because it’s expected. It’s tempting, because customers do look for it. But offering it without doing the math first is one of the fastest ways to quietly bleed money every month without realizing how much.

Aim for more than break-even. This one matters more than people think. You didn’t start your business hoping to work incredibly hard just to come out even at the end of the year. Most of us started because we wanted to build something that could actually provide for our families. Shipping decisions are a real part of whether that happens.

Where This Leaves Us

So, to be direct: yes, our free shipping threshold went up, and yes, some shipping rates were adjusted. It wasn’t a decision we made lightly, and it wasn’t about squeezing more out of you — it was about making sure this business stays healthy and sustainable so we can keep doing what we love for years to come.

I know shipping costs going up isn’t fun for anyone, on either side of the transaction. But I’d always rather be honest with you about why, than quietly raise prices and hope no one notices. Thank you for understanding, and for continuing to support a small business that’s trying to do this the right way.