If you plan on shipping a lot buy a bag of lacons (p.n.120300) from lacontainer. I skip the foam inserts and just pull apart a cotton ball.
I used to do that, and it works great.
Beer bottle caps will always be readily available and it gets recycled
The only challenge I see with beer caps is that they are metal. I dont trust mail sorting magnets or prying artificial eyes. Otherwise I think its a great idea.
Been using them for 17yrs. and never had problems and shipped some seeds to South America and United Kingdom and they all received them…hope this helps.
Plastic lined, enough room for a bit of padding, probably enough metals to haze out an X-ray…
---- yeah. That definitely helps!
fwiw - UPS says my package was delivered. The pkg said “Seeds” right on it too!
I think shipping within California should be fine - unless your driver grows…
Waiting to hear back to find out if they arrived intact.
I dont use UPS I only use USPS 17+ years and use regular white envelopes with 2 stamps bromigos…when I ship seeds I’m not gonna over think nor over spend…
Coin flips are the new fashion around here lol I just got seeds sent to me ,it’s handy I use the little hard plastic tubes I need to buy some coin flips
Hi there people, can you people show the best seeds in mail i(nternationally) techniques?
It will help alot, waiting for this awesome community’s help.
Exactly as OTUG says…
Keep the weight under 1oz (28gm) - that’s usually 2, sometimes 3 flips including card and envelope.
Cheers
G
Correct…great way the weak spot is …STAPLES , especially if your mailing in envelope internationally.
I use a mailing co in USA for Amazon and mail etc to Panama
Got a pull of some seeds few weeks ago…the envelope had been opened at Panama City P O.
and resealed and forwarded to my local Post office, ( out in the sticks )
All was intact…when I asked the girl at the local P O why it had been opened …
Her reply was the machine detects metal …and hence alerts.
For 100% internationally I would just tape the cardboard.
But anything that beats the system is
I was using plastic bottle caps similar to that way and mailing out east the mail machines were ripping the bottle caps clean out the envelope so all they received was the envelope and the sheet of paper they were in
I’ve seen some pretty cool 3D printed ones
I only use the plastic caps when I send out both seeds and cuttings and they’re going to the same addy…otherwise I just use beer caps in an envelope…
Guessing the duct tape is prob what helps, I was doing 2 bottle caps with seed baggie in the middle then the two caps as a perfect fit in the small baggie, worked for most but once it made it out east they got ripped out the baggie and envelope. Had one return to sender and could see the grooves on the caps stretch the lil baggie on the way out, wouldn’t have believed it with the couple I heard the stories from had I not seen that first hand, now I just go with the standard hose washer and coin flips and been trouble free, got 500 flips for 15 bucks and 100 hose washers for 6, still cheaper than any other shipping method for most part
I just mailed a couple envelopes 2 wks. ago, 1 to San Fran & 1 to Oregon and both made it to their destination fine…if your shoes shine why buff them.
@Afghoxotics
u can use the “extra ounce” stamps if you’re gonna go over instead of a whole nother stamp
$4 for 20
https://store.usps.com/store/product/buy-stamps/brush-rabbit-S_740304?gclid=Cj0KCQjw_4-SBhCgARIsAAlegrVatjnsXp6xSgnL1E25HdM69kVuT9qzscPqVH9fQJK4zhRTt-JLlj0aAimuEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds
I am the same way so if you find soil and or coffee stains on a seed flip its all good I use KNF so there are some beneficials in there I promise…
Not that anyone could miss it… but here is a GREAT idea for some 3D printed "Veggie seed sorter and mailing disc…
My seed company uses USPS Priority Mail with tracking. International orders arrive in about 7-10 days and all domestics show up in 3-4 days max. The boxes for the prepaid Priority mail are sturdy and protect the seeds inside just fine. International prices varie but domestic is about $9 a box. Cheap when you consider you have tracking and how secure it is.
Inside the usps boxes the seeds are in packaging that includes a cotton ball inside of a makeup container (similar to a coin flip but you can buy them cheaper and in mass quantities) and the cotton keeps the seeds in place so they don’t jostle around.
Including over seas shipping to almost every country out there, over the years we have never lost a package. Not a single one. Only Argentina failed to deliver, as they required a phytosanitary certificate for the seeds they realized were seeds. We just shipped again rather than try to obtain a certificate, and they arrived safely. So literally only 1 failed to deliver package out of at least 2,000 individual orders in the last 3 years or so.
All International shipments go through customs and we declare them as Artificial Beads. There are only a handful of countries that we haven’t successfully shipped to: Iran, N. Korea, both Artics, and several African states/regions. The list of success countries is really long.
We’ve never had seeds arrive damaged or anything like that, except for 1 distribution order we shipped to ACE Seeds in Europe. Luis the owner requested a new shipping method that was unusual… and the package had been torn apart on arrival, which lost 2 seed packs out of 20. We never shipped like that again (using padded envelopes and odd seed packages inside).
Hope this helps people ship beans safely!