Online retailers shipping to Aus

[MetalHound]

Hi all, recent lurker, even more recently joined. Have been trying to gear up for a bit of extended hiking, and thru-hiking should the my job fall through (it will) and alternate employment be difficult to source (also likely - mineral exploration, enough said).

In gearing up, have been scouring this and other forums for recommendations on gear and general info, etc, acted on some already, but one of my problems is finding a retailer with a decent price and not the good old Australia price inflation that seems to happen with far too much OS manufactured equipment. I'm sure everyone has their stories of vastly inflated local prices for equipment that is available OS for significantly reduced prices (e.g. from my research Thermarest, Arc’teryx, Voltaic solar). I understand that local suppliers are likely dictated to by the manufacturer and I'm not here to bash them, but I also don't much feel like paying a 200% premium AFTER exchange (excluding freight) just because I don't know any supplier who will ship to Australia.

One thing that I've not seen addressed anywhere in the forum is a list of suppliers, that, in the case of local are not gouging the bejeezuz out of Australian customers, and in the case of OS suppliers will actually ship to an Australian address. I also understand that there are ways and means around the address issue, with forwarding services, but for some gear I'm hesitant to use a forwarding service for warranty issues. However if you purchase direct from a supplier, you may have some recourse in the case of faulty gear whereas with grey imports you generally have no recourse.

I'm not advocating purchasing from these organisations, and still a case of DYOR, and I reckon that after a few people have submitted links/suggestions I will find that I've paid far more than I should have for the gear already purchased and will sob quietly in the corner, but if the info is available maybe others won't fall into the same trap. I can offer a couple of suppliers who will ship direct to Australia from purchases made.

Gossamer Gear
Katabatic Gear

Mods - I read the rules and I don't think that this contravenes Rule #2 but let me know if I'm reading that incorrectly.

Cheers to all.

[Neo]

Recently read a past thread that spun off into the Aus and rrp things you mention so there is some info tucked away in here. One was ultralight outdoor gear in the uk, said to have fair shipping costs to Australia.

(Exped lightning 45 rrp in pounds about AU$200, here rrp is $250 but add postage and you only save ten bucks or so)

We do have high labour, rents, taxes and a small population compared to the rest of the world. Add to that decent infrastructure, healthcare etc.

Many retailers offer free shipping on orders over $100 too.

The trick is to wait for a sale. New year, new season x4, easter, end of financial year, mid year, Christmas, boxing day, crazy days, mothers and fathers days, no reason to have a sale sales.

[GPSGuided]

There are always re-shipping services if the retailer refuses to ship, obviously with added cost.

One problem with having a list is that it'll be easy for the consumer but will also be easy for the local distributors to make complaints, thereby blocking the source. So I'd say that you are best to do your own research or read up on individual mentions nested in the various threads.

[Mark F]

The issue with the high prices of many products is that there are Australian wholesalers in between the manufacturer and the retailer who insert a hefty markup to pay for their services. While I do not know for certain, it seems that wholesalers have largely disappeared in the US and Europe markets. This will explain much of the price differences we see. Overseas retailers order direct from the manufacturer at trade shows, take delivery of the products, often in a single shipment for the season, and when sold those products become unavailable until the next cycle. This is driven by the more seasonal nature of outdoor activity in US and Europe. The smaller size of the Australian market makes the role of wholesaler more important for overseas manufacturers as the cost of doing business direct into Australia is costly and time consuming given Australia is not particularly important in the design process and is counter seasonal to some extent.

[GPSGuided]

Counter season should be beneficial for the manufacturers to off load their excess, as seen in Costco. We just stay 6mths behind.

[wayno]

its been discussed before on previous threads,
retailers lame the distributors for high prices, they often have a monopoly on a brand and can charge whatever they can get away with, outdoor shops are often located where the foot traffic is full of people with a lot of disposable income...
the shop rentals are high, in a small market there can be limited sales to be made, popular brands that people recognise are sold that come with a premium price from the manufacturer to start with.
they cant compete on price with big online shops that have high purchasing power, buying in massive quantities and have their warehouses where costs are low and everything is concentrated in a few locations. they don't have to pay to ship everything constantly to a chain of retail shops.
although hunting shops are in areas frequented by people of more modest incomes...
online theres always a sale going on somewhere with the brands that sell in bulk, end of season clearance sales...
in NZ there are very few independantly owned Hiking retail shops in the bigger cities, only one in Auckland numerous shops have gone under with the rise of chain stores and online shopping, the rest are chain stores.
the bigger chain stores can coordinate their sales to coincide with big shipments arriving from overseas, trying to minimise how much stock they have to hold in between sales, where it can be pot luck trying to get the item you want. so when they ship to the shops its more in one of bulk amounts. but they have a problem where they are bringing in so much stuff in bulk, they have to predict how much they are likely to sell.... mild winters have resulted in poor winter sales and the shops holding too much stock and they have to sell it at rock bottom prices to shift it before they have to make space for the spring sale items... and its a fashion industry, they try to keep sales up by modifying existing designs or bring out new ones every season so you cant hold gear till next season and expect to sell it for the same price... but theres a market for shop sales. so the retailers take the risks and try to make money.
macpac used to sell their stuff through third party shops. but decided to change to selling in their own branded shops in a far more limited no of locations where middle class people shop in the bigger towns, totally abandoning small towns. when you're selling well known brands theres usually an agreement with the distributor that you will sell at a recommended retail price which is a price that enables the distributor and the retailer to set a reasonable markup to potentially make a reasonable living, the retailer gets the bonus that the brand is probably already being marketed heavily by the manufacturer or distributor, people are more likely to buy a brand they recognise if they can afford it... so there may be two markets out, there those that can afford the established brands and will deliberately shop at established shops for those brands, and those who buy whatever cheap brand they can afford wherever they can afford to buy it and gtake the rik of buying a more unknown brand with a more unknown reputation

[idc1970]

If you're wanting to buy something from the US, you can use Australia Post 'Shop Mate'. They offer a freight forwarding service from the US for about half the price of US Services.

Create yourself an account and you get a unique US address with a suite number. The suite number is your ID number, package arrives at Aust Post warehouse and gets forwarded to your Australian address after you paid in Aud.

I did this recently for a ULA backpack which you can't buy here in Australia. It was free shipping in the US and I paid $37 AUD from US to Aus. it was $60 US if I used US Postal.

[wayno]

there have been claims made that people will mention a freight forwarding company on this site and then find subsequently that a brand they are after no longer ships to that freight forwarding company, possibly because someone in the industry is monitoring forums like this
problem is i buy some brands overseas bypassing export restrictions to nz from the US because they are items that i cant buy here from brands that happen to sell here but with a limited range of gear and as a result i cant get the stuff I want officially. it may not be worth the distributors while to import a large array of items, but it makes things worse not better for customers here... but i do have to wonder why i'm literally looking in the shops at $1000 raincoats that are a half a kilo of plastic, something has gone wrong to enable that sort of price markup.... although there is a marketing strategy where yhou price the item at the top of the range at an over the top price and the bottom of the range items only slightly cheaper than the middle of the rainge items so the next items down look better value for money.
the big brands can get a bit finicky about heavy discount pricing, so for some of those brands in the shops they will use discount shops in completley different parts of town from their normal shops to sell the gear at knock down prices and they may not be advertising those shops at all, they may sit in giant discount malls where the ore budget conscious shop, often those discount shops may be the distributors own shop because they issue gear on consignment and the gear isnt sold to the retailer till the retailer sells it, then the distributor takes back old gear that isnt sold and has to do something else about selling it that isnt going to undercut the specific retailers they sell to

[Mark F]

Counter season should be beneficial for the manufacturers to off load their excess, as seen in Costco.

Not the way it works now days. Manufacturers basically make to order with very little extra which is why successful products sell out and are not replaced. It is the retailer now who carries the risk of excess stock. Bit like off the plan sales of units.

[Strider]

Counter season should be beneficial for the manufacturers to off load their excess, as seen in Costco. We just stay 6mths behind.

I work for a supplier to Costco. They pay full price and work on low margins. Don't overthink it.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

[slparker]

If you're wanting to buy something from the US, you can use Australia Post 'Shop Mate'. They offer a freight forwarding service from the US for about half the price of US Services.

Create yourself an account and you get a unique US address with a suite number. The suite number is your ID number, package arrives at Aust Post warehouse and gets forwarded to your Australian address after you paid in Aud.

I did this recently for a ULA backpack which you can't buy here in Australia. It was free shipping in the US and I paid $37 AUD from US to Aus. it was $60 US if I used US Postal.

Nice to know.

Another issue is the range of items that are available in Oz, Try buying half sizes in some models of running shoe, for example, in Australian shops - they don't seem to exist; yet online there is a greater range of sizes, colours widths etc.

Same for bushwalking boots - many euro boots com in half sizes (i.e.44.5; 45.5), not that you would know it shopping in australia. No wonder so many people complain of blisters - it's probably impossible to correctly fit some punters.

I understand the pressures on the seller but not stocking a complete range of sizes when you tout yourself as a professional boot fitter seems somewhat disingenuous to me.

When amazon opens in Oz it might well be a gamechanger - not sure how they get around the warehousing and distribution gouge but say good bye to many Australian bricks and mortar shops if they offer the same items as their american and UK shops do.

[RonK]

The reality is, most online retailers will ship to Australia. It's the product manufacturers that restrict shipment, usually to protect the Australian distributors exclusive rights agreements.

It comes down to finding brands that don't restrict shipment, or a retailer who is willing to ignore the restriction, or (if you must have a particular brand/product) using a forwarding agent.

So it's fairly pointless trying to list retailers, since most are are able to ship some brands, but not all brands.

You need to research all purchases carefully, not just on the item price but also on shipping costs and also how purchases can be bundled to acheive the best overall shipped price. There are no shortcuts unless you are willing to risk paying above the ante.

[GPSGuided]

Counter season should be beneficial for the manufacturers to off load their excess, as seen in Costco. We just stay 6mths behind.

I work for a supplier to Costco. They pay full price and work on low margins. Don't overthink it.

Thanks for the insight. I was thinking more of Costco's own Kirkland brand products and seasonal products. I note that we typically receive off-sizes in the clothing range, something less of a problem in their US outlets when I visit.

Otherwise the best solution for me is to wait for personal/family/work trips to the US and order as needed or incidental finds at the right price and shipping cost.

[MetalHound]

...you can use Australia Post 'Shop Mate'.

I'd be careful of Shop Mate, research I have done leads me to believe that issues with Shop Mate are quite extensive, some have had real issues with oversize/overweight packages and have been charged significant amounts as Shop Mate does not consolidate packaging, whereas other services do, and they have a maximum package size that is reasonably restrictive. People have had to resort to other engaging other forwarding agents to handle shipments that are basically "stuck" in country of origin, and with the help/parent company of Shop Mate being Singapore based (I believe), getting any sort of assistance from them is allegedly difficult. There is a large body of anecdotal evidence on various forums (one in particular that I probalby can't list - haven't read the posting rules though) dealing with this sort of trouble, though admittedly Shop Mate/Aust Post have someone who regularly reviews the forum and does attempt to help resolve issues.

Again, one reason I'm hesitant of using a forwarding agent is that you have little/no recourse when it comes to warranty. If no warranty, certain items are immediately off the table for grey importing (i.e. electrics/solar, etc) and many other itmes I'm still a bit hesitant to import personally. I've written to a couple of forwarding companies to see if they offer any sort of assistance with warranty claims, but not holding my breath on getting a response, let alone a positive response.

I hadn't thought of some of the other points raised, such as a list enabling distributers a one point stop to finger print suppliers (sorry if terminology incorrect) who are dodging bans, I hadn't considered that.

I really do object to paying locally AUD330 for an item listed on Amazon for AUD175 that weighs 350g and packs to the size of a water bottle. I doubt that you can convince me that everyone getting their fair whack on the way through, paying freight and finally GST on all of that results in AUD155, and if it does, then someone's definition of "a fair whack" certainly differs from my definition. And that item has been in production for quite a number of years under I believe the same design/colouration, so there's no seasonal adjustments, or any of those sorts of considerations.

[RonK]

I've used both Shipito and Shopmate to forward orders from the US, and have had no issues with either.

I switched to Shopmate because it's an Auspost service so can be delivered to my parcel locker.

[simonm]

Auspost now also ship through Shipito, take oversized packages and is usually the cheapest option.

[Neo]

I was interested in a Montbell Versalite rain jacket. Alas, no online purchase to Australia as Larrys has the rights but stocks a limited range = no sale.

In my searching I did see a Japanese buying/forwarding business. If I have some cash blowing around I might look into Shopmate.


Also Im told that big hardware store we all know doesn't pay for the stock on the shelves and their product sizes are slightly different so technically they cant be beaten on price for most items.

[Mark F]

Neo - if you are looking at Mont Bell gear go to a US retailer rather than japanese. The products sold in the US are better sized for westerners. I have a few bits of Mont Bell sourced from backcountry.com. The range sold in Japan is a bit different as well after looking for a parka in the Tokyo store.

If you examine the balance sheets of many big retailers, especially supermarkets, you will find the value of stock held is far less than the amount owed to suppliers. The store takes your money and then belatedly pays the supplier.

[Neo]

Ok cheers Mark.

(I'm tempted to spray some waterproofing on my existing wind jacket and try a diy kilt)

[wayno]

i've bought alot of gear online, and saved hundreds of dollars, i've found any risk doing that and using ail forwarding companies worth it. all the items I've got so far havent had any issues with them that i'd want to return them, even if one or two did have issues , i still would have saved far more money than if i had bought in shops, but all the items i bought weren't available locally anyway, in my experience the more you buy online the more its likely to work out in the long run
i have had one item I bought online bigger than i would have liked but its still been useable anyway...