Save On Shipping Costs With Amazon Prime

I actually do a lot of shopping online there days, especially on Amazon.  Last Christmas, in fact, I did 100% of my shopping on Amazon for several reasons.

1. They sell practically everything these days
2. Their wish list feature makes it easy for everybody to let me know exactly what they want
3. Their prices are generally quite competitive if not outright lower than the brick-and-mortar competition
4. No sales tax (yet)

The only catch is shipping costs.  Sure they have that feature where you can get free five-day shipping if you order over $20 (or $25, I forget) worth of merchandise, but that’s really a trap to get you to buy more than you intended.  I know I’m guilty of adding another item to the shopping cart to get that free shipping option.  But what if you either need it sooner or only want to purchase that one item?  Their regular shipping options are actually relatively expensive and probably amount to more than sales tax would be, especially for inexpensive single items.

Enter Amazon Prime

Amazon Prime is a service allowing you unlimited two-day shipping no matter how many items you order (note: it applies to most but not all items on the website, so anything extremely heavy probably wouldn’t qualify) for a flat fee of $79 per year.  At first glance that seems like a lot, but if you’re a heavy shopper making many small, separate orders (like me) you will likely save money.  If, on the other hand, you tend to hold off and purchase many items at the same time just a few times of year, Amazon Prime probably isn’t for you.  You should do the math based on your personal shopping habits, but I think you’ll find you will recoup the $79 fee suprisingly quickly if your spending habits match the target profile.  Of course, the frugal thing to do would be to purchase multiple items at once to take advantage of the free shipping option, but for some people that’s just not good enough.

If you’re interested, Amazon offers a free one-month trial of the Amazon Prime program.  You can always sign up just in time for Christmas, do all your shopping, save on shipping, and then cancel your membership if you aren’t impressed with the service.