Cha-cha-cha-changes

Today we’re saying good-bye to two inaugural design team members, Amber and Merry. They have both been with me since Day One and I’m so thankful they helped me get things off the ground. Please stop by and wish them well as they move on to other crafty journeys. Bye girls!!!

This is the first of some upcoming changes here at IHP. I did make one change to the store, based on some of the survey feedback. Now, instead of alphabetically, items are listed reverse chronologically with the newest items/items recently changed being listed first. This way when you look at the sale and new pages, the top items are the most recently added items.

There is still the search function, manufacturer drop down (on the homepage) and under the category Open Stock you can view By Collection Name, in case you’re having a hard time finding something specific.

Perhaps the most major change is that beginning tomorrow, Feb. 1, the free shipping threshold will now be $50. I’ve always prided myself on offering the lowest free shipping around but honestly, with the postal increases I just can’t keep it this low any longer.

There were two postal increase in 2009 and I DID NOT raise my prices or up my threshold at all. But this recent one at the beginning of January was too much for me to absorb. Even raising my threshold to $50, I am still the lowest around to offer free shipping and to not have any restrictions on what “qualifies” or to charge extra for Priority shipping. I don’t have any restrictions or limitations on what you can order to qualify – it is just a set dollar amount.

Before I made this decision I looked at our competition because it was important to me to remain at the top in customer service and to definitely stay competitive. I did some comparisons to our top competitors and this is what I found:

Competitor #1	Free with $75 of qualifying items (12x12 paper does not qualify),
Competitor #2	Free with $85 order, ($3.95-$9.25 for less than threshold)
Competitor #3	Free with $100 of qualifying items (sale items do not qualify), $4.95 for less than threshold
Competitor #4	Free with $150 order, $4.95-$8.80 for less than threshold
Competitor #5	No free shipping option, $5 for all orders
Competitor #6	No free shipping option, minimum charge $6.30
Competitor #7	Free with $75 of qualifying items, must pay upgrade fee of $2.50 for Priority Mail
Competitor #8	Free with $55, $6.95 flat rate for lower than the threshold

See that? We’re still lower than everyone on this list! I hope you understand! And of course there’s still our great prices (almost ALWAYS below MSRP), super duper speedy shipping and stellar customer service/response.

I’ll be back tomorrow with a crafty post for you. Thanks for popping in today and for your understanding!