We changed our shipping charges – wowie zowie – after 10 years of a $15 flat fee. It’s about time, no? If you place an order on Gustiamo, shipping charges are now calculated on the basis of how many items you are purchasing. So this is how it works, now: base shipping charge is $5.75, with $2.0 increments for every item and a maximum of $19.75. This means that if you buy only 1 item (hope not!), shipping charges are $7.75; if you buy 20 items (hope yes!), shipping charges are maximum $19.75. This is for ground delivery. Of course, if you are in a rush and prefer to have your order shipped overnight, you still have that option.
to celebrate our new shipping charges, there will be no shipping charges on your orders through the end of February IF you write in the special instruction box in the shopping cart: “SHIP“. if you don’t write “SHIP”, Anne will not know you read this and will NOT take the shipping charges off your bill and credit card.
Nice ups good deal!
grazie! hope you place an order with free shipping, soon. but your name…
If you buy only 1 item the shipping charge is $7.75 (see above). If this is true, then the “base charge” of $5.75 is not really meaningful, since there is no circumstance under which it would apply.
This is not really clear…or I just don’t get it.
sorry. you are right it is not clear. i didn’t know how to put it better. yes, the minimum is $7.75 for 1 item purchased.
grazie for asking.
How about if you buy 4 of the same item (coffee, example)? Is it 4 items or 4 of 1 item?
Hi Maggie,
it does not matter if it is the same item or different products, what matters is the quantity. Therefore, if you order four tins of coffee, shipping charges would be $13.75. I hope this helps!
Hello again,
I am taking advantage of the great offer of free shipping, but after that, unfortunately that means a higher price than before. So it is actually NOT GOOD news, but really bad news.
It only takes 5 items to get above the previous 15$ shipping fee. Who would have ordered only 4 or 5 items or even less, I mean, really? So let’s be honest: the new shipping charge is now 20$ instead of 15$. That would be more accurate to say. Because I can’t believe that anybody would really mailorder one or 2 bags of pasta or rice (for example).
And now my second-favourite pasta (Latini Bucatini, after Martelli) is sold out, I could not fit that into my free shipping order today. Grieve! That means I cannot order it later either, as then the new higher shipping charge will hit me in the face.
These are the very few moments when I wished I would actually live in New York City, so we would just walk into your store. But one day I’m gonna make it, I will come to New York and visit your store. This must be like a treasure chamber (I imagine)…
Marion,
We always believed that a flat fee is a great incentive to browse our website and try a lot of our wonderful products. But throughout the years we received a lot of criticism and suggestions to change our shipping policies. In the past year, the criticism become louder because – unfortunately – our customers placed smaller orders due to the economy. The truth is that there are quite a lot of people who want to try just one or two items, and for them $15 for shipping seems to be a lot. Obviously we cannot make everybody happy but we try our best with this free shipping offer and many different promotions and specials.
We hope you’ll be able to come visit us soon here in New York!