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The U.S. used to allow very cheap international book shipping by surface mail, called an M-bag https://faq.usps.com/s/article/What-is-M-bag-Service https://faq

by schoen 6y ago

The U.S. used to allow very cheap international book shipping by surface mail, called an M-bag https://faq.usps.com/s/article/What-is-M-bag-Service https://faq.usps.com/s/article/What-is-M-bag-Service It was kind of insanely cheap compared to other ways of transporting books internationally. But it was discontinued about a decade ago and replaced with airmail M-bags, which may still be cheaper than many other options but are not nearly as cheap as the surface M-bags were. Did you (or someone who was sending you these books) find a service like this still available from Japan? I'd be happy to hear that this is still offered in other countries and that people are still getting a benefit from it.

jwr 6y ago
I used it once in the past. I cried when the bag arrived. The books were ground to a fine pulp, with all covers torn off and only some of the insides remaining holding together. The bag contained mostly dust. No amount of throwing would do this: they bag must have been thrown insecured into a larger container, where it slid around and bumped into other things as waves rocked the ship(s). Never, ever again.
- schoen 6y ago
  My father owns a bookstore and would use surface M-bags, while they existed, to ship things to customers overseas (with their permission). I believe he never had a problem with significant damage to the contents. I agree it's got to be riskier for books than the airmail options, and I'm very sorry to hear of what happened to your books when you used it. :-(
m4rtink 6y ago
I havent seen any book specific options, but it could be that the transshipping companies I used (Tenso, Buyee) so far simply dont have those. In general there is quite a good price for air shipping < 2 kg. But above that weight air shipping costs get really expensive. On the other hand surface ahipping is already cheap at 2 kg and get even cheaper per unit of mass as your package gets heavier, up to 30 kg max (or some fairly genwrous size limits). So thats why I used surface mail for those books - they were mostly second hand and shipping them by air would be quite a bit more expensive than theor price in many cases! :)

by schoen 6y ago

jwr 6y ago

I used it once in the past. I cried when the bag arrived. The books were ground to a fine pulp, with all covers torn off and only some of the insides remaining holding together. The bag contained mostly dust. No amount of throwing would do this: they bag must have been thrown insecured into a larger container, where it slid around and bumped into other things as waves rocked the ship(s). Never, ever again.

schoen 6y ago
My father owns a bookstore and would use surface M-bags, while they existed, to ship things to customers overseas (with their permission). I believe he never had a problem with significant damage to the contents. I agree it's got to be riskier for books than the airmail options, and I'm very sorry to hear of what happened to your books when you used it. :-(

m4rtink 6y ago

I havent seen any book specific options, but it could be that the transshipping companies I used (Tenso, Buyee) so far simply dont have those. In general there is quite a good price for air shipping < 2 kg. But above that weight air shipping costs get really expensive. On the other hand surface ahipping is already cheap at 2 kg and get even cheaper per unit of mass as your package gets heavier, up to 30 kg max (or some fairly genwrous size limits). So thats why I used surface mail for those books - they were mostly second hand and shipping them by air would be quite a bit more expensive than theor price in many cases! :)