Australian retailers are often given a good price on goods purchased from their wholesalers only to later find the invoice charges them more for freight than the actual cost.

Australian freight companies (they are all treacherous) all charge customers based on either the cubic space of the consignments or the weight whichever is the highest.

Gifts and homewares product consignments almost always, weigh lower than their designated weight per cubic meter, so are charged on the basis of the cubic space they occupy and then a rate per cubic meter dependent upon the distance carried.

Interstate capital cities freight rates are cheaper, and then the more remote the destination (or number of depots) distant from that capital city, determines the rate per cubic meter (or rate per kg converted from their chosen kg rate per cubic meter).

Since a lot of retailers are paying freight on consignments regularly, they should know when they are being stiffed. Some don’t complain, “They just never come back”. However some wholesalers with periodic products like Christmas wholesalers must imagine that you won’t remember next year, as they seem to be more prone to sticking it to their customers with inflated freight components.

It’s a good habit to ask wholesalers at the trade fairs “is the freight cost based on actual cost”, because they will know in advance not to try this nasty little trick and you can later ask them to demonstrate the actual cost.

Good wholesalers will not only be basing their freight charge on the actual cost, but will also have lower than average freight costs because of the sheer volume they generate for their freight company and they will be passing that on to you.