b'VOX POPSo yes, shipping is by far our biggestsuppliers, like certified organic calen- JACK59expense. We use Canada Post, becausedula flowers. We ended up having to its the most cost-effective, but it is stillsource those from France, which weVanessa Marshall, Ownerextremely expensive. No businessended up paying a premium on, pluswww.jack59.cacan offer free shipping unless youremore shipping charges to get them here.Ethically driven plastic-freesomeone like Amazon, and even theyBefore COVID, we ordered some travel- hair productslose money from free shipping.sized tins for packaging from overseas. We ended up waiting a year and a half We do get pushback from customers,to get them, and even when they were and the best way we handle that isshipped, they just sat in the port for four just by educating them as much asmonths because everything was back-possible about the true cost of gettinglogged. That meant we were out of stock our product into their hands. We arefor about a year even though we had very clear on shipping options. Peopleordered well in advance of when we can order from Satya.ca and receivenormally do. free shipping when they spend over $100. But we also have all our in-storeAs a result of those delays, weve had locations listed on our website and tellto do a lot of thinking about timelines, people, Please, if its easier for you, then which, of course, puts pressure on your pick it up right from the store. We havecash flow. If you must order somethingstores across Canada where they can easily accomplish that.and pay for it months in advance, then Of course, getting our products out toyou dont have that money to operateA fter staffing, our next biggest issue with, and it becomes very difficult tois shipping. Prices have gone up customers relies on access to raw mate- keep going. We just try to be as helpfulinsanely. We offer a free product with rials and packaging. During COVID, we every order to offset that cost. We also as possible if people are having difficul-dealt with some supply chain issues.ties getting their product, maintain thattry to offer some free shipping to our It became difficult to get the ingre- customer service, and try to be as opencustomers, but we can only do that over dients we needed from our normalas possible about the situation. a certain threshold, which is at $97.00. Still, we get customers who are unhappy. Canada is a huge country, and we ship coast to coast. We get people who say, I want to buy a shampoo but your ship-ping is so expensive, and think were the ones who created that cost, when the reality is weve fought very hard to get corporate rates from these compa-nies or get a courier account and lower those costs for our customers, but cant. So, having to explain to people that shipping is an external cost that we have no control over is a challenging issue that we spend a lot of time discussing Halliburton is committedin our business. Its a continual battle to Indigenous Inclusion. and it doesnt help that the quotes were given on shipping platforms are often not correct, which leads us to Our goal is to build meaningful relationshipspaying more than our customers are throughout our operating areas, focusing onbeing charged. cultural understanding, economic benetsWhen it comes to those shipping fees, and community involvement. we try to be as transparent as we can be and keep our prices as low as we can. A lot of companies offer free ship-ping, but they just transfer that cost into their products without their customers realizing it. We dont want to do that because we also sell our products in-person, and we dont want those2023 Halliburton. All Rights Reserved. in-person customers paying higher 60A CCAB PUBLICATION2023'