Throughout the last 10 years, I've gotten probably half my radios from Europe. And there's something I've noticed. No disrespect intended, but I'm curious why Europeans tend to use old beat-up boxes and balled-up newspaper to "protect" the radio, rather than newer, sturdier boxes and bubble wrap? Is that stuff harder to find in Europe?
Ok. Europe is a pretty big place including a massive variety of countries all completely different so categorising all of us as the same ain’t gonna work. Saying “no disrespect intended” doesn’t reduce the disrespect I’m afraid. I’ve had plenty from all over Europe and the States and some packing has been good and some has been bad but it’s not a ‘Europe’ only issue
I live in "Europe" and I've rarely had the misfortune of opening a package before that did not contain a decent amount of padding for protection except for a few, disrespectable sellers. Last week actually, I received a WM-10 from the UK, wrapped with FOUR layers of bubble wrap. Of all the countries I ordered from, from about 2,000 items, Japan likely uses bubble wrap the least and for ecological reasons. Lots of recycled foam and paper, yet not a single damaged item (customs tampering with the content doesn't count obviously).
I agree with Reli. In my experience most of my packages from Europe are not well wrapped. But in one exception the biggest bubble wrap i ever received was from Europe: @Selcuk Turkoglu sent a boombox with massive bubble wrap (I can wrap a bed with his bubble wrap) and in another exception a European seller sent me a box wrapped in a blanket.
I was going to say that it is because we are more environmentally friendly. Then I remembered that Apple make a big fuss about having eliminated PVC (which is what Bubble Wrap is usually made of) from their products. Actually I love Bubble Wrap. Here is my current stock - about the fifth roll that size I have bought I think the reason people don't use Bubblewrap is cost and availability. That roll was bought online from a Packaging wholesaler for about £12. If I just wanted to get some tonight my local supermarket or stationers they would charge about £3 for 2m of that width packed in a hang up bag. It is usually with the Greeting Cards and probably carries about the same mark up. One thing we wonder about in Europe when watching American dramas is the use of Handleless paper bags for Groceries. Until about a year ago when a nominal charge was introduced for environmental purposes all the UK supermarkets gave away plastic bags with handles for free. Most of the time you packed your goods yourself taking as many as you wanted / could get away with. I bought a Lava Lamp on Ebay and it came securely packed in an old beer box packed out with about 50 carrier bags. It did the job and the cost of the packaging to the seller was just the tape to secure the top of the box.
OK I should clarify since I was too lazy to list the countries I've purchased radios from. I'd estimate 40% were from USA, 60% elsewhere, which includes (by memory) England, Germany, Austria, France, Sweden, Switzerland, Poland, Italy, Romania, China, Japan, Russia, and Canada. Among that list of countries I'd say Germany has been my biggest source. The "European" packages are usually never a perfect square or rectangle. They are usually shaped like a door wedge, or even a football, because they were constructed of 2 or 3 old boxes cut in half and taped together, because no effort was made to find a proper large box. And the tape is often that shiny brown tape that doesn't stick well. Needless to say, when I receive the package it's ready to fall apart, if it hasn't already. And for insulation, it's usually a mix of 7 or 8 different ingredients, kind of like a pot of stew. Balled-up newspaper, broken and dirty pieces of Styrofoam, balled-up garbage bags, blankets, torn shirts, egg cartons, etc. The radio itself is usually not wrapped with anything.....It's just sitting naked in the middle of this "stew". I suppose it's easier to find large bubble-wrap here in the USA since it's sold at large stores like Walmart and Office Depot which are less common in Europe?
Handleless? I have not seen one of those in years. The paper bags I get from my grocery have handles. And department stores often have very elaborate paper bags with colored ropes for handles. California, the state that other Americans like to hate on, requires grocery stores to charge 10 cents per bag. This encourages customers to bring their own bags, like intelligent people would anyway. It's not to hard to keep a few bags in the trunk of your car.
Proving my point about some companies prices Argos are charging £10.99 for fifteen metres http://www.argos.co.uk/product/3233331 That is over half the price of their cheapest "boombox" http://www.argos.co.uk/product/5135451 As noted before you can buy bubblewrap much cheaper but only if you plan ahead and buy in quantity. Your comment about packing techniques reminds me of a seller who took about a month to send me a Casio Synth. One of his excuses was "I went to B&Q (large DIY store) to get a box but when I got there they had emptied the recycling skip". In the end I was just pleased to get it despite mediocre packing. A couple more thoughts. In the maximum airmail package is 90cm (length x height x width). Beyond that you have to use a courier who are far more expensive. Watch out for Bubblewrap marking surfaces. A few years ago at work a colleague was given a CRT monitor which had been wrapped in bubblewrap while in storage. The anti-reflection coating on the screen was covered in marks from where the bubbles had been touching it.
I had a Minidisc arrive wrapped up in a T-Towel a couple of weeks ago this was in a cereal box with a stew off newspaper . the contents were mint and unharmed in this case. This was from the UK and I purchased of Schpock (like Gumtree) so I Guessed the seller did not have packaging knocking about the place. Stuff from Japan I find is the worse off of Yahoo! , Walkmans inside a cheap Jiffy Bag
I leave most of my boxes on the porch in extremely cold conditions for a few days to make sure all the cooties are dead before I open them....
It's hit of miss for me. I've had walkman's shipped from the states that were wrapped in a plastic grocery bag inside a cardboard box twice it's size. How it survived I'll never now. It comes down to the individual. I find dealing with a fellow member here, regardless of country, tend to over protect and over pack the boxes which I cannot thank them enough for. I'd rather pay a little extra for protection, then to suffer that deflating feeling, when you open a box and it's already rattling like a box of Legos True collectors know that couriers toss these boxes around and stack overweight packages on them. With that knowledge we know to err on the side of caution. BTW I had a box come from Italy last year from a S2Go member and it was packed better than I'd pack my mother's crystal vase on moving day! It took my half an hour just to open it!
Here's a package from England that arrived last week. You can tell the box was "enlarged" and jury-rigged together. No bubble wrap was used either.
In my experience, there's no rule for any particular country. Sometimes packages (either from USA or EU) came with a bad packaging, sometimes came with very good. What I found is that here in EU seems that we are more towards re-using materials for wrapping, and tend to use paper and cardboard more than plastics as protecting material (which I like). In the USA they seem to tend to fo for bubbles. But especially China and Japan, they tend to use bubbles much more. Packages from Deuschland tend to use paper most of the time. I don't like to use plastics, they are ruining our world; we should drastically reduce the use of plastics and use reciclable materials, like paper and paperboard. In my case, I have bought bubbles just once (it was a small layer). What I do is to save the bubbles I receive in some packages and re-use them for another package. Have you seen this?
I think newspaper is fine for Walkmans, but not for boomboxes. It is almost impossible to add enough newspaper to prevent the boombox from shifting around.
I agree with Hugo about plastic waste and the harm to our environment but this cannot explain the unsafe packaging we receive sometimes. I have received broken broken boomboxes from Japan and Europe in the past. I hesitate to buy any more boomboxes. 3 weeks ago i received a walkman broken to pieces because the guy placed it in the envelop without any protection. Hopefully we all learn from members concern/ experiences and whenever we ship things make our packaging safe and as much as possible use environmentally friendly material protection
Here are the results when you stock 3 ghettoblasters of significant weight on top of each other without using the term fragile,put it in a paper carton and hope for the best. I bought recently three ghettoblaster tv combos from Germany and the results are awful. I will probably loose all the money spend since its an ebay buy and the seller states that he will demand money from post office for me.I do not believe i get a dime 1st mistake:Seller took the liberty of putting three ghettoblasters in one paper box with a thick paper underfloor just and do not state the term fragile. 2nd mistake:Who the f@$k told you that stryropore pieces will do anything to prevent the ghettoblasters from getting damaged. 3rd.mistakene layer of bubble wrap is equal no bubble wrap:Wrap the damn thing 4 times i do not care! 4th mistake:What about wooden boxes why are you so cheap?I would be happy to pay the extras cost. 5th mistake buying from a stranger instead of the community that actually cares for their boxes sent. Sony was in mint condition now average....... Next time somebody pulls a joke like that to me please remember i travel a lot and no hard feelings if you find me at your doorstep doing that to your face....love peace and the rest!
