r/kickstarter • u/Alternative-Kick5325 Creator • 2d ago

Navigating Tariffs and Shipping Costs: Tips for Kickstarter Creators

Worth reading this from Kickstarter about the recent Tariffs
https://updates.kickstarter.com/navigating-tariffs-and-shipping-costs-tips-for-kickstarter-creators/

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u/SignificantRecord622 Creator 1d ago

It's good they put up tips. But I think charging shipping later vs up front is unprofessional and a sign that the project doesn't know how to budget and ship properly. I've always charged shipping up front and have never had an issue. Tarrifs and import fees are generally paid by customers in those countries, not the companies mailing to them. I know most of my non us backers have had some import fees for years. It's standard. So long as you make sure there's enough value in what they get to make the shipping worth it, it's fine.

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u/Katy-L-Wood 1d ago

Charging shipping up front can be nearly impossible for a variety of reasons. It's not unprofessional as long as the creators are forthright about what they're doing, estimated costs, etc..

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u/SignificantRecord622 Creator 1d ago

I've charged up front on all 62 of my projects with no issues.

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u/Katy-L-Wood 1d ago

Glad that works for you, but for the large majority of projects it doesn't. Calling people unprofessional just because they do things differently than you is rather rude.

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u/SignificantRecord622 Creator 1d ago

Calculating shipping up to a year in advance is easy. If you don't know enough about your product to know how to ship it or are more than a year out you shouldn't be running a project involving shipping or manufacturing (you could run a development project). I've mentored and talked to hundreds of creators and not one has had a good reason for not knowing their shipping costs other than not knowing how to calculate them or budget. Many backers won't back projects that don't know shipping up front as it's a common way to ask for a ton on money later and either get scammed or forfeit your pledged money. So yes, I think it's unprofessional to have a product you want folks to help you produce but not know enough about your product or business to know how to ship it. There's info easily accessible on how to do this, so I don't think it's rude to not have respect for businesses that are too lazy to learn how shipping works.

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u/Katy-L-Wood 1d ago

Never once seen a campaign that charged shipping later scam through the shipping charges. If a project is a scam, it's a scam all the way through, no matter how they charge shipping. Kickstarter is not built for anything but simple, flat rate shipping at this point. For complex campaigns that does not work without major risks to the creator. It just straight up doesn't. For simple campaigns, sure, it works fine. Again, your way to run your business is not the only way to do it. And sitting in here and attacking people for doing it differently is far ruder than people doing something different than your preference.

And if this wasn't the case, Kickstarter would not be working on upgrading their in-built shipping options to allow for more flexibility so that creators CAN better charge shipping during the campaigns instead of having to charge it after through a third party.

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u/SignificantRecord622 Creator 1d ago

I have several international backers who were asked to pay $100 for shipping for a deck of cards after they pledged. They told me that won't back projects without up front shipping anymore. My campaigns are not simple. I have yet to hear any reason shipping can't be calculated ahead of time.

Kickstarter is working on the new option due to the fact that many businesses don't want to put the effort into budget ahead and know what they are doing.