@jt-libra wrote:
A question ... I plan to start a new selling site for sports cards. My brother sadly passed away recently and he was a major collector. Could someone please advise how these cards can be shipped without risk of damage (bending) and still comply with Canada Post regs for documents. I see that other card sellers ship by lettermail to the U.S. ... still. So I'm assuming that they're being shipped as documents. Am I wrong?
Sports cards are something I have no experiencee with. That said, over the years I have sold and still am selling a lot of collectible postcards and antique photographs to customers around the world. Seems to me sports cards and postcards should have a lot in common as far as lettermail shipping is comcerned.
To protect postcards and smaller photos such as cdvs and snapshots they are first placed in a high quality plastic sleeve, the acid free archival type. The sleeved card is then placed in a boxboard pouch.
Those I manufacture myself out Coke cases, soft drink cases are preferred as the boxboard used is thinner, lighter and tougher than the cereal box board. A 12 pack case yields 4 pouches. Using a simple cutting board with pre-measued guide lines I can cut up enough soft drink cases to make a hundred pouches in 15 minutes or so. The Coke ones are easy to work with as they already have corners that fold over to make a nice pouch, if accurately cut all that's needed to construct the finished product is to fold them with the printed side hidden, and then tape the sides and bottom with cheap packing tape.
Cereal boxes work well too but it is necessary to score 1 side so the board can be folded over, it works but takes slightly more time and effort. Even the large family size yield only 2 pouches large enough for postcrds. I also use them to protect larger items.
The pouches are made large enough so as the sleeved contents comfortably slip into the pouch with space to spare on all sides. The Coke cases are great, because of the way they are manufactured they provide a reinforced and ready made bottom edge.
The pouches made of Coke cases are light enough that 1 or 2 postcards placed in one weigh less than 30 grams allowing them to mail domestically with a P stamp.
My experience has been that up to 4, sometimes even 5 postcards can be slipped into a single pouch and still qualify (maximum thickness) for standard Domestic lettermail under 50 grams.
I have been using white paper announcement style envelopes large enough to accept Continental size postcards. They measure 5 x 6.5 inches. For years now I have been printing the shipping and return address directly onto the envelope. In the past I've used slightly smaller envelopes of the same type, those are 4.25 x 6.25, they're fine for standard size cards.
Since CP started their recent enforcement I've stopped writing Do Not Bend on international Letter-Post mail and have also stopped displaying the ebay VAT paid code on the face of envelopes. To date, this hasn't caused any problems. It seems they are passing through fine.
So, far so good, I've had no returns of postcards or photographs (cdvs) that were mailed Letter-Post USA or International using 5 x 6.5 inch plain white envelopes as described above.
I may try mailing a couple 9 x 12 cabinet photos packed in oversize flat rigid mailers just to see how Canada Post reacts to those. From what I have read here it doesn't seem likely that they will be allowed to cross borders without a customs declaration.
