MP order

[Michael]

Many of us are aware of how quick MP is when an order is placed, I placed an order on Tuesday night, it was at my door this afternoon. Dang!!!
By my calculations it was only 60-ish hours from the time I pushed the order button order until it showed up here. Double Dang!!
It will take me a hell of a lot longer to get around to using them.

 

[Josh]

That's odd, because the travel time on my last order was 12 days. Now that I post this, I do believe that the little scuffle in Ukraine had just touched off too.

Makes me want to order another mould just to check delivery times again... LOL

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

My last was screwd up by FedEX. MP shipped and it was in my town in 48 hours. FedEX had it on the truck TVREE DAYS then a Sunday was thrown in. They called for a HI VOLUME. EVERY DAY IT WOULD SAY OUT FOR DELIVERY with a early time that was changed till about 21:00 then next morning start again... X3.

BUT it was STILL quicker then I can get a package out of Texas Michigan or Tennessee.

 

[Petrol & Powder]

The duration of the delivery is impacted by timing that no one has control over, particularly the seller.

A package that is boxed up, labeled and ready to go 1 minute after the last truck of the day leaves, will sit there until the next business day.

A package that arrives at a sorting facility right after the truck has left for the airport will sit there until the next truck leaves for the airport.

A package that arrives at the airport after the plane is loaded will sit there until the next plane is ready to be loaded.

A package on a plane that is delayed for maintenance, weather, crew, etc. will sit there until that plane, or another plane is ready.

And the process repeats until the package is delivered.

It’s like driving a route with 20 traffic lights – sometimes you get green lights the entire route, sometimes you can’t buy a green light.

 

[Michael]

My last was screwd up by FedEX.

Well.... duuh.

Makes me want to order another mould just to check delivery times again... LOL

Makes total sense to me.

The duration of the delivery is impacted by timing that no one has control over, particularly the seller.

That is why I was so excited, all planets were in line, everyone showed up for work, not hung over, nothing was broken, delayed, diverted, on strike, PMS, etc., etc., etc. Where we are at Amazon takes 5-7 days.

 

[Petrol & Powder]

That is why I was so excited, all planets were in line, everyone showed up for work, not hung over, nothing was broken, delayed, diverted, on strike, PMS, etc., etc., etc.

Yep, ALL the stars and planets must align. It's a remarkable system when you examine the totality of it. The success is not your package being delivered but millions of packages that we move around the earth daily.

And it doesn’t matter if it’s FedEx, DHL, UPS, USPS, or some other giant system, they all have big chains, and it only takes one weak link to cause an issue. Something as simple as a smudged bar code can create a problem and you can’t interrupt the progress of 50K other packages to address that “Special Snowflake” of a package. Nor can you hold up a plane pushing back from the gate (with a very narrow take off slot to make) because some guy found one more box that didn’t make it into the container.

I’m amazed at how well those systems do work. I think FedEx and UPS are systems America can be proud of. People love to focus on individual failures but overall, we’re winning that war.

 

[CZ93X62]

We are kinda spoiled by the efficiency of our logistics systems in the first quarter of the 21st Century.

I am very pleased by the fine customer service the folks who make our semi-custom moulds provide. Accurate and NOE have done my heavy lifting for me, and they are first-rate. I haven't tried MP Molds yet, but they seem to handle their business efficiently if our site's commentary is a barometer. Mountain Molds was excellent, too--and NEI when the late Walt Melander was with us was GREAT.

In our little 'niche hobby' world......THESE are the Good Old Days.

 

[Tomme boy]

Last several were delivered like this. One other one took two weeks. I accidently checked the Fedex economy instead of Priority.

 

[Petrol & Powder]

We've become very spoiled with parcel delivery.

A package that takes a few days or even a few weeks to arrive is a First World problem.

 

[Glaciers]

When I was in the Charter business in Valdez which is a small backwater on the north gulf coast of Alaska I had a break down needing parts that were not available in Alaska, the northwest and west coast. I identified what was needed while still on the water using a radio to phone patch while limping back to port. I was able to find that the part was available in Florida but due to being 4 time zones later they were closed. I was on the phone at 3:00 AM and got the part coming expedited overnight air freight. It was on the first flight arriving Valdez the next morning. I was amazed.
But my point is a few years later I needed to send a part from Fairbanks to Valdez but no direct flights. Long story short there was no way to get the parts to Valdez by the next day, Fed x, UPS, USPS, DHL, airlines it didn’t matter. I ended up getting in my truck and driving the parts myself and arriving late evening, then assisting in the repair so the vessel could go out in the morning.
The whole time with this particular repair in the back of my mind was the other parts delivery years before, overnight from Florida almost 5,000 miles distance and comparing to not being able to get a part that was in my hand, a distance of 365 miles.
The delivery times from MP has always amazed me. One of these days I’m going to have to place an order just to test it out.

 

[Petrol & Powder]

Oddly, or at least maybe not immediately apparent, the distance usually isn’t the major factor. It’s all the other tasks in betwen that must happen.

It’s the timing when the parcel arrives at each step. Did the plane just leave or is it not leaving for another 20 hours? Did the parcel get put on the truck first and therefore will be last off at the sorting facility? Is there a ground transport segment that will cause a long delay if there is a short delay during part of the travel (ferry, train, customs, sorting, shipping container full and no replacement, etc.) The long-distance segments go without anything much occurring, it’s the ends of those long journeys where the real problems are.

It's not much different than when people travel great distances. Once you’re on the plane, things generally go well. It’s the airports, ground traffic, parking, trains, buses, security, gate assignments, etc. that screw things up.

I’m amazed with the logistics involved. If you’ve ever watched package delivery in a major city, you get an understanding of the complexity just in that final leg of the process. Drivers stop and unload a runner (or runners) with a huge cart full of packages. They can’t park, they just stop. Those runners have to deliver packages to multiple buildings just on that one block. Those buildings have dozens of addresses within them, spread out over dozens of floors. And that’s just the LAST segment of the journey for those few packages out of millions. In some sections of Manhattan, those runners go to the next block and exchange carts from the truck of a different truck. The system is mind boggling.

Rural delivery has a different set of problems. There’s so little density and frequency that there is a disproportionate amount of labor and fuel for those last few miles. None of it is simple.

 

[358156 hp]

Many of us are aware of how quick MP is when an order is placed, I placed an order on Tuesday night, it was at my door this afternoon. Dang!!!
By my calculations it was only 60-ish hours from the time I pushed the order button order until it showed up here. Double Dang!!
It will take me a hell of a lot longer to get around to using them.

You messed up Michael. You should have been buying a lottery ticket at the exact moment you pressed "send" instead of ordering the mould. You could be a multi-millionaire from that moment on instead of the proud owner of a neat new mould.

 

[Rick]

The last MP mold I bought took over two years to ship. Once it finally did ship, I received it 2 months later. It flew from the EU to NYC, from there it took a ship thru the Panama Canal and up the west coast to L.A. I got it a week later.

 

[fiver]

maybe the state of Idaho can get on board, and get me my license plates that are coming from 300 miles away, delivered in under the 4-6 week minimum timeline they set.

 

[RicinYakima]

USPS packages are quick in the summer when the passes are open, a lot slower in the winter. FedEx is fast just before Christmas because they have several plane loads a week coming in, but ground is slow because of snow. UPS is unreliable because they use a computer route map and the drivers don't watch the streets they are on. The three streets in my neighborhood all have a house with the same number. We just do the final delivery ourselves, as UPS says they are perfect and never make mistakes.

 

[Rick H]

We really are spoiled. I remember when catalog orders went in the mail, 3-5 days for delivery, then the business filled the order, another 5-12 waiting for the check to clear, then it was mailed out to you, another 3-5 days if you were lucky the process took 2 1/2 weeks, and probably 3-4 weeks was the norm. Of course we didn't worry much about porch pirates then either.

 

[Bret4207]

My last was screwd up by FedEX. MP shipped and it was in my town in 48 hours. FedEX had it on the truck TVREE DAYS then a Sunday was thrown in. They called for a HI VOLUME. EVERY DAY IT WOULD SAY OUT FOR DELIVERY with a early time that was changed till about 21:00 then next morning start again... X3.

BUT it was STILL quicker then I can get a package out of Texas Michigan or Tennessee.

FedEx delivers Sundays up here now, or at least they did for a while. I'm talking July of this year not the Christmas rush. I wonder if that's a regional thing?

 

[Bret4207]

We really are spoiled. I remember when catalog orders went in the mail, 3-5 days for delivery, then the business filled the order, another 5-12 waiting for the check to clear, then it was mailed out to you, another 3-5 days if you were lucky the process took 2 1/2 weeks, and probably 3-4 weeks was the norm. Of course we didn't worry much about porch pirates then either.

On opening morning of deer season I used to open the gunshop at 4:30 AM or so. You'd be amazed the number of people that showed up needing a last minute item...like a GUN or AMMUNITION!!!!!! Some folks just can't plan ahead at all.

 

[Rick H]

I never understood the guys buying a brand new rifle, having the sporting goods store mounting the scope and "bore sighting" it for them the week before the opener. They show up in the Northwoods having never fired their rifle. I suppose it didn't matter for those who spent their time drinking and playing poker all night and sleeping most of the day.

 

[david s]

We really are spoiled. I remember when catalog orders went in the mail, 3-5 days for delivery, then the business filled the order, another 5-12 waiting for the check to clear, then it was mailed out to you, another 3-5 days if you were lucky the process took 2 1/2 weeks, and probably 3-4 weeks was the norm. Of course we didn't worry much about porch pirates then either.

Around the turn of the millennium, I use to put a letter in the mail on Monday from Montana addressed to Brownell's, I would have the order in hand by that Friday. This was a somewhat regular occurrence and always amazed me. Spoiled indeed!