How to Actually Lower Cost Per Package — Without Shipping Less

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Most businesses only look at their total shipping spend — and assume the only way to cut it is to ship less.

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But the smarter move isn’t to shrink your business.

It’s to reduce your cost per package by auditing smarter, negotiating better, and understanding how your shipping behavior affects your rates.

At RCS, we help companies lower their effective cost per shipment — without touching their volume — using data, refunds, and strategic control.

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What Drives Cost Per Package (And How to Improve It)

Your cost per shipment isn’t just about base rates. It’s shaped by a mix of carrier behavior, shipping decisions, and missed opportunities:

1. Unclaimed Refunds

Late deliveries, billing errors, and duplicate charges go unnoticed without weekly audits.

Every refund you miss = inflated cost per package.

2. Service Level Misuse

Are you using 2-Day when Ground would arrive just as fast?

We identify faster-but-cheaper service swaps to reduce spend without sacrificing delivery time.

3. Surcharge Creep

Fuel, residential, DAS, and address correction fees can double your per-shipment cost — and they grow quietly.

We help you catch invalid ones and negotiate caps.

4. Package Optimization

Dimensional weight (DIM) charges are brutal.

We help you identify size/weight mismatches and reduce packaging penalties.

5. Contract Misalignment

Your current agreement may no longer match your shipping behavior.

We use real audit data to renegotiate smarter — not just based on total spend.

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The Wrong Way to Lower Cost Per Package

Many companies respond to rising costs by:

• Cutting order volume
• Charging customers more
• Switching blindly to cheaper services
• Ignoring the issue altogether

Those options hurt sales, brand perception, or both.

The better strategy? Audit. Analyze. Adjust. Repeat.

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✅The RCS Approach:

Here’s how we help you lower cost per shipment — while your business keeps growing:

• Weekly audit catches every refundable event
• Surcharge trend tracking exposes fee growth early
• Contract alignment ensures your rates reflect your actual behavior
• Packaging and service-level analysis finds low-friction ways to save
• Clear reporting helps you monitor cost-per-package over time

📦 Less waste. More control. No sacrifice.

You don’t need to ship less — you just need to ship smarter.

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