Re: shipping commercial vs. fine art shipping:

Have you sent displays or actual artworks?   A display can be
re-manufactured and is likely a pretty sturdy object to begin with; a work
of art can be easily damaged, cost thousands to repair and can never really
be replaced.  Every time somebody ships something to me via UPS, it ends up
damaged.  I keep asking people not to send anything to me that way, and yet
there are those who simply must have it their way.

And, yes, of course: UPS and FedEx do a fine job of shipping all sorts of
things, but fine art shippers exist for a reason.  The commercial guys are
really not up to the task and are *very* difficult to deal with when they
damage things.  I speak from personal experience here.

Also, check with your insurance agent about coverage in case of damage.  Our
insurance - and maybe yours too -  won't cover damage caused by any
non-fine-art-shipping except for USPS Registered Mail, and the commercial
shippers usually don't cover damage to really pricy things.  We've actually
had better success with the USPS Registered Mail, which we occasionally use
for low-value things that are not easily broken (rolled up prints, for
example).



----- Original Message -----
From: "Northwest Presentation" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, August 05, 2003 4:08 PM
Subject: Re: Art shippers

> Michael,
> I understand your lack of confidence in the major players in shipping -
> however, I must say that I have sent several thousand displays all over
the
> US via UPS since I started my company in 1995 and have had ONE damaged
> shipment. If you decide to ship UPS, I'd just make a shipping container
out
> of plywood, with a bubble liner and send overnight if possible.... it gets
> the most personalized care that way....
>
> I recently had a "lost" carton that needed to arrive on a tight
deadline....
> the customer had given an incomplete address... and the manager of the UPS
> facility in MD spent hours of his time locating it (AFTER HOURS) and
> delivering it personally to the convention center at 2 am ......
>
> my kind of customer service!
>
> Kindest regards.
> Don Blake
> Owner,
> Northwest Presentation
> http://www.northwestpresentation.com/
>

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).