Parcel versus LTL
Parcel carriers take shipments up to about 150 lb. A 100-piece t-shirt order at roughly 0.22 kg a shirt is about 22 kg — 48 lb — comfortably parcel. Six hundred pieces is about 290 lb, which is LTL territory.
That crossover matters: parcel pricing is per-package with a per-pound rate, while LTL is priced on weight, class and lane, plus accessorials. The per-piece freight cost can fall by a third when a shipment crosses into LTL.
- 100 pcs ≈ 48 lb — parcel.
- 300 pcs ≈ 145 lb — at the parcel/LTL boundary.
- 600 pcs ≈ 290 lb — LTL, usually cheaper per piece.
What a zone table actually measures
Ground rates are quoted by zone, and the zone is set by the distance between the origin warehouse and the destination ZIP — not by the state. Two shipments to the same state can be in different zones.
This is why a supplier with one warehouse cannot promise the same transit everywhere, and why a supplier with two can halve it: the closer coast wins.
The accessorials nobody quotes
Residential delivery, liftgate, inside delivery, appointment windows and re-delivery fees are all charged on top. A warehouse without a dock needs liftgate; a retail store with limited hours needs an appointment.
These can add $75–200 to an LTL shipment, which on a 600-piece order is $0.13–0.33 per shirt — small per piece, but it is not in the quote.
When US stock beats shipping from China
Compare landed cost, not unit price. A China shipment at $2.85 FOB with duty and freight can land at $5.00; US stock at $3.70 plus $0.45 of domestic freight lands at $4.15 and arrives in days.
US stock also carries no duty risk, no customs delay and no broker fee. What it does not carry is the lowest possible per-piece cost at volume — above several thousand pieces, a direct production run still wins.
A worked example
One hundred 230gsm crews to Ohio: $370 of goods plus roughly $45 of ground freight — about $4.15 delivered per shirt. Six hundred pieces: $2,130 of goods plus roughly $150 of LTL freight — about $3.80 delivered.
The freight per piece falls from $0.45 to $0.25 as the shipment moves from parcel to LTL, which is a real saving that never appears in a per-piece price list.