Shyp: The service that picks up your items, packs, and sends them anywhere in the world using the lowest cost, most reliable option.
I’ve been shipping very often for a long time, but sometimes there are items that are harder to ship because you have to find the right box, bubble wrap, international customs forms… it gets expensive and it can get confusing if you don’t do it often. From finding the best/cheapest shipping method, to having to use weird shipping stores (especially if you’re in NYC) that charge you extra, and dealing with lines at the post office, most people just give up.
Shyp is an on demand shipping service in SF, NYC and Miami (Soon LA). Once you download the app, Shyp makes it so easy to ship an item or multiple items, just by taking a photo of what you’re shipping and entering the destination (international or domestic). A ‘Shyp Hero’ picks it up from your house within the hour (sometimes as fast as 15 minutes) and for $5 + shipping they pack and ship it for you. You can specify cost/speed of shipping in the app and see price estimates in real time.
It almost feels like magic being able to hand off an old Alarm clock you sold on eBay (I literally tested it out by selling an old, heavy iPhone alarm clock that I didn’t have a box or bubble wrap for) to a Shyp Hero, who places your item in an individual canvas bag before driving off into the night (Shyp will pick up items from 8am-8pm). Like Uber, you can track your Shyp Hero until they arrive for pick up; they then send notifications as your item is being packaged and shipped, with the total price and a tracking number. The four packages I’ve sent (including one to New Zealand) have arrived safely, with no issues.
So if you need a little extra help shipping and you don’t mind paying an extra $5 (which you’d probably spend anyway getting the right supplies if you don’t have any boxes or tape on hand) it’s a really amazingly helpful service. Also, I have had the same 'Shyp Hero’ pick up my packages three times; we high five now and I wonder what he thinks about my random packages.
Another great way to use it is returning online purchases. A lot of places like J.Crew, Amazon, etc will give you return labels but maybe at that point you’ve thrown the box away (recycled it I hope) or don’t find time to get to a drop off location or print out the label at home, so you never return your item. In this case you can request Shyp to pick up and package your item for $5 – but they will use your FREE return label to ship it for you. So if you have a lot of holiday returns and just can’t find time, I’d say it’s 100% a great service to help you get that all done. Read more about that here.
Shyp is currently available for pickups in San Francisco; New York City in Manhattan and Brooklyn (see coverage area); and in Miami and Miami Beach (see coverage area).
Click here to signup to get a FREE shipment to try it out (up to $30 value).
Please send me a tweet to @mattrubin if you end up using it and like it or have any other comments!
P.S. There’s always those reviews in the app store that say they never sent a package, lost things or used too expensive of shipping. I can only go off my experience and I’ve enjoyed it a lot for those moments I wanted a little extra convenience.