What free delivery actually costs
Delivery is never free; it is priced somewhere. Understanding where changes which offer is genuinely cheapest — and why a basket from three sellers arrives in three parcels.
"Free delivery" means the delivery cost has been moved, not removed. It is either inside the item price, funded by a minimum-order threshold, or absorbed as a cost of winning the sale.
Knowing which changes how you read an offer.
The three arrangements
Built into the price. The seller lists at $51.23 with free delivery instead of $45.24 plus $5.99. Identical economics, different presentation — and the free-delivery version wins buy boxes, because it looks cheaper on a landed-cost basis and is cheaper for a single item.
Threshold-funded. "Free over $50" is a basket-size incentive. It works on the seller's margin at that basket size, and it is why you have added a $12 item to reach $50 and saved $6.99.
Absorbed. Some sellers eat it to compete. This is real and usually temporary.
Why this matters for comparison
Once you compare on delivered cost, presentation stops mattering and the economics show through. An offer at $49.00 plus $5.99 delivery and one at $51.23 delivered are not close: the first costs $54.99 and the second $51.23.
The sticker ordering says the first is cheaper by $2.23. The delivered ordering says the second is cheaper by $3.76. Only one of those is the amount that leaves your account.
Three sellers, three parcels
If your basket spans three merchants, it ships as three parcels, from three warehouses, arriving on three days — and delivery is charged per parcel, not per item.
Two items from one seller travel together and are charged once. Adding a second item from a different seller adds that seller's delivery in full. That is why a cart grouped by seller is more honest than one flat list: it shows you what is actually being shipped.
It also means the cheapest way to add one small item is usually from a seller already in your basket.
What to actually do
- Compare on the delivered total. Always.
- Check the threshold before topping up. Adding $12 to save $7 is not a saving.
- Consolidate where you can. Same seller, one parcel, one delivery charge.
- Treat speed as part of the price. Next-day for two dollars more is often the better buy; nine-day delivery to save two dollars rarely is.
Delivery is not free. It is just quoted somewhere you were not looking.