Confused with Peaks shipping wax..

[pita4294]

So I ordered my first case of wax from peaks during the 25% UPS shipping code and I got it today...the 4625 was in this huge box, the slabs were broken apart crumbs everywhere. There is no indicator that this is actually my 4625. Normally wax comes in a box with the lot codes etc on it from BCN and TCS. I'm confused...is this how they normally ship their wax??? It almost looks like a straight paraffin wax to me not the normal creamy white 4625 but it hard to tell with so many crumbles everywhere!

[lmc]

I haven't bought a case of wax from Peak, but 10lb slabs come tightly wrapped and labeled. I know LS gives type and lot info on the cases so maybe call and ask them...they have excellent customer service.

[Chefmom]

I have a case of 4625 and yes, the slabs are sometimes broken when it arrives. Mine was damaged by UPS in shipping, but hey, it's just wax and I have to break the slabs up anyway.

The outside of the box has a white label with the LOT# and it is marked 4625. Peaks ships the cases of wax as they come from the IGI manufacturer. So if the wax is broken and crumbly then it could have happened when it was shipped to them.

When they ship an individual slab, they wrap it in a plastic bag, but the full cases ship out as they receive them.

Also, my 4625 isn't creamy at all, it is more opaque. It isn't like raw paraffin and translucent, but something in between.

I agree with Imc, Peak's has excellent customer service. ANY issue, give them a call. The few times I have had to call, or even type chat on the web-site I have been satisfied completely.

[pita4294]

Thanks for the replies. I sent customer service an email with a picture and questions. I looked on the box and the shipping tag there is no indicator of the lot # anywhere, order number on the address tag. I'm sure the crumbles everywhere have affected the whiteness I'm used to with 4625 but I have to say in still disappointed there was no padding in the box

[rjdaines]

That looks pretty bad and sends a message that the manufacturer doesn't care much for their product. Then again, maybe this is the industry standard for raw materials.

[Alan]

Hi Heather,

Based on the amount of space that I can see between the slabs and the carton walls, that doesn't look like the original carton. What that tells me is that something happened to it during transit and it was repackaged by UPS while in transit. Sometimes a case will get broken/ripped open during handling, and UPS will simply get another box and repackage it. When that happens, sometimes UPS notifies Peak, sometimes they do not.

While the original carton may or may not have the IGI logo as depicted on the product page (IGI has been doing less and less printing), it would've at least had markings on the outside of the carton indicating the type of wax. The original carton would've also had your name hand-written somewhere on the exterior, as an artifact of processing.

Cracked or broken slabs are not unusual for the harder waxes by the time they arrive to you, especially in cold weather where they get even more brittle. Cases are shipped in the same cartons provided by the manufacturer, with no added padding. The heavy cases are often dropped on the hard aluminum floors of the UPS trucks. While Peak doesn't treat cracked or broken slabs as a defect, since they are intended to be melted down anyway, I would be concerned about the amount of product that ultimately reached you. When cases break open, and are repackaged, UPS may not get all of it. If you can, get it on a scale. If there was a shortage, let our customer service team know. We will make it right for you. I'm sorry this happened to your case.

As far as the color, that looks about right for 4625. It does vary a bit in opacity from lot to lot, based mostly on the cooling conditions at the plant on the day that IGI happens to slab it. Faster cooling conditions equate to increased opacity, while slower cooling results in higher translucence of the slabs. Neither will play a role in the opacity of your finished candles, which will be dictated by your own cooling conditions.

If your other suppliers have found a practical way to pad cases, without causing the cost to go up significantly, let me know so that we can explore ways to better meet your expectations. We could double-box and add padding for instance, but that would cause the price of what is a wholesale raw material to rise by about 5%. And because that extra packaging will not affect the finished product, I'm just guessing that many candle makers would consider it an unnecessary expense, in an already tight market.

Kind regards,

Alan

Edited December 15, 2013 by Alan
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[pita4294]

Hi Alan,

Thank you for taking the time to read my post and most of all replying..

You are dead on..it was UPS! I weighed the wax, minus all the crumbs on the bottom of the box, and it's just a little over 52lbs. I would have never thought of any of that! That explains why it took 4 days to arrive which was another thing that threw me off, along with no invoice or the freebie fragrance oil I read about on the main page.. It all makes sense now!

Usually the cases of wax I've received are 6 slabs fit perfectly inside a box, I'm sure like your describing so there was never a need for padding. I only suggested it since it seemed as though six slabs of wax were to just tossed in a huge box and shipped out to me. By the way, I didn't mind too much that they were mostly broken up, saves me some "hammer time"

Thanks again for taking the time to reply and solving my confusion,

Heather

[doglvr]

I never considered that about UPS. Same thing happened to me last week only with a wax order from CS. They came broken up and no sheet or anything telling me it's what I ordered. In fact it was so frozen, it didn't look anything like "my" wax and I thought it was something different until it thawed and softened. Explains why my one FO came a week later in the mail! I didn't think to weigh it though.

[Michdj]

IMO UPS wouldn't have to do this if suppliers would start using double-corrugated boxes that fit more tightly around the wax slabs. There are some suppliers who do this and the wax arrives in perfect shape, as it didn't have the room to slide around, knocking against the sides and ripping the box. A thicker box also reduces the chance that the sides rip and cause UPS the trouble in the first place. I've received boxes from some suppliers that use single-corrugated boxes that are barely holding together by the time they arrive to me, or they only tape the bottom of the box with one pass of tape and the box is falling open. If a quality job is done at the supplier's end, it doesn't arrive in such a mess. This should be considered when one considers "customer service" from a supplier.

[Alan]

Update: We looked at the cost of repackaging all of IGI's waxes, after manufacturing. It would add about $3 to each case of wax, and might spare the loss of about 1 in 200 cases. In my mind, that's not real cost-effective. I believe it could be done much more cost-effectively, if it were done at the time of manufacturing, replacing the single wall corrugated with a higher quality double-wall construction. So, that is what we are looking into. We have a dialog going with IGI about getting the wax packaged into double-wall corrugated at the time of manufacturing. Hopefully we'll have some good news shortly.