We recently started a an Etsy account. Shipping prices are very high going to our local UPS store to ship. Does UPS have some kind of small business account that I can set up to get discounted rates for shipping? How does this work?

We're a custom packaging company serving restaurants and currently work with a warehouse provider that primarily uses UPS for shipping our products from their warehouse to our clients' locations. They offer us about a 50% discount on the standard UPS rates, but I believe we might get a better discount.

I'm curious, if we were to set up our own UPS account, how many boxes would we need to ship per week or month to achieve a discount of around 70-75%?

Additionally, considering we have clients across various states and operate warehouses in multiple locations, would it be possible to use a single UPS account to print shipping labels for packages going from different warehouses to various destinations?

And for international shipping w/ DDP, the rates are, on average, about $10more than FedEx for a similar class of service. I bring this up repeatedly during our many meetings and Teams calls, but when I ask "why does this service cost so much more than what literally anybody can get just by using Shopify or Shipstation, I get a company line about funding and either 7 or 15 day payment terms (frankly I forget).

It just seems really silly to waste the time of a company (We spend about $100,000 a year on shipping) when the rates are not even close. For a relationship with someone to solve problems, etc, I'd pay a bit more, but $4 more? No way.

I should add that some rates, like overnight are way better with my UPS account, and also some larger packages are also about 40% less than shipstation rates for ground. So, they apparently can discount rates. Why show me rates that are $4 more for the bulk of my orders? Are they hoping I won't notice? Do I get a kickback or something? LOL