Recently, I asked our contact at Gentle Giant what was up with shipping, and got the following response:
Thanks for getting in touch with us. Here’s the deal – in the case of the SDCC Exclusives it’s actually incredibly unlikely that they’re going to ship at the same time because we’ve got them coming from different manufacturing partners. Due to how the timing’s working out, we’re sending allocations of each piece directly to our pickup point in San Diego to have in stock at the con, while the balance of each editions are literally being sent via Slow Boat from China. That’s 5 different Slow Boats. Just knowing how this works logistically, I can all but guarantee that no two pieces will arrive at the same time. We’ll process them the moment they arrive in our warehouse.
Also regarding the fees, yes that is what it costs to pack and ship (even with our business discounts, etc. with UPS) and we’re actually charging customers less than what it costs us. We’re not making any money shipping these pieces to you guys – we’re actually taking it on the chin and losing money.
I know our transition is unpopular. It is what it is. Unfortunately, we’re faced with some serious logistical challenges on our end since the launch of our new site and the transition to our new shipping partner. After considering several options, this is the best method we could devise to address them.
That being said, we are watching things closely. Time will tell.
Best regards,
All that said, it does make a lot of sense, and I do know that many if not most companies out there use more than one vendor to produce items like that. As to why stores like EE or MWC can get them cheaper, it's no different than retail. They can order more (cases upon cases) of an item, so there's always a unit discount when ordering in that fashion.
