ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, December 4, 1996 TAG: 9612040032
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B-6 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: MARKETPLACE
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS
AIRPORTS ADVISE travelers to mail those nicely wrapped presents, or else they might get opened at the airport.
In customary Christmas stories, Santa Claus throws toys for good little girls and boys in a sack, tosses the sack in the back of his sleigh and bounds away with a crack of his whip to make his rounds.
Local experts don't recommend Santa's methods for handling your own Christmas packages, however.
For one thing, you might wind up like the people who picked up some prettily wrapped packages from relatives in Roanoke that were not to be opened until Christmas and then headed to the airport.
When one of the packages was X-rayed, a staple gun inside raised the suspicions of airport security guards, and the nice wrapping had to be undone for an inspection before the travelers could catch their flight.
Wrapped packages always are subject to being searched before a traveler can board an aircraft, says Mark Courtney, a spokesman for Roanoke Regional Airport. The airport advises not wrapping presents until they reach their destination, Courtney said.
In fact, the airport's best advice to travelers is to send packages by the U.S. Postal Service or a commercial shipping company such as United Parcel Service or Federal Express, he said.
However, if people aren't careful and knowledgeable, other kinds of problems can lead to disappointment for the recipient. People can either prepare and ship packages themselves or use of a professional packaging and shipping service, which may greatly improve their chances of getting their presents to friends and relatives safely.
The biggest mistake people make is in under-packing their gifts and not realizing how roughly packages can be handled in transit, says Keith Myers of the Handle With Care Packaging Store on Brambleton Avenue. "Glasses from Wal-Mart wrapped in brown paper won't survive," he said.
Myers' business is one of a half dozen or so packaging and shipping services that can be found in the Roanoke Valley phone book.
One thing that people often don't realize, Myers said, is that they need to put ample packing material inside the fancily wrapped gift box itself as well as in the box that the wrapped gift will be shipped in.
Some things such as guns and alcohol should not be shipped at all, Myers said. Don't ship sand art, he advised. It doesn't hold up very well. Dried flowers and wreathes need extra-special care.
If you plan to ship a package by ground transportation, which is the least expensive way, and expect it to arrive on the West Coast before Christmas, you should mail it or get it to a commercial shipper before Dec. 11. If it's headed somewhere east of the Mississippi, get it on its way before Dec. 18, Myers said.
Myers' best advice on shipping by air is to send the package before Dec.21.
A variety of prices and services are available from the U.S. Postal Service and commercial shippers, Myers said. In general, prices for shipping by air run about double those for shipping by ground transportation, he said. For example, it will cost about $7 to $8 to send a 5-pound package from Roanoke to Atlanta by ground and roughly $15 to $16 to send it by air.
By using commercial trucking services such as Yellow Freight, Wilson or Overnight, shipping companies like Myers' also can deliver items that are considerably larger than the traditional Christmas package. Generally, those items can be delivered anywhere in the country within seven working days, Myers said.
He has shipped bicycles, motorcycles, rocking chairs, antiques, airplane parts, a stuffed two-headed calf and a 20-foot-long teddy bear, Myers said. Almost nothing nowadays is too unusual to ship, he said.
LENGTH: Medium: 72 linesby CNB