Freight Shipping
Large, heavy items ship a little differently than the typical UPS or FedEx package delivered to your porch. Instead, they travel on a pallet with a freight carrier. If that's new to you, don't worry—we'll walk you through the process from the time your order ships until it arrives at your home.
1. We Ship It
You'll receive a tracking email once it leaves the warehouse. The delivery date on the carrier's website is when the shipment is scheduled to reach their local terminal — not your door. Actual delivery often gets scheduled while it’s in transit to your terminal.
2. The Carrier Calls You To Schedule
While your shipment is in transit, the carrier calls to set a delivery appointment — typically scheduled Monday through Friday. The delivery window provided varies by carrier. This is why we need an accurate phone number at checkout.
This call is the time to mention anything specific: gate codes, call ahead request or access considerations for a semi. If you need the shipment held at the terminal, let the carrier know during scheduling. Availability and any storage charges vary by carrier.
During busy stretches, an appointment can occasionally get bumped. It's a carrier capacity thing — if you run into any scheduling or delivery issues, let us know. We'll gladly work with the carrier to help resolve them whenever possible.
3. Delivery Day: Curbside, With A Liftgate
The truck has a liftgate to lower the pallet to the ground, and drivers use a pallet jack to move it. Officially, delivery is curbside at the end of your driveway. Some drivers may be willing to move the shipment a short distance beyond the curb if conditions allow, but that's entirely at the driver's discretion, not a guarantee. What they won't do is bring it inside, around back, or onto your patio. Plan on handling that last stretch yourself—a friend and a hand truck can make heavier items much easier to manage.
In rare cases, very large items — typically fire pits or fireplaces over 80" — may not fit on the liftgate, depending on the driver and local terminal's equipment. When that happens, a forklift may be needed on site to unload. We do our best to flag this in advance if it's a possibility for your order.
4. Inspect Before You Sign — This Is The Important One
This is the most important part of the delivery. Once you sign, you're telling the carrier the shipment arrived in good condition. So before you do:
Look it over carefully. Check the box and packaging for crushed corners, punctures, tears, or anything that looks off. The driver should give you time to inspect the external packaging.
If you see damage — even just to the packaging — do one of two things:
- Refuse the delivery. If the shipment arrives heavily damaged, you may refuse delivery. Then contact us so we can begin resolving the issue. Keep it, but write "damaged" on the delivery receipt before signing. Even if you decide to accept the shipment, noting the damage helps preserve the shipping claim and gives you time to fully inspect everything after the driver has left.
- Take photos before you move anything. Snap the pallet and packaging as it sits at delivery — especially anything that prompted you to note damaged on the delivery receipt. Photos of the shipment on the pallet, as delivered, is the best way to show that damage happened in transit, and they help us process the claim as efficiently as possible.
A clean signature on a shipment without noting damage lets the carrier off the hook — and makes it much harder for us to fix things for you. When in doubt, write it down.
5. Find A Problem After Delivery?
Sometimes damage hides inside intact packaging. Email photos to {contact_email} within 5 calendar days and we'll review everything with you and help determine the best path forward. Include shots of the packaging too — carriers want to see how it arrived, and the photos you took at delivery (see step 4) make these claims much easier to resolve.
