What US shipping service would you recommend for small items?

[goatparty.livejournal.com]

Hi there! I've recently made the jump to selling small polymer clay items on Etsy, but so far I've had to shell out $5.75 per box for flat rate priority mail shipping (I picked it because it comes with insurance and tracking). Since my items are only $10, I feel like raising shipping to flat-rate price would deter customers.

My questions to folks who sell similar items are:

1. What service do you use, and what does it cost?

2. Are both insurance and tracking an option for it?

In the meantime I'll be researching this myself, but I wanted to get more experienced artists' opinions on this as well.

Thanks!

Edit: Thank you for the replies!

Comments

[slyminera.livejournal.com]

I've actually run into a similar issue when sending out my packages. I make small, hand sewn plushies and started out at around 10$, but came to find that shipping them out was costing me half of my commission income.
I ended up raising my prices slightly to compensate, but it seems to have sent my business into a slump. Haven't had a commission for almost half a year now. :T
I don't go through a third-party selling site though, I advertise on DA and my Tumblr and take payments directly through Paypal.
So I'm also kind of curious if there's a better (cheaper) way.