I just place an order with Nancy's Notions for over $50.00 and the shipping was free. Not long ago I ordered from Connecting Threads, order over $50.00; the shipping was free. Then there have been times when I had a small order and the shipping was rather high, but there was a coupon for free shipping on the next order. I did notice that overnight shipping has really escalated in price across the board. Before I retired I worked a lot with shipping costs. A company that ships a lot usually has some discounted shipping costs and the more they ship the larger the discounts. Perhaps smaller companies are actually paying a lot for their shipping.