Has anyone ever used a shipping company other than the big 3? e.g. an independent carrier I searched through the forums and I didn't find any mention of people using services such as uship (made famous by the show shipping wars). Just for kicks I entered a box with dimensions and weight similar to what I usually send and found a price that was ~15% cheaper. While introducing additional risk on the reliability front it appears less likely a "package destroyed" notice would be given.
I haven't used them yet, but if you are your partner are close to a Greyhound station you can ship up to 50lb packages fairly cheaply, and they get there much quicker than UPS or FedEx. The only problem is you have to drop off and pick up at a Greyhound location.
I didn't know about this service from Greyhound. Reading up a little on it and looks like they ask that you leave your package opened for inspection: http://www.shipgreyhound.com/e/Pages/faq.aspx#Ship_Q17 Lots of prohibited articles, including beers of course: http://www.shipgreyhound.com/e/Pages/PackageTandC.aspx#articles
