I was a little surprised by Rich Ingram's comments that shipping was
a major portion of the price of roll boxes, because I've recently
found, buying building materials from halfway across the country, that
truck shipping to be surprisingly cheap.  Then, of course, there is
all the incredibly cheap stuff that is shipped from China to the US
and then trucked across the country.  But then 'expensive' is in the
eye of the beholder.

Just for a laugh I went to FedEx freight and priced shipping a pallet
of approximately 3000 roll boxes across 600 miles, guessing the
weight is 500 pounds including the pallet.  At the absolute top dollar
retail rate the cost was $255, or less than a dime a box.  I'd expect
a negotiated discounted rate to be something like half that.  (Anyone
who ships regularly will have a much lower negotiated rate, and FedEx
almost certainly isn't the cheapest to start with.)

This, of course, doesn't help with delivering 20 or 50 boxes to a
customer where the price will probably go up by 10 times.

Cheers,
Roger Wiegand
http://www.carouselorgan.com/