Totally noob HMV question(s).

[enigma]

Alright, here's the deal.

I want to pick up some steelbooks from HMV. They ship to the states, but the shipping is outrageous. As in, I have four steelbooks in my cart and shipping is sitting at £18 ($28)! I'd actually be paying as much or more for shipping that three of the four items actually cost.

So my noob question: How do people stateside usually handle HMV transactions?

I actually added five of each title as an experiment and the shipping raised an even £4.50 per title, so that seems to eliminate the ability to group buy if reduced and/or free shipping isn't even available. So what option does that leave (besides forking over almost $30 for them to send four movies)?

In comparison, Amazon.co.uk will ship me four copies of Batman Begins/The Dark Knight Limited Edition Steelbook for about 1/3 of what HMV is charging (and I could actually get Amazon's fastest shipping for only $10 more than what HMV is asking). Arrow Video doesn't even charge for shipping on orders over £49.99. So what's HMV's issue? I understand shipping overseas is more expensive. I have no problem with that. I'm not trying to get things dirt-cheap. I'm just trying to offset the cost a bit, because there's "more expensive" and then there's "HMV."

Sorry for the rant, as I'm sure this is nothing most of you don't already know, but I just don't get it. Blu-ray importing experts - please advise, my forum brethren!