I am both a seller and a buyer. Please, SHOW THE BUYER EXACTLY HOW AN ORDER WILL SHIP. Telling someone that their purchase is shipping as "Standard" is just plain useless. Let people know how the item is shipping before they check out.
When you say how an order will ship, do you mean the carrier and the name of the carrier's shipping (like UPS Ground)?
I agree with you on the one hand that "standard" is a weird name for shipping, UPS Ground is "standard" but so is USPS Ground Advantage, and they have different delivery timeframes. I think they are trying to distinguish between standard and expedited, but a typical buyer may not understand all that.
When I order from Amazon, it just tells me a timeframe for delivery - some things come via UPS, some in an Amazon truck. Maybe the concept is "don't worry about who or how, you'll get a box on your doorstep by _____".
@liquidstarjewelry -- If you want your buyer to see the actually shipping service names, you have to use calculated shipping profiles ... then at checkout, it will show as whichever services you selected -- "Media Mail, First Class Mail, Parcel Select Ground, Priority Mail, Priority Mail Express, Standard Int'l, Priority Int'l, Priority Express Int'l" ... otherwise just by using manual rates, the service name are not shown at checkout. Wish I was in Kailua right now ... we just got hit with a major snow & ice storm ... so glad I was NOT in the 100 car pile up on the freeway!!!
Standard is often used because not everyone has access to Etsy labels. Therefore Etsy has no way of knowing how sellers in other countries are shipping their items. Standard gives leeway.
In calculated and I think even in fixed for the US, the buyer knows the shipping method for USPS. Not if the seller is using FedEx or UPS.
Honestly, very few companies actually tell what form of service used. Amazon can use USPS, their own delivery people or other services. A few others I buy from use UPS but they don't tell me. It just arrives by UPS.
Considering the state of affairs with shipping I think standard may be better for most sellers in the long run without having to designate which gives freedom to the seller to use a shipper that works for that particular order.
Think about it in terms of how YOU ship... standard is your usual method. The shipping profile would have the processing/est delivery time which is shown to the buyer. If you want buyers to know exactly how your standard shipping works, add an FAQ.