🚚The delivery fee is the whole argument.

Thirteen and a half at 2 cu ft, eighteen at 1.5, twenty-seven at 1 cu ft, and thirty-six at ¾. It is the number that makes bagged material expensive: a $4.50 bag is a $60 yard, and the same mulch loose is often under $40.

Somewhere to put it. A bulk delivery is tipped in one heap on your driveway, and it has to be moved by wheelbarrow within a day or two before it stains the concrete and kills the grass. Bags can sit in the garage for a month.

Usually — you save the whole delivery fee — but check the payload. A cubic yard of mulch is about 700 lb and fine for a half-ton pickup; a cubic yard of topsoil is 2,200 lb and is not. Cubic yards to tons does that check.

Bags are sold by volume and settle in the bag, so a 2 cu ft bag delivers about 2 cu ft loose. Bulk is measured loose in the bucket and settles once tipped. In practice bulk delivers slightly more than the ticket says and bags slightly less — assume they are equal and you will be close.

Independent of the format. Bulk from a good yard is usually fresher and more consistent than a bag that has been on a pallet since March; bagged from a garden centre is more predictable and dyed products hold colour better in the bag. Neither format is inherently better material.

A one-cubic-yard tote sits in between: no tipping, no shovelling off the drive, and priced closer to bags than to loose material. It is worth pricing as a third option when the job is one to two yards.