You're right, I could have just eaten the damage and moved on. It's hard for me to get my head around that you buy something new, it shows up damaged, that such is an OK outcome. That's not what I do when I ship to my customers, even if I have to cover the entire cost of the shipment.
I can sue for damage to the ski. I didn't want to be in a position where I had to litigate on it and explain why I was rejecting a "full refund". Had they given me a chance to return it when it showed up damaged, that would have been a very reasonable outcome... I'd be totally OK with that.
The shipper IS liable, but they're not liable to me. Their contract with with Heinen's. Had I arranged the shipping myself, it would be between me and the shipper. Heinens provided the shipping as a "service" so they could make a profit on it, which is fine.. But at that point, they're responsible for the service that they charged for.
As long as Heinen's was going after the shipper, I'd be fine with it and wouldn't complain. Instead, what happened was that they told me that they would file a claim. When I checked at 90 days, no claim had been filed. Heinen's has since said that my damage claim was "rejected" - but I never saw any paperwork to support that and based on the fact that no claim was filed after 90 days, I simply don't believe it.