Merchandise Logistics
Selling merchandise is a leading market in ecommerce.
But not only do fans and customers want merchandise — they want it fast!
That’s why brands that sell merchandise partner with a logistics partner that enables fast fulfillment.
ShipBob is a premium merchandise logistics provider, offering the fulfillment infrastructure, best-in-class technology, data and analytics, and expertise and support to enable growth.
By partnering with ShipBob, merchandise brands can meet customer expectations by tapping into services and capabilities such as 2-day shipping, faster delivery speeds, and fulfillment automation to quickly scale.
Read on to learn how ShipBob can help you grow your business.
We love that ShipBob actually operates its fulfillment centers — they know their operations and they are very clear about it.ShipBob having multiple locations was also huge for us. Keeping our inventory in Chicago and Los Angeles has brought cost savings since we ship from the locations that are closest to the customer.
Lee Nania,
Founder of SubSubmarine
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What is merchandise logistics?
Merchandise order fulfillment refers to the managing an efficient supply chain that enables fast delivery. It involved receiving inventory, picking and packing, and shipping merchandise orders to customers and fans.
From CDs and signed posters to band t-shirts and hats, efficient and affordable merchandise fulfillment is an important part of building your brand.
Why choose ShipBob for merchandise logistics
If working with a 3PL seems like the right choice for your merchandise fulfillment, consider partnering with ShipBob.
ShipBob is a best-in-class merchandise logistics partner that offers simple, fast, and affordable retail fulfillment for ecommerce brands.
“Last time we shipped our own packages, it took us 3 weeks. It took ShipBob less than 2 days. I couldn’t wait to delegate this business over, because the stress level was through the roof. I am just so grateful for ShipBob.”
Andrea Hamilton, founder of The Finer Things 1920
Here is an overview of ShipBob’s merchandise logistics solutions:
Multiple distribution centers
Thanks to the internet and global communities, fans can be from around the world.
ShipBob offers a network of fulfillment centers, to help you strategically expand into new distribution locations based on where your customers are located.
This not only speeds up order delivery and reduces shipping costs, but it also helps mitigate risks in case of unexpected warehouse closures or inability of carriers to pick up from the facility due to bad weather.
Although online shopping allows access to your products from customers all over the globe, international fulfillment services present entirely new challenges. Different countries have various regulations, tariffs, taxes, and requirements for incoming shipments, making it difficult to navigate the international landscape.
ShipBob’s international locations are powered by the same 3PL software, which enables consistency throughout supply chain.
Optimized shipping strategy
By connecting your store(s) to ShipBob’s technology and splitting inventory across ShipBob’s network, you’re able to optimize your shipping strategy.
When an order is placed, ShipBob’s algorithm will send the order to the closest fulfillment center to automatically enable the fastest and most cost-effective shipping route. ShipBob also offers 2-day shipping options for qualified customers (depending on their location and the nearest fulfillment center), which offers affordable and fast shipping for customers.
Providing different ecommerce shipping options for your customers has been proven to reduce cart abandonment and improve average order value.
“Running a music label, order volume fluctuates as it is based on certain times when an album drops. We don’t have continuous promotions running, and months can go by before a new physical product is ready to sell. I also couldn’t get order volume discounts if I set up an account with DHL or FedEx on my own, which have steep minimums.”
Lee Nania, Founder of SubSubmarine
Streamlined data and analytics
As you expand into new channels, you will need to aggregate logistics data, which provides insights in the entire inbound and outbound logistics process.
Having full visibility into your supply chain helps to keep fulfillment logistics costs down, improve speed of deliveries, and consistently meet demand despite sales fluctuations.
With ShipBob’s free analytics and data reporting tool, you don’t need to juggle multiple spreadsheets anymore. ShipBob makes it easy to automatically track your orders and inventory and provide insights into fulfillment performance, shipping, future demand, logistics costs, and more.
Returns management
Returns are an unavoidable part of selling merchandise online. ShipBob helps ecommerce merchants automate the returns process, making a typically difficult process more simple and streamlined.
When a customer returns an order, ShipBob will process the return and restock or dispose of the item depending on your preferences. This makes the process easier for both you and your customers; you won’t have to handle returns in-house, and customers can easily track the status of their return shipment.
How ShipBob works
Getting started with ShipBob is simple.
Once you sync your online store to our technology, we help get you up and running quickly. As soon as we receive you inventory, the orders are automatically sent to the closest fulfillment center to the order’s destination to be picked, packed and shipped.
From the ShipBob dashboard, you can track inventory in real time, view order fulfillment and shipping insights, forecast demand, and much more.
Read on to learn more about how ShipBob works.
Distributed inventory
With ShipBob’s network of fulfillment centers, you can strategically split your inventory across our locations to get your products from point A to point B more quickly and affordably. Storing inventory near your customers helps reduce the shipping zones and costs associated with shipping orders to faraway destinations.
Distributed inventory also helps you stay competitive by offering fast shipping to your customers. When an order is placed, ShipBob’s algorithm automatically selects the warehouse and carrier that will give you the quickest turnaround at the best price. This strategy has helped our merchants bring 13% savings to their bottom line.
100% Coverage Across the Continental US
If you’re looking to expand into the United States, ShipBob has 2-Day Express Shipping that provides 100% coverage in the continental US from even just one fulfillment center.
You can also distribute your inventory across ShipBob’s fulfillment centers across all regions of the United States. We leave it up to you to decide where you want us to store your inventory.
Order management
At ShipBob, we track your orders from A to Z. Filter orders by status, search for specific orders, see a quick timeline view of where your order is in the fulfillment process (e.g. when an order is picked, packed, or shipped), easily find shipping-related information (e.g., weights, dimensions, or carrier service), and get a quick snapshot of any orders that require action.
With order management software for your direct-to-consumer and wholesale shipments, you can manage subscriptions, make changes to your orders post-purchase, map your store’s shipping options to ShipBob, and automatically share tracking information with your customers.
Inventory management
At ShipBob, we empower merchants to manage their inventory with the right tools and guidance. It’s easy to view the status of inventory and quantity on hand across locations at any point in time, identify slow-moving inventory with high storage costs, and gain insights into the performance of units sold over time by channel.
Our inventory management software helps you set reminders to proactively replenish inventory with reorder notifications, bundle your products for promotions, make inventory transfer requests, and much more.
Reporting and analytics
To provide you with visibility into our operations and performance, and also hold ourselves accountable, ShipBob’s free analytics tool is packed with charts to help you with everything from year-end reporting, to better supply chain decision-making.
Data can be a competitive advantage, and our reports show an analysis of which fulfillment centers you should stock, days of inventory left before you run out, impact of promotions on stock levels, each shipping method’s average cart value, shipping cost, and days in transit, your fulfillment cost per order, storage cost per unit, and much more.
End-to-end customer experience
We care about the customer experience as much as you and strive to be an extension of your team. From custom branded boxes to free plain packaging, ShipBob works with you to provide the unboxing experience you want. We also help you offer the fastest, most cost-effective shipping options to meet your customers’ expectations.
As soon as an order ships, tracking is pushed back to your store. We also offer return management services, allowing customers to generate return shipping labels and track returns, while getting your products processed and back into your available inventory as efficiently as possible.
How ShipBob improves your fulfillment and logistics
Save on fulfillment costs
Coffee creamer brand Prymal joined ShipBob in 2019 and was quickly able to save $8,000 per month on fulfillment costs, while at the same time achieving 4x growth.
Improve your conversion rate
Not only was BAKblade able to scale internationally by partnering with ShipBob, but they found adding 2-Day Shipping increased their conversions as well.
Store, ship, and grow internationally
Sunglasses brand Ombraz distributed their inventory across 3 fulfillment centers in two different countries. This has allowed them to ship to 55 countries on seven continents.
