Sending Items For Less Money

Have you started an online business where you are shipping items to customers? If so, you're likely wondering what you could be doing better to ship items to your customers. Here are some things to consider so that you can do the best job possible.

Have The Right Options On Hand

When it comes to shipping materials in the mail, you have two basic options that you can pick from. You can use a box or a padded mailer. Which one you use will really depend on the type of item that you are selling. If you use a padded mailer, you'll immediately notice that they are lightweight and are going to help reduce your shipping costs. They are also quite flexible with adjusting to very item sizes and weights as long as they can fit in the mailer. For example, if you are selling custom t-shirts online, an order of 1 or 5 shirts is going to use the exact same padded mailer, and you won't pay more than you have to due to the weight of the packaging. 

Boxes can work great as well if you have items that are a bit bigger, but keep in mind that you are going to need additional packaging material to fill the box and prevent your item from shifting around. This can add to your shipping costs due to needing bubble wrap or air pillows, but it may be the only option for bulky items. You'll also need a variety of boxes on hand to cover your inventory since you'll want to use the smallest box possible for every order. 

Know How To Charge For Shipping

Shipping is never free since someone always needs to pay for the item to get to them. This gives you two options for how to do it. Some people like to offer free shipping and simply raise the cost of the items that they are selling. This makes it feel like the shipping cost is free to the customer, but can make your items appear slightly more expensive if they are shopping around. This may work best for unique items, rather than items that you are reselling and people can compare the price of exact items in other stores.

The other option is to have the buyer pay for shipping. This can sometimes make customers not want to make a purchase due to being used to free shipping, which can be risky. The best compromise is to use free shipping once they reach a certain threshold of a final purchase price, which will then only slightly cut into your profits. 

To get prepared for shipping orders, reach out to a local shipping material supplier that offers products like mailers and boxes.