How Drop Shipping Can Help You Manage Your Inventory

By Author: Ann Hoskins
Total Articles: 30
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Drop shipping of wholesale merchandise occurs when a manufacturer or vendor of a product ships merchandise directly to the purchaser rather than to the retailer. The most experience Ive had with drop shipping comes in the furniture industry.

Depending on the vendor, many items can be drop shipped to customers, from throw pillows and small accessory pieces to large upholstery and case good (non-upholstered). Many vendors prefer not to drop ship items because it costs them more to ship items individually through various shipping companies like UPS and FedEx and depending on the retailer, there may be freight caps or other freight accommodations made as part of their contract and the added freight cost may not be able to be passed on to the retailer. Some companies have no problem drop shipping their merchandise and others still, will only drop ship because they ...
... do so much business in certain areas of the country that the additional cost isnt significant and they can use any shipper they choose, even the US Postal Service at very little cost.

The biggest reason the store I worked at drop shipped merchandise was because the client was planning to move out of our local area or some other unusual circumstances. We had customers that would order yardage of some of the custom order upholstery fabrics to either have draperies made or a piece they owned re-upholstered. Usually having the yardage brought to our warehouse when it's going to a customer for a project they are doing themselves would almost always guarantee that the customer didnt pick up the materials until they were ready to do the project, sometimes up to a month.

Having the ability to drop ship the materials would keep them out of our warehouse and off of our "open order" report. It would keep our staff from having to call the customer on a weekly basis waiting for them to pick up the items. Another reason many people would have items shipped is because they werent going to complete the project themselves. Customers would frequently have yardage drop shipped to their upholsterer, family friend that sews or seamstress in another town that makes custom draperies. No matter the circumstances, we were more than happy to ship their items without charging them the extra freight or shipping fees and, happy customers generally cause repeat business, and everyone can use more of that!


Ann Hoskins has been writing and publishing articles about wholesale and drop shipping. She is a business consultant and has been specializing in logistics management and shipping for more than 10 years.