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April 13, 2010

Shipwire – Simplify Your Shipping

When you’re designing products and marketing them to consumers online, you don’t have time to waste picking out shipping materials, packaging your wares, and waiting in line at the post office to mail your sales out each day. Shipwire is an application that understands this, which is why the service partners up with both individual sellers and other online retailers to provide them with an easy way to store, package, and ship their products worldwide. Rather than handling shipping and packaging on your own, Shipwire takes the reigns and deals with all aspects of the order fulfillment process automatically.

Before Shipwire can begin handling your shipping needs, you’ll need to send the company a selection of your goods. Sign up for an account online, then send a parcel, pallet, or container of your merchandise to one of the company’s warehouses around the U.S. Once Shipwire receives your goods, you can go online and choose a set of preferred shipping options—whether that’s Ground, 1 Day, or 2 Day service. You can also decide how much of the order fulfillment process you really want Shipwire to handle, and whether you prefer to wrap your merchandise yourself or have Shipwire handle that aspect, as well. Thanks to its full integration with a number of online shopping cart companies, Shipwire receives notification whenever an order comes into your site and mails the merchandise as soon as the payment has been processed.

Retailers can take advantage of Shipwire’s comprehensive services for just a single monthly fee, plus the cost of shipping for any packages that were mailed. Meanwhile, client’s who choose the company’s “Pick and Pack” option don’t even need to pay for cartons and packaging supplies, since they’re included in the service price at no extra cost. For online retailers and sellers looking for a way to grow their business and satisfy more clients with quick processing and shipping, Shipwire is a cost-effective solution that is worth trying out.

Practical Uses:

  • Stop waiting in line at the post office to ship your merchandise
  • Spend more time designing and marketing products, and less time handling packaging and shipping
  • Get your products to customers more quickly
  • Save money on shipping supplies by utilizing Shipwire’s “Pick and Pack” service

Insider Tips:

  • Integrate Shipwire with your shopping cart system for increased automation
  • “Lick and Stick” option lets you send Shipwire your pre-packaged goods to be mailed out
  • Set up your Shipwire account to allow for phone orders, as well as online sales
  • Choose which warehouses to store your merchandise at based on where the bulk of your sales come from

What we liked:

  • Automatic shipment confirmation emails are sent to buyers
  • Using Shipwire saves retailers time, which can be better put to use designing new products
  • Multiple packaging options allow sellers to retain more control
  • Packages are sent from whichever warehouse is closest to the buyer, which reduces shipping costs and time

What we didn’t like:

  • Many businesses will need to upgrade to a more expensive custom plan in order to fulfill all their monthly orders, since the premium plan tops out at 60 shipments/returns per month

Alternatives:

Company Info:

  • Launched: July 2004
  • Privately Held
  • Headquarters: Sunnyvale, California
  • Founded by: Damon Schechter
  • Web site: http://www.shipwire.com

Costs:

  • Free trial
  • Plans start at $29.95/month

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