Pivot to Profit Week 2 Day 5: Organizing your Shipping

Big things are happening! You might be feeling just a *tad* overwhelmed with all of these organizational tasks this week...which I TOTALLY get. 

It’s a lot. 

If you had any of these pieces already nailed down then KUDOS to you, you are ahead of the pack! I personally am very good at having my space organized, not so good at having my business-y stuff (like systems) organized. I’m getting there, though!

I wanted to end this week’s challenge with something that you likely already have a plan for: organizing your shipping.

As you ramp up to the busy fall and holiday sales season, your shipping system needs to be running like a well-oiled machine. That means:

1. Having all of the shipping supplies that you might need on hand
2. Having all of these supplies corralled into the same place (a “shipping station” if you will
3. Having a “system” for packing your products that ensures consistency, quality, and the best possible user experience

When selling online, your shipping packaging is going to be the very first tangible thing your customer gets from you. Yes, they saw pictures of your products and liked them enough to order, but this package that will come in the mail will be the very first “real life” greeting they get from you.

Lets dive into this a little deeper. 

There is nothing worse than having an order (or 10) and realizing that you are out of one critical piece of your shipping packaging. You can get sales out the ears, but if you can’t ship them, you are in big trouble.

COVID has impacted every area of our lives and our businesses, and one way that it has impacted shipping is in the supply chain of the packaging itself. That means that the bubble mailers that used to come to you overnight might now take 3 weeks...or you have to overpay at Amazon or Target to buy a couple to squeak by.

I cannot recommend strongly enough ordering enough packaging supplies to last you through the holiday season. Shipping supplies don’t go bad or expire, so they won’t go to waste. 

Look back at last year’s sales, both online and at shows, and try to estimate how many of each item you will need (i.e., if last year you had 100 online sales between September and December, you can reasonably expect to have at least 100 online sales this year too. You would then estimate how many more you would expect this year, then order supplies based on that). 

Here is a list of some standard shipping supplies that you might need to support your rockstar-level online sales:

• Blank shipping labels
• Bubble mailers
• Bubble wrap/bags
• Business cards
• Ink or toner for your printer
• Interior packaging for the product: box/bag/envelope, etc
• Packing tape
• Paper for packing slips
• Shipping boxes
• Stickers
• Thank you cards 

Today’s Task:

Take a look at your shipping supplies and see what you might need. 

If you don’t have a shipping station already set up, see if maybe you can carve one out! A basket holding all of your supplies with a tray to work on is plenty: the point is to have everything at your fingertips so that packing & shipping is fast and easy. 

In the challenge workbook, there is a worksheet that will help you estimate how much packaging/shipping supplies you will need. Use this to figure out how much you need to order...then make sure you go ahead and get it all ordered! (psst: come on over to the group and let us know where you like to get our shipping supplies from and maybe you'll find some exciting new options too!)

If it’s not possible to order it all now, I suggest making a calendar task for yourself to order in stages as it becomes feasible. Trust me, you don’t want to be in a position where you are scrambling to ship when the holiday orders start to roll in!