I always encouraged my customers to provide feedback after their purchase. It gave potential customers a good feeling to see that others had a great experience shopping with us. So we’d get these feedback comments in after nearly every order, and more than anything, the comment that appeared in this feedback was how important the free shipping was to them. When I spoke with customers on the phone, it would almost always come up again about how our free shipping was what made them choose to shop with us. So in my personal opinion and from my own experience, I would suggest that most smaller drop ship merchants offer free shipping.

The wholesaler that you purchase from will almost always charge you to ship the item/s to your customer. I say almost since some will occasionally offer a free or reduced shipping promotion. But for the most part, if you’re going to offer free shipping, it means you’ll have to absorb the cost into your profit margin, therefore reducing said margin. There are several schools of thought on this, and no one way is the absolute right way. Experiment and see what works best for your customers.

Let’s assume you’re selling a piece of framed kid’s art and the wholesale cost is $30. The wholesaler charges you $15 to ship and the MSRP (Manufacturers Suggested Retail Price) for that item is $60. You can charge $60 plus $15 shipping for a total customer cost of $75, leaving you a profit of $30. Or, you could charge that same MSRP of $60 and offer free shipping, leaving you a profit of $15 since you’ll be eating the shipping cost. With the searching power of the Internet today, you’ll be hard pressed to compete with another online merchant who offers free shipping. You have to choose between fewer sales at a higher profit, or more sales with lower profit. Again, experiment and see what works. An easy way to track experiments within your online store is to create a specific category for items where you offer free shipping. Or maybe another category for items where you’ll offer free personalization. Pick only certain items to put in these categories and see what your customers do.

You’ll find that when I suggest a wholesaler in my Dropship Directory, I will usually speak to how their pricing and shipping is laid out. I absolutely LOVE when a wholesaler has provided me with exactly how much they’re going to charge me for shipping. Some will do this and it makes life so much easier on us, the merchants. You know that the sum of the wholesale price, the shipping charge and, if any, the dropship fee is going to be your total cost and you can price accordingly – no surprises.

However, there are a lot of wholesalers who provide you a price list with the wholesale cost of each item, and instead of a shipping charge, they give you shipping carton dimensions and weight. You are then required to input that weight and dimension data into UPS’s shipping calculator to find the shipping charge. But wait… UPS also wants to know where that shipment will be going before they’ll say how much they’ll charge. Unless you’ve found that crystal ball I’ve been hunting for, you won’t know where your future customers are from. So how can you price items on your site and be sure that you aren’t shooting yourself in the foot? Again, several schools of thought here, but what I  (actually my wife, Summer, did this) did was take the wholesalers spreadsheet and add a column for shipping cost. Then spot check about twenty percent of the items using the UPS shipping calculator. If your wholesaler is in North Carolina and that’s where the items will ship from, use a destination zip code far away, like California. Once you have about twenty percent completed, you will have a good average of what percentage to add to the wholesale price for shipping. Here is a very simple Shipping Price Calculator you are welcome to use. You simply input some price information and it will calculate the percentage for you. Then you have a good idea of how to price the remaining items. In the examples provided within the calculator, I would know to add about 26.91% to the wholesale price to cover shipping.

So try a few thing out. Experiment. Your customers that want your products won’t have the same buying habits that mine do. You’ll need to find out what makes your customers tick; whether that be promotional sales, free shipping, reduced shipping, etc.

Ping Services

You can opt to dropship, or buy in bulk lots. Either way the owner, Joy, is just that to work with… a pure Joy! She is professional, her products are unique and her prices are very fair for the quality your customers will get. Becoming an authorized retailer of Art 4 Kids couldn’t be easier. Just head on over to Art 4 Kids Wholesale Application to get started.

Shipping is typically via UPS and they package the banks very well, insuring safe delivery every time we’ve ever ordered from them. Wholesale orders can be placed online 24/7 or can be faxed/e-mailed in. If you have a retail store, or want to order in bulk, they offer a great package that includes reduced shipping, saving you money and adding to your profit margin.

You can register to become a Big Belly Bank retailer at: http://www.bbbankswholesale.com/

Levels Of Discovery lists all shipping costs up front for each item, so you always know what the total wholesale cost will be to you. They ship in stock items very quickly, and customer service is second-to-none. Overall, they are a perfect dropship supplier!

Levels Of Discovery can be found at their web site: www.LevelsOfDiscovery.com

Check out these amazing hand-painted step stools by Straight From The Harp. They are a family owned and operated company headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. Each step stool is built from solid wood, hand painted and personalized especially for children. They also offer other baby items.

The step stools are approximately 11″ in diameter, 7″ in height, and hold up to 150 pounds. They make excellent gifts for baby showers, birthdays, and Christmas! Items are completely customizable by your customers and Straight From The Harp can even match their decor with a completely custom design!

Straight From The Harp is great to work with! Eden Harp (the owner) makes pricing and shipping very easy and will personalize each step stool (included in wholesale price). She dropships directly to your customers and will even ship under your name. The margin between your wholesale price and MSRP leaves a comfortable profit margin… even if you want to absorb shipping and target the “Free Shipping” market. Straight From The Harp is highly recommended!

You can contact Eden at her MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/straightfromtheharp