Starting an online store is the ambition of many, but few ever make it a reality – why? There are many reasons, but often concerns about the cost to get started, difficulty with inventory management and the complexities of shipping and customer service are at the core of it. A way does exist, however, for you to start selling beautiful customised homeware online without any of these stresses – that way is through drop-shipping.
Drop-shipping allows you to start your online store without inventory management or start-up capital being a concern. There has never been an easier way to begin selling your own customised products online than through a specialist drop-shipping partner, such as Printful. So whether it’s for interior decoration or brightening up a home’s exterior, it’s time to start thinking about 2020’s design trends and designing your own range of homeware!
How does it work?
Drop-shipping is a simple concept. You work with your partner to decide a range of home products you’d like to sell. Drop-shipping specialists offer a selection of “white label” products – which are blank products that you can customise to your own tastes.
You begin listing these products for sale through your own eCommerce store, such as Etsy or Shopify for example. When a customer buys something, the order is then transferred straight to your drop-shipping partner who will take care of the order for you.
That means they’ll print/customise the item as necessary in line with your designs, they will prepare it for shipping, and they will ship it. It’s as simple as that. The order is picked, packed, and shipped for you by your drop-shipping partner, and you get the credit.
What are the benefits?
The benefits are plentiful, which is why drop-shipping is becoming so popular. The first is that you don’t need to worry about start-up capital. Traditionally starting a business online meant you’d need to invest in purchasing inventory beforehand so you could sell it. That would require a considerable investment, often enough to put most people off.
With drop-shipping you don’t need any money up front. You pay your drop-shipping partner for their part of the service through a cut of the sales you make. So if you don’t sell anything, you don’t have to pay anything. That means you’re only ever re-investing from profit you’ve already made when you pay for the service, it’s not coming from your pocket.
Then there’s the ease of inventory, shipping, and customer services. Your drop-shipping partner will handle all of it for you. Forget about filling your home with stock, struggling with packaging safely for international delivery and spending half your day dealing with customers on the phone asking where their orders are. This is all handled on your behalf.
All you have to do is build your brand, customise your homeware items, and focus on driving customers to your website. That’s all it takes to build a successful homeware brand.
Thanks to drop-shipping there has never been a better time to start selling homeware online. Try it for yourself and see.