What are your experiences with DropShipping?

I have always been interested but never actually done it... Please share your opinions on this

Cheers

A lot of my ebay sales are done this way, I haven't had any real problems and everything so far has gone smoothly, it is a great advantage for me as if the items are sent to me first this costs a lot in delivery and customs charges.

Can you explain what Dropshipping is please?

I was leaving this for someone else to answer, but no luck... Anyway

Dropshipping is when the supplier will ship straight to the buyer. This means that you dont need to hold stock and arrange post etc.

However, the problem with this is that you have to place trust with your supplier into sending on time etc. So a good relationship with the supplier is absolutely essential

Ok?

Thanks James,

Seems a bit risky to me.

Yes, it can be risky as essentially you are putting the companies reputation in the hands of someone else.

However saying that, if you do have a great supplier, it is possible to do it successfully, and it can cut costs down in a big way

i prefer good old fashioned wholesale goods and so it's in my hands not in some company unless someone has some recommentation i might consider

I agree JimJam, with dropshipping you are leaving 50% of the profits with the dropshipper. They can be good to get started, to put some cash on a side, but once you have enough cash it's profitable to stock products for the real profits. A 250sq ft storage space can cost as little as £100 per month (if not less) depending on location. Surely there is more than £100 (a lot more) in profits when buying wholesale.

We operate a Drop Shipping System, but unfortunately I find many people wanting to run a "Get Rich Quick" Scheme.

Although we deal with items down the lower scale of the market, I cannot get it through to some of the customers that by selling in bulk they will make more, than selling single items.

For example, we can sell toys at 63p each, these sell in the shops at £2-50 + but because the customer only wants one, we have to charge the Royal Mail Rate for Postage according to weight, plus the cost of additional materials such as Jiffy Bags etc. This in effect adds £1.25 to the price of the item making it £1.88 in total

Whereas selling in bulk we can give a discount firstly to the price of 59p per item plus throw in free mainland UK Delivery if they sell 72 items whether all the same or 72 different items, (all prices include Vat) A typical profit can be made in the region of £20 if the customer wanting things sent out on their behalf put better planning into operation :roll: :roll: