Mixing Owned Inventory with Dropshipping Products

Shopify Discussion
1

Hello!

I launched my online clothing boutique last month where I own and hold my own inventory and manage all the shipping to my customers. I’ve been thinking about adding new products to my store that would be dropshipped so that I don’t have to store more inventory. I’m trying to figure out how it would work if/when customers place an order that contains both items that I will ship to them directly and items that are dropshipped…

  1. Are there 2 separate shipping charges? Does the customer see 2 different shipping charges or one combined price?

  2. Will the customer receive 2 different tracking links for their one order? How will confirmation/tracking information be displayed when ordering both in-house and dropshipped products in the same order?

  3. How can I note this accordingly in my shipping policy? Do I need separate policies?

  4. Can dropshipped products be returned? If so, can the customer return them to me (like they would with my regular in-house inventory) or would they have to be sent to the supplier?

Thank you in advance for any guidance you can give!

2

1. Are there 2 separate shipping charges? Does the customer see 2 different shipping charges or one combined price?

It’s up to you. You might want to use 2 separate shipping charges to make sure you’re not losing money on it. If your dropshipping service is a separate fulfillment service then that will probably be the default option. If not and you want to combine and ship on a single charge, you can request Shopify to change the settings in your shipping (I ran into this before with a client, they wanted to change it but the setting was not available in the normal settings).

2. Will the customer receive 2 different tracking links for their one order? How will confirmation/tracking information be displayed when ordering both in-house and dropshipped products in the same order?

If there are 2 different shipping locations then yes.

3. How can I note this accordingly in my shipping policy? Do I need separate policies?

However you would like. You can add text on a shipping page, cart page, product page, etc. Think of what makes sense to you and your team, try that, then as your customers provide feedback you can evolve it.

4. Can dropshipped products be returned? If so, can the customer return them to me (like they would with my regular in-house inventory) or would they have to be sent to the supplier?

Yes, you would decide your policy. Some dropshippers process returns, others do not, they are free to set their own policies of their business, just communicate with them to agree on what’s best for business.

Good luck on this project. My advice is to set up your system then do some test orders to make sure it functions how you want, then do some marketing, get customers, and get their feedback, then adjust and continue growing and improving your brand.

3

How do I add my drop shipper to my store to notify my customer when the item has shipped?