Issue: A merchant needs the same SKU fulfilled by a 3PL with different delivery notes and packaging depending on the sales channel (two separate Shopify stores, “Shop A” and “Shop B”).
Current capability: Shopify’s custom fulfillment service assigns fulfillment per product and sends a “Fulfillment request” email to the 3PL with order details. It does not natively let the same product be fulfilled differently based on the order’s source channel.
Workarounds:
Edit the Fulfillment request notification separately in each store to include clear packaging/delivery-note instructions for the 3PL.
Limitation: This relies on the 3PL processing instructions from emails, which may be impractical.
Recommended solution: Build an app/integration with the 3PL to transmit orders from both stores with channel-specific flags/instructions. Referral to Shopify Experts for development.
Alternative tool: An OMS (Order Management System) like Orderbot claims built-in functionality to handle this scenario.
Key terms:
3PL: Third-party logistics provider that stores/ships goods.
Dropship: Supplier ships orders directly on behalf of the seller.
OMS: System that centralizes order routing and fulfillment rules.
Status: No native Shopify solution; options provided (email customization, custom app, or OMS). Discussion remains open.
I hope that the community is able to help me out. I have an own webshop and decided to let a 3PL take over the fulfillment. I also ship the same goods as “dropship” goods, i.e. I print a different deliver note and use a different shipping box.
The 3PL now told me that is not possible in Shopify. They said that there is no technical functionality to “attach” the correct deliver note in the order itself so that their system is not able to print a different delivery note.
If so, when you mark an item or complete order as fulfilled in your Shopify admin, the fulfillment service is sent an email with all the order information so that they can fulfill it for you. And because that service works by setting the products you want that 3PL service to fulfill, it wouldn’t be possible to specify when you sometimes want the same products to be fulfilled by different logistics. You can learn more about custom fulfillment services here.
If there is anything else I can help you with, please let me know.
I’m not sure if I understood everything correctly.
Let’s say I have two sales channels, “my” product in “my” shop, let’s call that shop “Shop A” and the same product in another shop, i.e. sales channel, which is not mine, let’s call it “Shop B”. Both shops are coincedently handled by the same 3PL.
Now a customer is placing an order in “Shop A”, all the data goes to the 3PL and he picks and packs my parcels and sets in on its way.
Now another customer is placing an order in “Shop B”, now the same 3PL should know that this time the exact same SKU should be shipped but with the box of the other shop/sales channel.
Is this possible with the custom fulfillment service? I would simply need some sort of “flag”
That makes more sense! Thanks for clarifying. What you could do is edit the ‘Fulfillment request’ notification in ‘Store A’ and ‘Store B’ to include explicit packaging instructions so that your 3PL can properly do that. This can be found in your admin > settings > notifications page.
So in that case the third-party fulfillment provider receives an E-Mail with the “instructions”? (Sorry if this is a stupid question)
It would be perfect it this information could be submitted via the order itself probably. My 3PL already mentioned that it is difficult to have a person sitting in front of a computer and check e-Mails manually…which I understand to some extent
Yeah I definitely agree, @User20 . The next step-up would be to create an app with your shipping provider that communicates the orders for both stores to their system.
I’m not formally trained in code to provide you with an exact solution to build an app. However, I’m confident one of our Shopify experts would be able to accomplish this at a reasonable price.
If there is anything else I can help you with, please let me know.
