How To Reduce Packaging And Logistics Costs

As you run your business, you need to ensure that you reduce your costs as much as possible, without compromising the quality you provide to your customers.

For your products, you can’t just ship them out to your customers bare.

They need to have proper packaging so that your customers can already set their expectations about the product and build their excitement upon opening them.

Apart from looking for great packaging supplies for business, you also need to find out how you can reduce the cost to increase your income.

More importantly, you also need to look for ways to reduce your logistics costs as they don’t come cheap. With proper strategy, you can reduce the costs, all while providing an excellent service.

 

Consider Alternative Packaging Materials

You can dramatically reduce your packaging cost by switching to a cheaper alternative that functions just as well. If you’re selling non-fragile items, you might want to consider using a drawstring bag or biodegradable plastic zips instead of placing them inside a hard box.

This way, you can have a cheaper material option, while also reducing the cost of using bubble wraps since you need to ensure that the package arrives in mint condition.

If you can’t avoid using a box for your packaging, you might want to consider a cheaper option where it can still serve its purpose.

You might also want to go for a cheaper stuffing material, such as recycled paper, so you don’t have to purchase a new one, which people would just throw out in the trash. Ideally, you should create the perfect packaging that your customers can reuse.

 

Remove Unnecessary Items

If your packaging includes plenty of flyers, thank you notes, freebies, and other unnecessary items, you might want to cut them off your packaging layout. While they might be great for your marketing strategy, if you’re not generating more net income than expected, you might want to consider removing them instead.

Everyone loves to thank their customers for purchasing from their store. While printing out a card can be an added expense, you might want to consider printing the thank you note on the inside of the box.

This way, when your customers flip open the box, they’ll immediately read the thank you note, which may include a voucher code that they can use for their next purchase.

Moreover, if your packaging includes plenty of ribbons, fillers, wrappers, and other things, you might want to consider removing them. While they might be genuinely nice to look at, your customers would just throw them away, putting your money to waste.

 

Add Multifunctional Packaging

As you ship your items to your customers, there might be instances wherein they’ll be ordering more than one item.

While it can be tempting to pack them individually, you might want to consider having multifunctional packaging in which you can place more than one item inside a single container. This way, you can reduce costs and have a cheaper shipping fee due to lighter and smaller packaging sizes.

For your multifunctional packaging, try to keep the design as flexible as possible. Ideally, you should eliminate fixed sizes and allow the products to be interchangeable freely. You can choose to add fillers to prevent the items from bumping into each other instead.

 

Reduce Travel Times

If most of your customers are from a different state that you’re in, you might want to consider relocating your warehouse to a similar state so you can save on travel times and high logistic costs.

When you continue to ship your items from a different state, you’ll be spending more unnecessary shipping costs, which may not only allow you to spend more but can also delay your shipping date.

Ideally, it would be best to build your warehouse in a state where you have most of your customers. Alternatively, you could hire a fulfillment service in that area so you can save money with the shipping cost.

 

Consolidate Shipments

Most shipping companies provide discounts or promotions when you choose to ship items in bulk. While it would be great for your customer satisfaction to ship items daily, you might be spending more than you should.

One way to keep your spending down is to use portable shipping containers to help you move more stuff and also have less damaged goods. You can learn about one of the shipping providers I like on this website https://www.mobilemodularcontainers.com/

If you ship your products daily, you’ll be traveling to the logistics office back and forth, thus, spending plenty on gas and load. With this, you might want to ensure that every trip you take would be perfect.

If you only receive few orders a day, it would be great to have a shipping schedule, such that you ship out your products two to four times a week, depending on your sales.

 

Conclusion

When you run your business, you should focus on how much income you can generate as well.

If you’re selling plenty of products, but you’re not generating much income, it would be a great time to cut down on your unnecessary expenses. This way, you can earn more without compromising the quality of your products.

As you change your packaging, ensure that they still live with your branding while being functional. Moreover, try to reduce your logistics costs as much as possible by seizing every minute as their expenses aren’t cheap.