March 11, 2024 • 11 mins
Are shipping costs plundering your subscription box profits? Anchors aweigh, my friends, because we have charted a course to treasure! Today's episode is like finding a secret map to shipping efficiency. We're talking about PirateShip.com, a resource that's going to help you trim those sails on expenses and navigate the choppy waters of logistics. Get ready to hoist the Jolly Roger and let's set sail on the subscription box shipping adventure you never knew you needed! Too much pirate talk? 🤣 We couldn't help ourselves!
Resources mentioned:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
So you want to launch a subscription box and don't
know where to start?
Girl, you are in the rightplace.
I'm Julie Ball and I'm ReneeGonzalez, your host here at
Subscription Box Basics, apodcast for new and aspiring
subscription box entrepreneurswanting to avoid overwhelm.
So grab a coffee, some pen andpaper and let's have some fun.
(00:21):
Hey, and welcome back toSubscription Box Basics, julie
Ball here, your head coach, andtoday I want to tell you our
secret source for shipping.
Actually, let's be honest, it'sno secret.
Where we get our shipping andwho we love to recommend you get
your labels from is Pirateship.
(00:42):
Pirateshipcom is our favoritesoftware to buy postage for
subscription box businesses.
Again, no secret, but I'm notaffiliated with them.
I'm not getting any kickback,but I'm going to use this entire
episode to tell you a littlebit about Pirateship and why we
love them.
First of all, they are a freeshipping software.
(01:06):
It's web-based.
You don't need to download anyspecial software.
There are no fees, no markups,no hidden costs, so there's
legit zero risk to try it out.
And so I'm going to tell you alittle bit about them, some of
the things that I love, so thatyou give it a chance and I
(01:26):
really think that you'll besuper happy with this software.
It's going to save you money,it's going to make your life
easier.
So if you go to their website,the first thing you're going to
see is they are completelythemed with pirates.
Their customer service actuallyeven talks like pirates.
Yes, they're there to supportyou, but they're there to make
(01:47):
you laugh too, to just have alittle fun with what can be a
really challenging thing in yourbusiness.
By far, their customer serviceand support is one of our
favorite things, but also one ofthe things that really makes
them stand out from the rest.
They have a live chat sevendays a week, 14 hours a day,
(02:09):
except on holidays.
So there's no reason why youcan't get support between their
live chat, and they also havetons of support docs.
But I'm telling you, thissoftware is so freaking easy.
You'll be able to get set upwithout even using any of their
support docs.
Their founders have built dozensof subscription boxes and they
(02:31):
learned everything they couldabout shipping logistics along
the way and built this platformto make it easier for themselves
and for you.
So they use the power ofaggregation, so basically
bringing together the orders ofhundreds and thousands of other
small businesses to negotiatebetter rates for you with UPS
(02:54):
and USPS United States PostalService.
In fact, they say they can saveyou up to 89% off of the
standard rates.
If you went into a post officeor to a UPS store, you're going
to pay one rate that counterrate but if you buy your postage
through Pirate Ship, you'regetting these different tiers,
these commercial rates and evendeeper discounts than you'll
(03:17):
find on some of the othersoftwares.
What can you actually do in thissoftware?
You can create your labels,whether you're doing a single
label or whether you're doingbatch labels.
You can compare pricing.
So when you put in all of thedetails about where you're
shipping to, where you'reshipping from and the dimensions
and weight of your box or yourpolymail or whatever you're
(03:38):
shipping, you can compare thepricing based off of what's
cheapest and what's fastest.
Then you get to choose the typeof postage that you want that
is going to best fit your needs,and I love that.
You're going to be able totrack it from point A to point B
.
So basically, when you ship itto, when it arrives, it has
(03:59):
tracking inside the dashboardand you can also send tracking
emails out to your customers,which is great because that's
going to help you with yourcustomer service.
They're going to get an emailthat says your box has been
shipped.
It's been shipped with thisservice on this day and here's
(04:19):
the tracking information.
I love that.
I even customize that to haveyour brand voice and imagery, if
you'd like.
What's also really cool aboutthose tracking emails is that
you can pre-schedule them.
I did this all the time I wouldbuy my batch postage on a
certain day and I knew I neededtwo or three days to finish
(04:42):
packing before they wouldactually go out, so I could
schedule those tracking emailsto go out at a later date so
that they wouldn't sit in theirinbox without any movement of
the boxes.
So love that feature.
When you log in and you can goto your dashboard, you can get
reports, and what's really coolabout the reports is that you
(05:02):
can see exactly how much you'respending on postage and it's
actually going to give you anaverage as well for your batches
.
So that will help you whenyou're trying to predict your
cost based off of these averages.
If you know your average boxcosts you $9 to ship month after
(05:22):
month, you can predict that anduse that as a great data point
to figure out how much to chargeor how much shipping is going
to cost you when you sign up foryour free pirate ship account.
You're going to want to go aheadand do some customization so
you can do some presets.
For example, if you have thesame size box that goes out
(05:44):
every month, it's great.
You can just put that in as apreset.
You don't have to type in thedimensions every single month.
All things like that can saveyou time and streamline your
operations.
You can add your ship fromaddresses, so maybe that's your
home address if you ship fromhome.
That way you don't have to putthat in every single time and
(06:04):
it'll have accurate information.
You can have a return addressthat is different than what your
shipping address is.
So, for example, I had a returnaddress of my PO box because I
didn't want to put my homeaddress on the labels of every
single one of those boxes.
I just wanted that informationto be private.
So I used a PO box for myreturn address.
(06:27):
I remember when I first launchedmy subscription box I did a lot
of checks and balances becauseI was afraid that one software
wouldn't have the sameinformation as another software.
So, for example, I usedCratejoy at the time to run my
subscription box business, and Iused Pirate Ship to purchase
postage.
I would run reports and dochecks and balances to make sure
(06:48):
that I was shipping the rightstuff, but I found after a
couple months that theinformation absolutely was
accurate, and I stopped doingthose checks and balances
because I trusted in theintegration of the software, and
so what that means is, as neworders would come in through
Cratejoy, the integration that Ihad with Pirate Ship allowed
(07:10):
that data to be sent to PirateShip, and so I could then look
at my shipments in Pirate Ship.
I could filter by what batchthey were, where they were going
, what state they were going to,if I wanted to do that.
I didn't need to do that, ofcourse, but I'm just sharing
with you that you can do allthese filters to help you with
your batches.
(07:30):
Another example would be I rantwo separate batches for gift
orders and non-gift orders,because our gift orders had
additional information likemessages, gift messages and so
we could print that right out onour labels through Pirate Ship,
making it so much morestreamlined.
Now, when I'm talking aboutintegrations, I mentioned
(07:52):
Cratejoy, but listen, let meread this list of all the
integrations that you can use.
This is subscription boxsoftware and just general e-com
software.
So if you're selling inmultiple places, this is a great
place for you to funnel allyour orders in and just print
your postage in one place.
So you can upload a spreadsheetif you need to and that will
(08:17):
populate all the information.
You can print a batch from aspreadsheet.
Or these are the softwares thatPirate Ship already has
integrations with Shopify, subly, etsy, woocommerce, bigcommerce
, cratejoy, paypal, squarespace,ebay, chargeify and Big Cartel.
(08:39):
Now they add new softwares fromtime to time, so if I didn't
mention your software, you cancheck back later.
But honestly, this is going tobe such a time saver, such a
money saver for you and justmake shipping easy.
Yes, you can shipinternationally with Pirate Ship
(09:02):
.
Yes, you can bulk print yourbatches and if you're using USPS
, you can even print your scansheets from Pirate Ship.
And if you don't know what thatis a scan sheet, is it's going
to look at one batch and it'sgoing to put all of that
information into one code.
That say you have a hundredboxes, instead of the USPS
(09:22):
scanning each box individuallyto gather the data, they scan
your one code on your scan sheetfor that batch and it uploads
all the data, all of thetracking information, where it's
going, et cetera.
So it's really great,especially if you are scheduling
pickups at your house.
You can give the postal workerthe scan sheet and they will
(09:43):
really appreciate that theydon't have to scan every single
box separately.
So I know I've talked a lotabout the features.
I really encourage you to go topirateshipcom, check it out for
yourself.
Sign up.
It's free again.
No commitment, zero risk,because there's no monthly fees,
no markups, no hidden costs, no, nothing.
What do you have to lose?
I hope this quick episode wasreally helpful for you to see
(10:05):
what a great option Pirate Shipis for you, especially if you've
been scratching your headsaying, oh, where do I buy the
postage, or do I take this tothe desk at the post office?
No, you can buy the postageright on pirateshipcom.
Print it out from any printer.
You don't have to have a labelprinter.
You can print it out on regularpaper.
When I first launched my box, Iused a basic black and white
(10:28):
printer from Brother that wasthe brand name I think.
I probably got it at Staples orOffice Depot and then, as I
grew my box business, I investedin a thermal printer which
prints four by six labels forusing heat instead of ink, and
so I can put my Amazon link inthe show notes if you're
interested in buying yourself athermal printer.
(10:50):
I used a Rolo and I used a DymOfor Excel.
If given the choice, I wouldpick Rolo, but both of them are
really great.
That's it for today.
Now you know our shippingsecrets.
Go check it out atpirateshipcom and I'll see you
in the next episode.
Bye resin research you.
So you want to launch a subscription box and don't
know where to start?
Girl, you are in the rightplace.
I'm Julie Ball and I'm ReneeGonzalez, your host here at
Subscription Box Basics, apodcast for new and aspiring
subscription box entrepreneurswanting to avoid overwhelm.
So grab a coffee, some pen andpaper and let's have some fun.
(00:21):
Hey, and welcome back toSubscription Box Basics, julie
Ball here, your head coach, andtoday I want to tell you our
secret source for shipping.
Actually, let's be honest, it'sno secret.
Where we get our shipping andwho we love to recommend you get
your labels from is Pirateship.
(00:42):
Pirateshipcom is our favoritesoftware to buy postage for
subscription box businesses.
Again, no secret, but I'm notaffiliated with them.
I'm not getting any kickback,but I'm going to use this entire
episode to tell you a littlebit about Pirateship and why we
love them.
First of all, they are a freeshipping software.
(01:06):
It's web-based.
You don't need to download anyspecial software.
There are no fees, no markups,no hidden costs, so there's
legit zero risk to try it out.
And so I'm going to tell you alittle bit about them, some of
the things that I love, so thatyou give it a chance and I
(01:26):
really think that you'll besuper happy with this software.
It's going to save you money,it's going to make your life
easier.
So if you go to their website,the first thing you're going to
see is they are completelythemed with pirates.
Their customer service actuallyeven talks like pirates.
Yes, they're there to supportyou, but they're there to make
(01:47):
you laugh too, to just have alittle fun with what can be a
really challenging thing in yourbusiness.
By far, their customer serviceand support is one of our
favorite things, but also one ofthe things that really makes
them stand out from the rest.
They have a live chat sevendays a week, 14 hours a day,
(02:09):
except on holidays.
So there's no reason why youcan't get support between their
live chat, and they also havetons of support docs.
But I'm telling you, thissoftware is so freaking easy.
You'll be able to get set upwithout even using any of their
support docs.
Their founders have built dozensof subscription boxes and they
(02:31):
learned everything they couldabout shipping logistics along
the way and built this platformto make it easier for themselves
and for you.
So they use the power ofaggregation, so basically
bringing together the orders ofhundreds and thousands of other
small businesses to negotiatebetter rates for you with UPS
(02:54):
and USPS United States PostalService.
In fact, they say they can saveyou up to 89% off of the
standard rates.
If you went into a post officeor to a UPS store, you're going
to pay one rate that counterrate but if you buy your postage
through Pirate Ship, you'regetting these different tiers,
these commercial rates and evendeeper discounts than you'll
(03:17):
find on some of the othersoftwares.
What can you actually do in thissoftware?
You can create your labels,whether you're doing a single
label or whether you're doingbatch labels.
You can compare pricing.
So when you put in all of thedetails about where you're
shipping to, where you'reshipping from and the dimensions
and weight of your box or yourpolymail or whatever you're
(03:38):
shipping, you can compare thepricing based off of what's
cheapest and what's fastest.
Then you get to choose the typeof postage that you want that
is going to best fit your needs,and I love that.
You're going to be able totrack it from point A to point B
.
So basically, when you ship itto, when it arrives, it has
(03:59):
tracking inside the dashboardand you can also send tracking
emails out to your customers,which is great because that's
going to help you with yourcustomer service.
They're going to get an emailthat says your box has been
shipped.
It's been shipped with thisservice on this day and here's
(04:19):
the tracking information.
I love that.
I even customize that to haveyour brand voice and imagery, if
you'd like.
What's also really cool aboutthose tracking emails is that
you can pre-schedule them.
I did this all the time I wouldbuy my batch postage on a
certain day and I knew I neededtwo or three days to finish
(04:42):
packing before they wouldactually go out, so I could
schedule those tracking emailsto go out at a later date so
that they wouldn't sit in theirinbox without any movement of
the boxes.
So love that feature.
When you log in and you can goto your dashboard, you can get
reports, and what's really coolabout the reports is that you
(05:02):
can see exactly how much you'respending on postage and it's
actually going to give you anaverage as well for your batches
.
So that will help you whenyou're trying to predict your
cost based off of these averages.
If you know your average boxcosts you $9 to ship month after
(05:22):
month, you can predict that anduse that as a great data point
to figure out how much to chargeor how much shipping is going
to cost you when you sign up foryour free pirate ship account.
You're going to want to go aheadand do some customization so
you can do some presets.
For example, if you have thesame size box that goes out
(05:44):
every month, it's great.
You can just put that in as apreset.
You don't have to type in thedimensions every single month.
All things like that can saveyou time and streamline your
operations.
You can add your ship fromaddresses, so maybe that's your
home address if you ship fromhome.
That way you don't have to putthat in every single time and
(06:04):
it'll have accurate information.
You can have a return addressthat is different than what your
shipping address is.
So, for example, I had a returnaddress of my PO box because I
didn't want to put my homeaddress on the labels of every
single one of those boxes.
I just wanted that informationto be private.
So I used a PO box for myreturn address.
(06:27):
I remember when I first launchedmy subscription box I did a lot
of checks and balances becauseI was afraid that one software
wouldn't have the sameinformation as another software.
So, for example, I usedCratejoy at the time to run my
subscription box business, and Iused Pirate Ship to purchase
postage.
I would run reports and dochecks and balances to make sure
(06:48):
that I was shipping the rightstuff, but I found after a
couple months that theinformation absolutely was
accurate, and I stopped doingthose checks and balances
because I trusted in theintegration of the software, and
so what that means is, as neworders would come in through
Cratejoy, the integration that Ihad with Pirate Ship allowed
(07:10):
that data to be sent to PirateShip, and so I could then look
at my shipments in Pirate Ship.
I could filter by what batchthey were, where they were going
, what state they were going to,if I wanted to do that.
I didn't need to do that, ofcourse, but I'm just sharing
with you that you can do allthese filters to help you with
your batches.
(07:30):
Another example would be I rantwo separate batches for gift
orders and non-gift orders,because our gift orders had
additional information likemessages, gift messages and so
we could print that right out onour labels through Pirate Ship,
making it so much morestreamlined.
Now, when I'm talking aboutintegrations, I mentioned
(07:52):
Cratejoy, but listen, let meread this list of all the
integrations that you can use.
This is subscription boxsoftware and just general e-com
software.
So if you're selling inmultiple places, this is a great
place for you to funnel allyour orders in and just print
your postage in one place.
So you can upload a spreadsheetif you need to and that will
(08:17):
populate all the information.
You can print a batch from aspreadsheet.
Or these are the softwares thatPirate Ship already has
integrations with Shopify, subly, etsy, woocommerce, bigcommerce
, cratejoy, paypal, squarespace,ebay, chargeify and Big Cartel.
(08:39):
Now they add new softwares fromtime to time, so if I didn't
mention your software, you cancheck back later.
But honestly, this is going tobe such a time saver, such a
money saver for you and justmake shipping easy.
Yes, you can shipinternationally with Pirate Ship
(09:02):
.
Yes, you can bulk print yourbatches and if you're using USPS
, you can even print your scansheets from Pirate Ship.
And if you don't know what thatis a scan sheet, is it's going
to look at one batch and it'sgoing to put all of that
information into one code.
That say you have a hundredboxes, instead of the USPS
(09:22):
scanning each box individuallyto gather the data, they scan
your one code on your scan sheetfor that batch and it uploads
all the data, all of thetracking information, where it's
going, et cetera.
So it's really great,especially if you are scheduling
pickups at your house.
You can give the postal workerthe scan sheet and they will
(09:43):
really appreciate that theydon't have to scan every single
box separately.
So I know I've talked a lotabout the features.
I really encourage you to go topirateshipcom, check it out for
yourself.
Sign up.
It's free again.
No commitment, zero risk,because there's no monthly fees,
no markups, no hidden costs, no, nothing.
What do you have to lose?
I hope this quick episode wasreally helpful for you to see
(10:05):
what a great option Pirate Shipis for you, especially if you've
been scratching your headsaying, oh, where do I buy the
postage, or do I take this tothe desk at the post office?
No, you can buy the postageright on pirateshipcom.
Print it out from any printer.
You don't have to have a labelprinter.
You can print it out on regularpaper.
When I first launched my box, Iused a basic black and white
(10:28):
printer from Brother that wasthe brand name I think.
I probably got it at Staples orOffice Depot and then, as I
grew my box business, I investedin a thermal printer which
prints four by six labels forusing heat instead of ink, and
so I can put my Amazon link inthe show notes if you're
interested in buying yourself athermal printer.
(10:50):
I used a Rolo and I used a DymOfor Excel.
If given the choice, I wouldpick Rolo, but both of them are
really great.
That's it for today.
Now you know our shippingsecrets.
Go check it out atpirateshipcom and I'll see you
in the next episode.
Bye resin research you.
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