US Overseas Warehouse Shipping Precautions: Overlooked Details Raise Costs

On the track of cross-border e-commerce online competition, more and more sellers are choosing overseas warehouses in the United States as their front-end inventory base. Compared to cross-border direct mail, shipping from the United States can bring faster delivery times and higher buyer experience, but many sellers tend to overlook a problem in their operations: every operation in the warehouse is a significant cost. In the United States, labor costs are high, and a little carelessness may "swallow" profits by additional expenses.

Firstly, before shipping to the overseas warehouse in the United States, the product inspection must be done thoroughly.

Many sellers, in order to save time, send their suppliers' goods directly to the warehouse, but this carries certain risks. If the product has defects or the packaging is not secure, once the warehouse discovers the problem, it needs to be manually reprocessed.

The cost of operations such as changing packaging, re labeling, and even returning goods is much higher in the United States than in China. If the seller completes the testing and reinforcement in China in advance, they can avoid most of the additional expenses and reduce the risk of customer complaints.

Secondly, the number of SKUs should not be too large.

Many sellers like to "cast a wide net" in product selection, with dozens or even hundreds of SKUs packed in one container, which may seem like a rich selection, but in reality, management is complex. Having too many SKUs means that the warehouse needs to invest more effort in sorting, shelving, and inventory, and each step may trigger additional labor costs.

Even worse, complex SKUs can easily lead to picking errors in orders, which not only slows down shipping efficiency but may also cause performance evaluation issues on the platform. Reasonably streamlining SKUs and making inventory structure clearer is the key to reducing operating costs.

Thirdly, efforts should be made to minimize situations that may lead to secondary operations.

For example, some sellers do not have a unified standard when shipping, resulting in different sizes and packaging methods of goods. The warehouse has to split and package the orders again when processing them. Some sellers overlook the issue of labels and fail to print FBA labels or local logistics tracking numbers as required by the platform, resulting in additional labeling by the warehouse, which increases both time and cost.

Ultimately, standardization and standardized operations can make it smoother for overseas warehouses to receive goods and avoid high costs caused by "temporary handling".

Fourthly, to understand the positioning of the US overseas warehouse, it is to help sellers solve the "last mile" problem.

It itself is a tool for improving efficiency and optimizing costs, but if sellers are not prepared in advance, they may be backfired. After the goods arrive at the warehouse, every move, unpacking, labeling, and shelving requires payment, which is completely different from the labor-intensive and low-cost situation of domestic warehousing.

You should know that in the United States, even a simple unboxing inspection may cost the seller several dollars or even more. When developing a shipping plan, sellers may want to think in reverse: which tasks must be left to the US warehouse for completion? What operations can be processed in advance in China?

Generally speaking, packaging reinforcement, label printing, quality inspection, and SKU sorting are all completed domestically as much as possible. In this way, the US warehouse only needs to do the most basic unloading, shelving, and outbound operations, which saves time and money and makes operations more controllable.

Taijia Cloud Warehouse's US warehouse provides relatively complete supporting facilities in this regard. From unloading, counting, shelving, to order processing and local delivery, we follow high standard procedures to help sellers reduce unnecessary repetitive operations.

For sellers who are concerned about high labor costs, utilizing their quality inspection, labeling, and unpacking services in advance can establish a connection between domestic and overseas markets, avoiding additional expenses after arrival at the warehouse.

If the seller can pay more attention before delivery, handle the goods well, and cooperate with the appropriate overseas warehouse services, it can basically achieve the balance between timeliness and cost.