What's the best online store to sell live oysters for consumption?
September 13, 2013 11:34 AM Subscribe
Trying to let people order oysters online for home delivery. The trouble I'm running into is finding a system that can handle the special shipping requirements.
We only ship overnight via USPS and the costs are all over the place depending on the destination. Most places I'm finding want to charge a flat fee based on weight. I've got 'average' weights for the quantities we are selling and I need someplace that will take those weights and calculate an actual cost (realizing the weights vary so sometimes we'll be over and sometimes under...)
I tried setting up a store on Amazon but am running into problems with UPC requirements (I applied for an exemption...) but am still not sure their shipping system will do what I want. No way to test it until the exemption (hopefully) gets approved.
Willing to try pretty much anywhere.
We only ship overnight via USPS and the costs are all over the place depending on the destination. Most places I'm finding want to charge a flat fee based on weight. I've got 'average' weights for the quantities we are selling and I need someplace that will take those weights and calculate an actual cost (realizing the weights vary so sometimes we'll be over and sometimes under...)
I tried setting up a store on Amazon but am running into problems with UPC requirements (I applied for an exemption...) but am still not sure their shipping system will do what I want. No way to test it until the exemption (hopefully) gets approved.
Willing to try pretty much anywhere.
Yeah I'd definitely look into some of the extensions available for popular carts. What kind of cart are you looking for? Hosted like Shopify or Bigcommerce? Fully customizable like Magento?
posted by radioamy at 12:54 PM on September 13, 2013
posted by radioamy at 12:54 PM on September 13, 2013
Oh also I don't think Amazon is the best place for something like this. Amazon can be really ruthless to its sellers - high marketplace fees, etc. And they can terminate your account for any reason including a buyer dispute. I don't think people are going to Amazon to buy fresh oysters. :)
posted by radioamy at 12:55 PM on September 13, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by radioamy at 12:55 PM on September 13, 2013 [2 favorites]
I do not use Shopify but would if I could, they support the most feature rich API on the market.
Also, UPS/USPS/FedEx can/should supply you with an API for calculating shipping charges, this should be in realtime during the checkout process... you just have to implement it.
Agreed on the Amazon Marketplace not being the best bet... you can get your stuff into Google Shopper/marketplace easy enough with a spreadsheet upload....
posted by anthroprose at 3:07 PM on September 13, 2013
Also, UPS/USPS/FedEx can/should supply you with an API for calculating shipping charges, this should be in realtime during the checkout process... you just have to implement it.
Agreed on the Amazon Marketplace not being the best bet... you can get your stuff into Google Shopper/marketplace easy enough with a spreadsheet upload....
posted by anthroprose at 3:07 PM on September 13, 2013
anthroporose is right, Shopify has good APIs. Volusion not so much. Magento is pretty robust and has a lot of extensions as well.
posted by radioamy at 4:31 PM on September 13, 2013
posted by radioamy at 4:31 PM on September 13, 2013
Response by poster: Ended up going with shopify and so far so good. Having trouble getting shopify to display our 'negotiated' rates instead of the regular rates but I've got a trouble ticket in so we'll see. Thanks for the help!!!!
posted by one4themoment at 5:41 PM on September 17, 2013
posted by one4themoment at 5:41 PM on September 17, 2013
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by mathiu at 12:37 PM on September 13, 2013 [1 favorite]