Drop-shipping

Drop-shipping

• Why Use Contrado

  Fast. Efficient. Premium quality.

  Everything is made in our facility with 1-3 days turnaround time. Combine that with guaranteed 2-4 day delivery on a tracked service, and your products will get where they're going in no time. 
  
  Concerned about waste, carbon footprints, or questionable labor practices? We've taken all of these into consideration and established sustainable production practices that make you and the planet happy. 
  Check out our Sustainability page for more.
  
  Fed up with slow production, poor out of stock management, and complaints from customers? Our friendly customer service team and lightning fast turnaround will leave customers satisfied every time.
  
  Swap your products and fulfillment over to Contrado and make more, with less fuss, and much higher quality of service.

• How does it work?

  Contrado has been making retail quality on-demand products since 2002. All our products are made in-house in one facility, not scattered over fragmented fulfillment centers with different quality standards and wide print variation. Design any of our 450+ products using our user-friendly mockup generator. Connect your Shopify and Contrado accounts so that your customers can order your amazing products. We automatically receive the order details whenever someone buys from you. We then manufacture and fulfill your order. Your customer receives a tracked delivery with your beautiful designs, within days of ordering. Choose white labeling, or add your brand as the only branding your customers see.

  
  Currently we only offer store integration and drop-shipping for Shopify. If you use another e-commerce platform, we would love to hear from you; we plan to expand our offering in the near future.

• Getting Started

  Joining and getting started is simple.

  
  

  • If you are already registered with us, you are one step in the right direction. If not, fill out our drop-shipping sign up form
  • Create a Shopify account on the Shopify site, and if you have store there already even better.... you are just moments from getting your designs on sale.
  • Watch this video on how to set up

  We will guide you with all the support you need.

• Creating your Contrado store

  • It’s really easy to create products on the Contrado platform. Head to ‘My Stores’ within your account to get started

  • For a full guide on how to create a store and post products for sale, see our store guide 

  • Your new store will be set to Private by default. You can connect your store to your Shopify-Account, add products or collections, and manage your store info in private mode. Click the toggle to switch from a private to a public store. Public stores can be seen on our website if you'd like to start selling your products via our site as well

• Connecting your store

  • Locate the Contrado dropshipping page by clicking here.

  • Head to the Shopify website > sign up (if you haven't already) and open the Shopify App Store located in the left hand menu > Search for 'Contrado' and click on the text or icon > click 'Add app' > log in to your Contrado dropshipping account via Shopify > Click 'Sync'.

  Please note: Syncing your Contrado and Shopify store is only ever necessary once - when you connect both stores for the first time. Once you're connected, it's time to get creative.

• Can I connect multiple Contrado stores to my Shopify account, or vice versa?

  Unfortunately not at this time. We hope to provide this in the future, but for now, it's only one Contrado store and one Shopify account at a time. If you have multiple Contrado stores, you can link each one to a different Shopify account. But only one Contrado store can connect to one Shopify account.

• How do I manage my products?

  When connecting your Contrado and Shopify stores, you can choose whether you would like to manage uploading products, prices, and the name and description of your products via Contrado or Shopify. If you change your mind you can change the settings any time via the 'My Stores' tab in your account under 'Edit'.

  Publishing products & product updates
  Use the Auto-Publish feature to immediately publish any new Contrado products on your Shopify store. This also includes updates made to existing products.

  Product name & description
  Switch the toggle to Contrado to automatically use the product name and description on Contrado for products in your Shopify store as well. If needed you can still modify the details manually via Shopify.

  Pricing
  If you set pricing to be managed on Contrado, the set price you published on Contrado will also apply to your Shopify store. This can also still be modified manually via Shopify if necessary.

  Deleting products
  Deleting a product from your Contrado Store will also remove it from your Shopify store. On the other hand, if you delete a product from Shopify it will not delete from your Contrado store.

  Locations
  Use the Shopify 'Locations' feature to track where your inventory is coming from. To add Contrado as a location please use the name 'Contrado Imaging Ltd.' for accuracy.

• How do I make a profit?

  We want your relationship with Contrado to be profitable and easy.

  
  It is important that you enter your default billing address when opening a Drop-Shipping account with Contrado to ensure that we can process your order smoothly and without issues.
  
  Simple Example

  
  

  • Your customer places an order for an article on your online store for $35.00
  • You keep 20 – 40% (profit $7 – 14 according to our deal) and send production balance to Contrado to make your customer's order in 1 - 3 days
  • Customer receives product 2 – 4 days after production time, on tracked service

  How do the payments work?

  
  

  • A customer will place their order using your Shopify store. They will make payment directly to you.
  • Their order with shipping details will automatically be sent to us and a pre-order will be generated.
  • Once you are paid we simultaneously send you an email link so that you can send production payment to us to get the order produced. You can even set up auto-payments via PayPal to streamline this service. You’ll keep the profit on your side, only sending us the remaining balance for production.
  • We’ll start production immediately on receipt of funds and ship the order directly to your customer. We will not start production of the order until we have received payment in full. After 48 hours if the production balance is not paid a reminder is issued.

  
  How do I make profit?

  
  

  • Customer pays Retail Price + Shipping via Shopify
  • You pay Production Price + Shipping to Contrado to initiate production
  • You keep the profit (difference between your retail price our production price)

  
  How much profit will I make?

  
  At least 20% scaling to 40% on standard pricing, and even more if you use our custom pricing model. The more you sell the more profit you make. They need to be bought in one order to quality for a discount. For example, your customer buying 15 products in the same order will result in 25% profit for you, plus your mark up.

  
  

  • 1 - 10 products: 20% profit
  • 11 - 20 products: 25% profit
  • 21 - 50 products: 35% profit
  • 51+ products: 40% profit

  If you use your custom price setting tools in the Shopify settings to raise the price, then your profits increase further. You can set your product to have up to three times our retail price to give maximum uplift to your profits. With the premium price you charge for the product, you keep a greater margin.
  
  

  Items such as large furniture and suitcases do not count towards the above tiers, they are discounted at a flat rate due to the cost of shipping. You’ll receive 20% discount on an order of single and multiple items. You can contact us for a full list of these.

• How much is shipping?

  One of our great advantages is that we have tons of experience in packing, shipping, tracking parcels, and returns. With over a million packages sent since 2002, our experience will be your experience.

  The first thing to note is that we are very fast. That translates into great service and fast delivery to your customer. We know this to add value and peace of mind to your service.
  
  Our shipping prices are not a profit center, and we literally either ship at a loss (good news for you!) or pass on the same carrier costs we are charged.
  Set your own shipping rates via the shipping settings in your Shopify account to ensure you can ship worldwide. Create new shipping rates or copy the existing setting(s) to other locations if you prefer.
  

  
  We only use premium tracked services to guarantee delivery that provide tracking for you and your customer, and we pay customs duties to most countries for peace of mind. Let's look at two examples here:

  
  Shipping to a USA/CA Customer

  
  If you set your store up in USA or Canada, we only charge you what is effectively a local USA or Canadian delivery charge.

  
  We have Small, Medium, Large, Bulky and Huge price brackets.

  
  Let's say you sold one of our most popular products, a mens or ladies Bomber Jacket, to a Canadian address. We will charge you $11.50 and ship it with FedEx and it will be delivered in 2 - 3 days (after production 2 - 3 days time). It goes on tracked service meaning you can check it all the way from hub, depot, out on van to customer signature inc. re-delivery if out - all included in that price.

  
  

  Alternatively, say you sold a mens or ladies Bomber Jacket to a US address. We will charge you $13.13 (9.49 USD) and ship it with FedEx and it will be delivered in 2 - 3 days (after production 2 - 3 days time).

  
  We recommend you reflect this charge and level of service to your end customer. We will bill you this charge on top of the production cost when you initiate your order transaction.

  
  Shipping to a UK Customer

  
  If you set your store up in the UK, we only charge you for local UK delivery by Royal Mail or, if the package is larger, Fedex UK for example.

  
  We have Small, Medium, Large, Bulky and Huge price brackets.

  
  Let's say you sold a mens or ladies Bomber Jacket to a UK address. We will charge you $9.40 (5.50 GBP) and ship it with Royal Mail 24 Tracked and it will be delivered in 2 days (after production 2 - 3 days time). It goes on tracked service meaning you can check it all the way from RM depot, to customer signature inc. re-delivery if out - all included in that price.

  
  We recommend you reflect this charge and level of service to your end customer by setting this up in your Shopify settings. We will bill you this charge on top of the production cost when you initiate your order transaction.

  
  For more details on shipping costs, click here.

  
  

  Please note, that when shipping to military addresses (BFPO, BP, or PO among others) the item will be dispatched using Royal Mail, and your customer will need to pay any customs tax/duty charges.

• Can I set my own prices?

  Yes.

  Set pricing to Contrado mode and use our price slider when creating a product to raise price and profit margin. We start you off with a base recommended retail price which works really well, but use our pricing widget to set the price of your product higher where you think you have added value. This is great for earning extra profit if you have a great premium design that your customers are prepared to pay that bit extra for. This works especially well for limited editions and exclusive designs.

• Price changes

  On rare occasions, we’ll need to increase the price of a product due to circumstances outside our control (ie. inflation, unexpected delivery costs, etc.). Rest assured that if we resort to increasing a product’s price, it’s because we have exhausted all other options.

  Our top priority is providing the best quality product for the most reasonable price. Sometimes we encounter an unexpected situation and need to quickly adapt. This may involve changing couriers, sourcing new materials, or revising the way we make a product. We will try to cover as much of the extra cost as we can, but there might be a slight price rise to compensate for the changes.

  We don’t enjoy increasing product prices and avoid it as much as we possibly can. If you sell our products, we will make every effort to notify you of a price change so your business is not negatively affected.

  For Drop-Shipping Account holders, here are some tips if your store is affected by a price change:

  • If you manage pricing on our site, you don’t need to change anything as the price will automatically be updated in your store. You may want to consider communicating with customers if necessary.
  • If you manage pricing on your drop-shipping store, you will get an email from us with more details about the price change. Please review all of your drop-shipping prices in light of this change to ensure you’re still happy with your profit margins.
  • Increase your product’s price to match ours.
  • Leave your price as is if the change doesn’t impact your margins too much.
  • Split the cost by increasing both the product and delivery cost slightly to lessen the impact (you can do this in your drop-shipping platform’s settings).
  • Add lower-cost products to your store to balance your selection.
  • Add lower-cost options to your product if available.

• Where do you ship to?

  We ship worldwide, and are especially strong in Europe, USA, Canada, UK, Australia and Japan.

  We mainly use major brand carriers and premium tracked service to guarantee fast delivery. All deliveries go on premium service and arrive in 2 - 4 days in 94% of cases. You can see more about our delivery information here.

• How long does it take?

  We are fast. We have been doing this since 2002, so we have great systems and processes in place to make sure we execute your orders efficiently. We make everything in one facility so this means added efficiency in production times.

  
  Most of our wide range of products are made in 1 - 3 days. That is our production time and indicated in each product page.
  
  Once the product is made and quality checked, we send on a premium tracked delivery and this takes another 2 - 4 days.
  
  The fastest we can get things made and delivered is 3 days, the average is 4 - 5 days. In rare cases such as remote areas the delivery takes longer.

• Do you make in-house?

  Yes, we make everything in-house and have no outside 3rd party fullfillers. All our 450+ products are made here in our facility, not scattered over fragmented fulfillment centers with different quality standards, print variation, or disparate service levels. One in-house facility, one focus, one service.

  
  This allows you speedy, coordinated fulfillment to your customers with no compromise on quality. We provide dedicated uniform quality and the same print control across coordinated manufacturing. It also means 1 pack to customer instead of fragmented deliveries. Our in-house model provides fast production, centralized customer service for better service levels, as well as centralized out of stock management, plus coordinated delivery.

• Which eCommerce platforms can your Drop-Shipping app integrate with?

  Currently our interface is only compatible with Shopify.

• Can I add my own logo to products?

  Yes, you are able to add a brand name and logo using our branding section. You are also able to add a thank you message using the same link. The majority of our items (especially clothing) have an option within the design interface to add your own label and with any product you can incorporate your logo as part of your design. The only place on your packaging and dispatch notes that would show our information is the return label, to ensure that we meet our carrier requirements.

  Click here to see an example dispatch note.

• Which products do you drop-ship?

  We drop-ship all of our 450+ products. This gives you access to a huge range of cut & sew clothing for him & her in a range of sizes, shoes, fashion accessories for him & her, kids & babies range, bedding, blankets, cushions, kitchen and dinnerware, homeware, home decor, bathroom accessories, stationery, pet accessories, garden & outdoor items, as well as fabrics and leather. If you can find it on our website, you will be able to add it to your drop-shipping account (excluding other artist's designs). 

  You can even design hundreds of products at once using our Product Mockup Generator. When adding a product to your store, you’ll find it in the same page where you set prices and write descriptions. Simply click ‘Add’ to generate a product with the same design. Click ‘Review’ to ensure the design meets your expectations, and once you confirm, it’ll be added to your store.

  You can find more information on our product range here:

  
  
  • Cut & sew clothing for him & her in a range of sizes including plus sizes: t-shirts, dresses, skirts, shorts, pants, leggings, underwear, sleepwear, loungewear, swimwear, gym wear & more
  • Shoes
  • Fashion accessories for him & her incl. sunglasses, scarves, hats, socks, ties, etc.
  • Kids & baby range: t-shirt, leggings, blankets, sleeping bag, etc.
  • Bedding, blankets & cushions
  • Handbags, purses, wallets, phone cases
  • Kitchen & dining ware incl. coasters, plates, place mats, tea towels, mugs & cups
  • Homeware & home decor incl. lamps, curtains, blinds
  • Bathroom accessories
  • Stationery including calendars, planner, organizers, journals
  • Pet accessories
  • Fabrics & leather
  • Garden & outdoor items

• Do you manage out of stock items?

  Yes we do. Any item, size, or other product option that is currently out of stock on our own website will also show as out of stock on your site. Once the product is not out of stock any longer, it will be automatically available for purchase again on your end.

• How much does your service cost?

  It's free. We do not charge for the app or any subscription costs. The only time you pay us is when your customers place an order with you. You can see more on our pricing here.

• Which currencies does your Drop-Shipping support?

  We support all major currencies according to your home location.

  £GBP
  €Euro
  $USD
  $AUS
  $CA
  Yen JP
  SEK
  CNY
  $NZ
  INR
  
  When you connect your Shopify store, we take your local country and connect the local base currency. We accept all other currencies in transactions for your international orders. So for your listings you just set up in your local currency and then you can transact in all currencies worldwide.

• I’m already a Contrado Wholesaler, can I use your Drop-Shipping service?

  Yes. All you need to do to get started is to sign up using our drop-shipping form. You can find more information on our drop-shipping services and details on how to apply here.

• What is the minimum order quantity or value for Contrado Drop-Shipping?

  We have no minimum order quantities or order values. This applies across our site, from wholesale orders, to drop-shipping for your customers. The more that you order, the lower the price will be, thanks to our exclusive discount scheme (more on that here). Order as much or as little as you like.

• What are the recommended Shopify settings?

  Local currency, charge fair local price for shipping.

  Custom pricing - charge more where you think you have extra value and earn more.

• How to market your store

  This is big a question. You need a fair understanding of online promotion, how to write well with keywords and great descriptions of your products. That way some traffic and customers can find you. We provide help on that here.

  Above all else, you need to figure out how to get someone interested enough to visit you, then entice them over the line with an offer and bring them on a journey with your art or designs as part of your community. Offers, good service and great quality products from us will help you achieve this.

• Legals: Terms, Returns

  • Please take note of our Ts and Cs, shipping and returns policies
  • We want you and your customers to be happy with your orders, if you have any questions or if your customer has asked a question you can’t answer, get in touch with our customer service team
  • Once an order is placed, there is little or no opportunity to make changes to the order, please ensure products are as you want them before posting them for sale.