Gift Basket Dropshipping - Becoming a Dropshipper or a Dropshipping Vendor

Drop shipping is a unique business arrangement whereby a retailer or online store acts as an intermediary for a supplier or manufacturer by taking on the job of selling their products. The party responsible for marketing takes orders from end customers and forwards orders on to the supplier who then ships out the product in question to the end consumer. The intermediary takes payment and then forwards a predetermined amount on to the supplier after deducting their profit margin.

Dropshipping is popular in the gift basket business as it is a business that has predominantly gone online. The dropshipping concept works well online as customers are happy to view pictures before making a purchase rather than needing to inspect sample gift baskets physically. Vendors can display a full product range for sale on their websites without having to worry about storing or assembling any of these products.

Lets examine the dropshipping concept more carefully and look at some of the ways that businesses are putting it to good use in the gift basket industry.

Becoming a Gift Basket Dropshipping Supplier

The great thing about dropshipping is that it enables gift basket companies to focus only on certain aspects of the business if they want to. If your strengths are in sourcing supplies and assembling baskets then you could look at becoming a dropshipper and assembling a network of sellers to make sales for you.

Under this scenario you would never have to worry about marketing to the end consumer. Although you will still face competition and have to market yourself to sellers before they will agree to work with you. Competition among gift basket dropshippers is fierce. Your best approach is to start looking for sellers locally by searching online and identifying the websites that are getting the traffic.

To make your service attractive to dropshipping vendors you need to be reliable and trustworthy as well as offer a first class product line. Good communication between dropshipping suppliers and vendors is essential. If a supplier is out of stock or discontinues a product then they owe it to their vendors to let them know. Otherwise they will go ahead and sell these items and subsequently face an embarrassing situation where they have to tell their customer that they are out of stock.

Respect the fact that customers gained via dropshipping don't really belong to you as the supplier. Even though the dropshipping vendors that you work with will be sending you a name and address to deliver a gift basket to fulfill an order that doesn't necessarily mean that you can start contacting those customers directly. A dropshipper will usually agree to put the logo of the seller on the gift basket or packaging to give the customer the impression that the product has come from them.

Vendors will also be interested in your prices as they will want to add on a healthy margin and still be able to sell the gift basket at a competitive price. Expect sellers to want to make profit margins of up to 40% or more per sale.

Good drop shipping companies will offer their vendors as many tools as they can to help them with their marketing. Sellers will need professional looking photos and accurate product descriptions to display on their sites. Some dropshippers even go as far as offering vendors a premade website or online store that they can promote.

Becoming a Dropshipping Vendor

If you find that your strengths lie in marketing then you may decide to become a gift basket dropshipper. This allows you to simply focus on setting up a website, driving targeted traffic to it and making sales. All the headaches associated with sourcing supplies, storing them and gift basket creation can effectively be outsourced. You simply have to take orders, collect payments and then forward orders to the supplier.

Drop shipping vendors also benefit from this business model as they are paid cash up front. They essentially pay for the gift basket after receiving funds instead of having to pay for supplies before receiving an order.

Some gift basket businesses become dropshippers in order to diversify their product line. As a small company you may specialize in only a handful of different basket themes and styles. However if you really want to give customers the impression that you are a well established business offering a full variety of baskets or other gifts then you can easily tap into the product catalogue of a large gift basket dropshipper. You simply enter into a dropshipping arrangement with them and feature their products on your website.

The dropshipping industry is rife with scams so you must do your due diligence before deciding on a supplier to work with. You need to make sure that the supplier that you work with is reliable and has good quality products. After all, if the product is faulty or doesn't turn up then the customer will be looking to you for compensation. It is typical for the vendors address to be attached to the basket rather than the suppliers. If your supplier suddenly disappears then you can be left facing a lot of problems.

Many dropshippers charge a membership fee before they allow you to promote their products. Do some research online and you will also find that there are some dropshipping programs that are free to join.

It is also likely that a dropshipper will require their vendors to sign an agreement setting out the terms of their relationship. Always look into such an agreement carefully before you sign to ensure that you are not being ripped off or taken advantage of in any way.

Additional Articles -

How to Market Gift Baskets - Our Gift Basket Marketing Plan

How to Price Gift Baskets - A Gift Basket Pricing Strategy

Selling Gift Baskets to Corporate Clients

Gift Basket Advertising - How to Sell Gift Baskets

Gift Basket Business Cards