I'd be open to the idea that it gets harder and harder as more and more people jump on the bandwagon and think they can find a dropship company, set up a Shopify site and, Bob's your teapot, passive income.
Paul.
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Dropshipping is not a novelty - it has been around for quite some time, and it can be profitable, if done correctly. But it requires devotion, commitment, and determination. It requires you to be hands-on with your online store and the products that you sell. The good news is that in 2022, eCommerce sales are predicted to hit $40 billion. That’s a lot of potential profit with dropshipping.
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Like most businesses, most people starting up in dropshipping will fail. That is because many think all you need to do is list an item up for sale and make millions.
IMHO, you can make money, but it is much easier if you do it differently from the rest, find different suppliers who will dropshipping but are not known for it.
My wife used to sell a lot of shabby chic items, and I sourced several great companies to dropshipping items with, even huge king size beds, wardrobes, cast iron towel rails etc.
Once we had proved the concept I rented a warehouse and we arranged our own despatch and packaging, since couriers were causing a lot of damages.
IMHO, you can make money, but it is much easier if you do it differently from the rest, find different suppliers who will dropshipping but are not known for it.
My wife used to sell a lot of shabby chic items, and I sourced several great companies to dropshipping items with, even huge king size beds, wardrobes, cast iron towel rails etc.
Once we had proved the concept I rented a warehouse and we arranged our own despatch and packaging, since couriers were causing a lot of damages.
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I was working for a German company until 2001 when I had an accident and prepared to leave them after 20 years as I was no longer mobile. They suggested opening a website and they would dropship for me. Contract drawn up all good. Served all EU. Great.
Went well until they bought an English opposition who took over the UK part. Brexit cut off the EU - not because it was impossible but due to the intransigence of the UK director. Since then I've had nothing but hassles from the UK side.
Went well until they bought an English opposition who took over the UK part. Brexit cut off the EU - not because it was impossible but due to the intransigence of the UK director. Since then I've had nothing but hassles from the UK side.
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I've never done dropshipping before. I think its the worst way to ecommerce personally.
Dropshipping really works for hot trending products where the demand is so high that you can just set up a sort of fly by night website and sell the trending products off the back of social media ads.
I personally don't like that and I prefer to build a niche store that has everlasting demand year round, where stock doesn't perish, has repeat customer potential,thst has long term potential so once you've invest the time on your website, sales copy, photography, seo, social media profile etc. You can keep making money from your investment for years.
Dropshipping really works for hot trending products where the demand is so high that you can just set up a sort of fly by night website and sell the trending products off the back of social media ads.
I personally don't like that and I prefer to build a niche store that has everlasting demand year round, where stock doesn't perish, has repeat customer potential,thst has long term potential so once you've invest the time on your website, sales copy, photography, seo, social media profile etc. You can keep making money from your investment for years.
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brexit has been terrible for EU ecommerce.
For the UK, the EU is a huge potential market. For EU the UK is a small market. EU customers have stopped buying from UK stores because they've had bad experience with surprise customs charges or long delays and they're staying away from our stores.
Without even marketing to EU, our small .co.uk stores used to have 10-15% revenue from EU. Now it's less than 1%.
To keep that extra 10-15% you'd have to set up an EU branded site and sign up to IOSS and pay the full VAT in advance to the VAT rep. (I dont know if that VAT is reclaimable on your VAT return).
It's just too much extra work for 10-15% of sales. I haven't bothered with it myself. But I hear SMEs who can afford it have set up 3rd party logistics companies in Europe so they can dispatch their European orders from there.
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If you're dropshipping on alibaba, it's a completely different model, since you're competing with a bunch of other dropshippers (pretending to be manufacturers).
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Same as Alibaba.
If you want to run a dropshipping business your stock needs to be in the county where your customers live.
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Unless you have a huge marketing budget and massive catalogue of products. Wayfair for example. I believe they're a dropshipper with long lead times. Hasn't stopped them becoming huge.
Shein? Maybe not drop ship but all coming from China and takes a week or two.
Most furniture companies effectively drop ship from the factory now. Not many hold stock.
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