Auto-Send WooCommerce Fedex Labels to Multiple Vendors

In this article, we will introduce you to a simple solution that will streamline the entire shipping process for both the store owner and the vendors. You will see how the WooCommerce Shipping plugin for FedEx along with the Multi-vendor addon can automatically send the FedEx shipping labels to your respective vendors.


Why having multiple vendors is considered healthy?

Maintaining products from different vendors on an online store can be troublesome for some store owners. To avoid the hassle many store owners opt for a multi-vendor marketplace that can hold products from other vendors. They benefit from a reduced workload burden and allow multiple vendors to manage their products by themselves.

In return, the store owners can choose to pay a commission for each product sold to cover the surplus costs. Another benefit of introducing products from different vendors is that it will make your store popular with your customers.


Multiple-vendor shipping solution for your WooCommerce

Many WooCommerce store owners find it difficult to manage multiple vendor products. The WooCommerce Shipping plugin for FedEx, for instance, allows store owners to ship their products via various FedEx services. But the struggle comes when the shop owner has to ship and print the shipping labels for the orders that contain the multi-vendor products.

And because of this limitation, the entire shipping process proves to be rather time-consuming. So, the question arises- how would you simplify this process?


Setting up multiple vendors on your WooCommerce

The process is quite simple. You need to install a multi-vendor plugin that will allow you to add multiple vendors to your WooCommerce store. In this article, we are taking the example of the WooCommerce Product Vendors plugin. You can follow the steps given in the following document in order to set up vendors on your store.

vendor

Note– While setting up the vendors you need to make sure that you have entered the correct email addresses of your vendors.

After setting up the vendors you have to give them the vendor rights. Doing this will allows them to manage their products on their own. Now, you would need to install the Multi-Vendor Add-On on your WooCommerce (contact customer support to get the add-on) and as soon as you open the settings page you will find the following page.

multi-vendor

In the settings page, you have two rate options that will allow you to split the products listed in the Cart/Checkout page. If you choose the first option, i.e Split and sum, then the rate would be shown as the sum of the individual shipping costs of the products in the Cart.


Checking out the Cart page

Now, if you choose the Split and separate option then the prices would be shown separately. Please note, we are using the FedEx Express Saver service which is the cheapest service after FedEx Ground. Refer to the image of the Cart page shown below.

shipping rates

After completing the above steps, you have to go to the FedEx plugin settings page and choose the Ship From Address Preference as the Vendor address. This will allow the plugin to select the respective vendor addresses and the shipping rates will be calculated based on these addresses.


The Role of Multi-Vendor Add-On Plugin

As you can see in the video, the Cart page is split into two sections and each section will show the relevant FedEx shipping rates. Customers can further choose the necessary shipping service for each product.

If you remember from the previous section, there are two rate options in the Multi-Vendor Add-On plugin. And in the video, we have shown the Cart page using the Spit and Separate option.

Now, if we choose the other option, i.e Split and sum, then the Cart/Checkout page would look something like the below screenshot.

fedex rates

If you compare the rates on the Edit Order page as shown in the video, you would find that $46.16 is the sum of $18.51 and $27.65. These are the individual shipping rates of the products in the cart. You can refer to the image given below.

order details


Sending FedEx shipping labels to vendors automatically

As soon as you receive the order containing the multi-vendor products, you can go ahead and generate the packages. Please note that if you are manually generating the shipments then you can choose the shipping service before creating the shipments.

This is useful when your vendor requests you to change the shipping service. Another good thing about manually creating the shipment is that you can add extra packages, if necessary.

The moment you will create the shipment, the plugin will automatically select the email addresses of the different product vendors and will send the FedEx shipping labels to them. In the video, you can clearly see that Vendor 101 receives the shipping label stating New York as the Origin address. Similarly, the shipping label for Vendor 2 states the origin address as Los Angeles.

However, the store owner will have access to both shipping labels. He or she can print FedEx shipping labels again if the situation demands. You can check out the following shipping labels generated by the FedEx Shipping plugin along with the help of the Multi-Vendor Add-On.

FedEx shipping label 1

vendor shipping label

FedEx shipping label 2

fedex shipping labels

Apart from automatically sending the shipping labels to the vendors, there are other benefits as well. If you provide admin access to your vendors then they can print the shipping labels themselves.

This is another way to save time and be more productive in your WooCommerce store. But doing this comes along with the risk of privacy and confidentiality of your store’s sensitive information. So, if you trust your vendors then you can avail the benefits of this using this shortcut.


Generating and printing FedEx shipping labels in Shopify

With the help of Shopify FedEx Appyou can generate and print shipping labels directly from your Shopify store. The App allows you to show live FedEx shipping estimates, print shipping labels, schedule FedEx pickup, and much more. You can know about this App on the Shopify FedEx page.

You can print shipping labels in various different sizes and image types. For instance, to let the App download the FedEx shipping labels in ZPLII format with the shipping label size of 4×6 for thermal printers. You have the option to define these settings under the Labels section as shown below.

zebra-thermal-printer

FedEx shipping labels would be generated automatically as soon as you click on the Auto-Generate Label option. If you don’t want to use the automated shipping label generation, then you can click on Generate Label option and experience the complete shipment process.

fedex-auto-generate-label

Once you do that, you should be able to print the shipping labels. Please mind that the shipping labels would be downloaded based on the type of image format you’ve selected. Here’s a sample FedEx shipping label generated in PNG format.

ship frozen

To know more about the Shopify FedEx App, check out its product page. You have many amazing features like real-time FedEx shipping estimate, bulk label generation, FedEx shipment tracking, and much more!


Conclusion

Using multiple vendor products is good for the sales of both store owners and vendors. Shop owners can pay commissions to the vendors for each product they sell. Moreover, it resolves quite a lot of issue of product management as the vendors are responsible for that. We saw how WooCommerce Shipping plugin for FedEx helps store owners handle multiple-vendor shipping scenarios and send shipping labels with no problem.

We hope this article would have helped you in some way. If you have any issues regarding the plugin or the Add-On, feel free to comment down below. You can also contact our customer support for further help.