FedEx is a multinational company focusing on providing shipping, transportation, and printing services to businesses of all sizes. With FedEx, you can ship and track customers’ orders seamlessly and create a successful ecommerce operation.
With additional products in logistics, development, and cross-border solutions, FedEx ensures you can deliver your products to customers reliably and affordably. Let’s dive into the highlights and areas for improvement for this provider of ecommerce fulfillment services.
FedEx Fulfillment Compared
FedEx did not make it onto our top list of the best ecommerce fulfillment services, even though it is still a decent (and popular) option. ShipBob is, in our opinion, the best option for a wide range of business and web store owners because of its deeper order management features and express two-day shipping availability. Request a quote from ShipBob today for free.
- ShipBob – Best ecommerce fulfillment platform
- Red Stag Fulfillment – Best for high-value and large products
- ShipMonk – Best for subscription boxes
- Dot Foods – Best for food and beverage ecommerce
- Easyship – Best for international fulfillment
About FedEx Fulfillment
FedEx offers comprehensive ecommerce shipping and printing services for businesses of any size. Whether you need to reduce shipping costs, send out more packages each day, or give your customers a better turnaround time on their orders, FedEx aims to help you make the most of your ecommerce operation.
Alongside FedEx’s ecommerce fulfillment services, its other offerings include a design and print marketplace, compatible business software, a developer portal, logistics tools, and cross-border solutions.
FedEx Health and Stability
FedEx was founded in 1973 as a publicly traded company with its headquarters in Memphis, Tennessee. As a multinational corporation, FedEx has multiple investments, including two diversity investments, which raised more than $175 million. However, FedEx only has one main investor, which is Matrix Partners.
As of 2023, the FedEx corporation has more than 600,000 team members across all its global operating companies. With a 3.7-star rating on Glassdoor, most of FedEx’s employees are satisfied with its work-life balance, career growth opportunities, and salary.
FedEx Fulfillment Pricing
FedEx’s main price point involves shipping costs, which is calculated depending on global clearances, packaging, order size and weight, and other considerations.
FedEx Pricing Structure
There are a lot of variations in pricing across FedEx’s products and its shipping rates are based on several factors, including freight length, weight, fuel, and delivery area. That makes it hard to ballpark pricing for ecommerce fulfillment, since so much depends on what you’re shipping, where you’re shipping it, and any necessary extra considerations like delivery speed and insurance.
However, offerings like its printing services are more predictable. Printing services are priced on a number-per-order basis. For example, you can purchase 100 custom business cards for $10 or get 100 custom-printed ear-lock mailers for your products for $146.
FedEx Pricing Comparison
Most ecommerce fulfillment companies base their pricing on order weight and delivery area, just like FedEx does. For FedEx, if a shipment is greater than 12 feet, you will have to pay a starting fee of $600 per shipment, which increases to $1,200 for any order with a dimension of 20 feet or greater.
Compared to other ecommerce fulfillment services, FedEx is certainly pricier. For example, ShipMonk bases its pricing on how many orders you will ship per month, and prices start at $3.00 per order for 500 or fewer monthly orders. ShipMonk also has additional fees for promotional inserts, extra items, and return processing—but the fees start at just $0.20.
On the other hand, you can find fulfillment services that are even more affordable, such as Easyship. Easyship offers a full plan with 50 shipments per month and one team member entirely for free. Or, you can decide to pay a monthly price of $29 to get 500 shipments allowed per month.
FedEx Trials and Guarantees
FedEx doesn’t currently offer free trials of its services, but it does have a money-back guarantee on select FedEx services for domestic and export shipments.
FedEx Ecommerce Fulfillment Service Review
FedEx stands out for its massive reach and shipping capability, with ecommerce fulfillment service that can integrate with your business’s other software and ship your products across the entire globe.
You could benefit from FedEx’s ecommerce fulfillment platform if you are looking for a reliable service that can handle shipments to nearly anywhere in the world. If you want to scope out other excellent alternatives, check out our reviews of the best ecommerce fulfillment services.
What Makes FedEx Ecommerce Fulfillment Service Great
Seamless returns process: FedEx ensures that if your customers need to return a package, they can do so with ease. There are three options for returns, including dropping off a package at one of 60,000 Drop Box locations, showing a FedEx QR code to a retailer and receiving a printing label in an instant, or creating a shipping label through FedEx’s website. FedEx also offers support for all returns, such as professional packing assistance and in-person service at all FedEx locations.
Delivery manager: If you want to make the delivery experience easier for you and your customers, FedEx offers a delivery manager business toolkit that can help you do just that. The toolkit can offer support that will help you save money by reducing the potential for missing shipment claims, ensuring more packages are delivered on time, and offering automatic delivery notifications, including photographic proof of delivery.
FedEx rewards: FedEx offers a comprehensive yet flexible rewards program that can help small business owners save money. New members can receive monthly bonus offers, earn rewards from big retailers, or request a refund or credit if a FedEx shipment arrives late. According to the FedEx website, you can save up to 40% on FedEx Express, 40% on delivery area surcharges, 20% on FedEx Ground services, and 70% on FedEx Freight services.
Global services: With FedEx’s international shipping assistance and global trade manager, you can make international shipping a breeze. The shipping assistant allows you to tell FedEx about your shipment and then receive shipment information so you can start shipping immediately. Its global trade manager is an online tool that can help you find international documents, estimate duties and taxes, and find shipping advisories and country and territory profiles.
Extensive integrations: You can easily integrate FedEx into your other ecommerce software through its developer portal, which allows you to access APIs, try out different APIs, and support your global presence. FedEx plays nicely with most major ecommerce platforms, accounting software, and even more intricate tools like CRMs.
Where FedEx Ecommerce Fulfillment Service Falls Short
Slow delivery: Unfortunately, despite FedEx’s efforts to market itself as a fast delivery service, many reviewers would say otherwise. The main problem is scale. FedEx handles so many parcels every day that there is a wide variation in the quality of fulfillment in terms of on-time deliveries and accurate delivery estimates. It’s just a little harder to ensure that the fulfillment benefits you’re promising customers are actually met during shipping, while other providers can more assuredly guarantee delivery by a certain date.
Unpredictable pricing: FedEx’s intricate pricing structure means it’s hard for small businesses mindful of their budgets to predict what fulfillment will actually cost them. A wide range of factors affect the ultimate cost, whereas other providers have simpler, more transparent pricing for shipping and related services.
Poor customer support: FedEx also doesn’t have a great reputation when it comes to customer support. Lots of reviewers have complained about the inability to get in touch with a representative, the difficulty in managing shipments and creating exceptions or delivery instructions, and a lack of acceptable resolution when something goes wrong with a shipment.
FedEx Ecommerce Fulfillment Service Compared
While FedEx is a multinational powerhouse for ecommerce operations, the best fulfillment provider for most web store owners is ShipBob because of its omnichannel support and accurate two-day express shipping.
- ShipBob – Best ecommerce fulfillment platform
- Red Stag Fulfillment – Best for high-value and large products
- ShipMonk – Best for subscription boxes
- Dot Foods – Best for food and beverage ecommerce
- Easyship – Best for international fulfillment
Final Verdict
FedEx is a decent multinational ecommerce fulfillment service that can grow with your business. With FedEx’s rewards, seamless returns processes, and the opportunity to ship globally, FedEx can take your ecommerce operation to the next level.
FedEx has been in the industry for 50 years, making it incredibly well-known and reliable when it comes to most of the company’s products. Even though its delivery times and customer support can be rocky, FedEx still has greater reach and capability than many of its competitors. However, if you’re looking for predictable pricing and better support for you and your customers, make sure to check out the options from our full list of the best ecommerce fulfillment providers.
Source: quicksprout
FedEx Fulfillment Review