DTC Fulfilment
Direct-to-consumer fulfilment from our UK premises.
Your stock sits in the UK, so every order your customer places ships domestically. We receive your bulk consignment, count and barcode it, photograph high-value intake, then pick, hand-finish and dispatch each order within two business days.
You remain Importer of Record for the inbound shipment. Our obligations begin once stock has cleared customs and been accepted at our premises. From that point, stock levels, order status and tracking are visible to you live through Mintsoft.
01
What happens to a single order
The order reaches us automatically. Your customer checks out and the order is with us within minutes through Mintsoft. Nothing to forward, nothing to export, no daily batch to remember.
It's picked against the item record. Not against a description — against the SKU and, where the category calls for it, the serial or batch number captured at intake. If there's a discrepancy, the order stops and you hear from us rather than a customer receiving the wrong piece.
It's finished by hand. Tissue, ribbon, wax seal, handwritten note — whatever your written packaging specification says. Nothing waits in a queue behind a machine.
It's dispatched on the right service. Tracked or Special Delivery, decided by value, not by whatever's cheapest that day.
Tracking goes back to your platform, which triggers your own shipping notification. The email your customer receives is yours, in your voice.
02
Service level, decided by value
We set a default at onboarding and you can override it per order.
Under £150 — Tracked 48 at £3.65, or Tracked 24 at £4.65. One rate, any weight to 2kg.
Over £150 — Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1pm, from £8.35. This isn't an upsell. Royal Mail's tracked compensation stops at £150, so a £400 bracelet sent tracked travels effectively uninsured. We won't dispatch one that way.
Special Delivery includes £750 cover as standard, upgradable to £1,000 or £2,500. Our maximum item value is £2,500, matching Royal Mail's highest tier. Above that we arrange separate cover with you before your first dispatch.
Worth knowing: Royal Mail compensates what the item cost you, not what it sold for. A watch you acquired at £900 and sell at £2,000 is covered for £900.
03
Dispatch timing
Two business days from order to dispatch, contractually, not aspirationally.
TikTok Shop is the exception. The platform requires dispatch within 72 hours including weekends, so TikTok orders run on a six-day dispatch week with Saturday collections. The additional Royal Mail Saturday collection fee is billed to you at cost. Details on the TikTok Shop integration page.
04
When stock runs low
We hold up to 200 units per storage cycle. At onboarding we agree a reorder trigger based on your actual run rate, and Mintsoft alerts you when you hit it.
We will not dispatch an order that would take your prepaid balance below zero, and we will not invent stock that isn't on the shelf. Both are deliberate. A silent stockout discovered by your customer is worse than an alert you acted on.
05
What this costs
Receiving
£20 per inbound batch. Your first batch is included in onboarding
Pick & pack
£2.50 per unit dispatched, from your prepaid balance
Signature Finish
£2.50 per unit, optional
Storage
£250/month, up to 200 units
Courier
Paid by the client, billed separately
Courier shipping is billed separately. You choose your carrier — we'd suggest Royal Mail for simplicity — and it isn't included in our per-unit fee.
06
The cost we don't charge you, and it's the big one.
Everything on our price list is small next to the thing we can't quote: getting your stock from where it is now to our door.
You are Importer of Record on that shipment. The freight, the customs declaration, the import VAT and any duty are yours — we take over once it has cleared and arrived. We are not a customs broker and we cannot handle clearance for you.
We'd rather say this plainly than have you discover it in week three.
What drives the number
Four things, roughly in order of impact:
Weight and volume. Two hundred watches and two hundred leather holdalls are the same unit count and completely different shipments.
Air or sea. Air is days and expensive. Sea is weeks and much cheaper. For a first consignment most brands choose air, because the cost of being out of stock while a container crosses the Atlantic is worse than the freight saving.
Who handles clearance. A freight forwarder who arranges clearance as part of the job costs more up front and far less in wasted days than doing it yourself the first time.
Import VAT and duty. Payable on the value of the goods entering the UK. VAT is usually reclaimable if you register; duty generally isn't. Worth taking advice on before your first shipment rather than after.
What we'd suggest
Get two or three freight quotes before you speak to us, based on your actual carton dimensions and weights. It takes a morning and it turns the largest unknown in this decision into a number.
Then budget for it before you budget for us. Our fees are predictable and published. Freight isn't, and it's usually the figure that decides whether holding UK stock makes sense for you this quarter or next.
Bring the quotes to the call and we'll tell you honestly whether the numbers work.
07
Sending stock on to Amazon
If you want some of your stock inside Amazon's network rather than ours, we can prepare it. Your consignment is picked, checked, labelled to Amazon's requirements and forwarded to the fulfilment centre.
It draws from the same stock pool and shows in the same Mintsoft login, so you are not running two inventories. Units prepared this way are charged at the standard £2.50 pick & pack rate. Signature Finish does not apply — Amazon opens and repacks them.
Tell us on the call if this is part of your plan and we will set it up at onboarding.
08
What we don't do
We fulfil to UK addresses only. We are not a customs broker — you are Importer of Record for the bulk shipment in, and duties, import VAT and clearance are yours. We don't offer same-day dispatch. And we don't touch your storefront: the connection reads orders and writes back stock and tracking, nothing else.
Direct-to-consumer fulfilment from our UK premises.
Courier shipping is billed separately. You choose your carrier — we'd suggest Royal Mail for simplicity — and it isn't included in our per-unit fee.