Today, we’re very much pleased to announce that we’ve strengthened our relationship with Volusion! While we’ve had a Volusion integration for ShipStation for some time now, we’ve been working with the booming e-commerce company, and are delighted to tell you that we are now a certified Volusion Partner!

Volusion is a leading e-commerce software platform, powering thousands of e-commerce sites like 3M, Deloitte, and Nalgene. They’ve got a fantastic and very helpful blog where their “2-minute Tuesday” videos and regular postings help companies great and small succeed in the ecommerce world. They also boast free 24/7 support via phone, e-mail, and live chat. If you’re looking for a new shopping cart platform, and already use ShipStation, give them a look.

We really look forward to working tightly with Volusion to help bring all parties involved (meaning, you, too!) the greatest service and software available. We love helping our customers succeed, and making your lives easier, and we’re excited for the opportunity to do that on a more personal level with Volusion and their merchants.

Express 1, a provider of discounted USPS shipping postage, has expanded their services to include even more ways to save money on shipping via USPS.

USPS is, in many cases, the cheapest way to ship your goods from your warehouse or storeroom (perhaps your garage) to your buyer, whether they’re domestic or overseas. You probably started out doing the “I’ll pack these at home and then go to the post office and stand in line to purchase my labels and get my packages on their way.” The flat rate packages were an awesome addition to the postal lineup when they were added, but like so many others, you soon got tired of standing in line day after day. So, you found ShipStation, and started doing things online. Oh, how nice it is to not have to go through that long and laborious process anymore.

Maybe that was your progression in shipping out your own products as you grew. Maybe not. The fact of the matter is, you ship via USPS. And with ShipStation, you don’t have to do all that standing in line and waiting. You get your rates, and print your labels using your own printer.

For those of you who signed up for, and began taking advantage of ShipStation’s free Express 1 account, you saw how awesome their rates were. Well, we’re very pleased to let you—and all of our sellers—know that Express 1 has expanded their offering to include discounted USPS rates on even more products. You can now get deep discounts on all your domestic flat rate priority packages (small, medium, or large boxes, envelope, padded envelope, it doesn’t matter), and awesome Priority and Express Mail rates on anything else, 1 – 70 lbs! If you shipped with Express 1 previously, you know that Express 1’s discounts only extended to a couple of flat rate box types, and only a few of the lower weights, so you know what a huge opportunity this is!

If you ship via Express Mail, you get discounts on those, too. Anything in a flat rate box gets discounted, and if it’s in your own packaging, you get discounts on anything from a half-pound to 10 lbs. If you’re wondering, yes, this has also been expanded (weight limit upped from 2-10 lbs. & expansion in package types), and signifies another way for you to save some cash when shipping your orders out.

But what about international? Those discounted rates are still in place, just like they always were. Which means you have a very well-rounded offering, and tons of options for shipping your orders cheaply when choosing to ship via USPS with Express 1, through ShipStation. Want some details? Here’s a full table of their new, expanded offerings:

* You may use either your own packaging or USPS’s free shipping boxes

At the end of the day, the new expanded product offerings from Express 1 are awesome. Now that you’ve done yourself that huge favor by using ShipStation to avoid those long post office lines and streamline your entire shipping and fulfillment process, do yourself another favor and check out Express 1. Trust me, it’s something you won’t regret.

I’m Erika, the social media & content manager for ShipStation. You’ll find me on Twitter, Facebook, our Community Forums and the other areas of the ShipStation world. In my free time, I’m a lover of video games, my cats, and other generally nerdy things. :)

ShipStation is constantly adding new features to make your shipping process easier. Today, we’re sharing one of ShipStation’s latest features:  Bulk Tracking.

This feature allows you to select a list of orders from the Shipments page, click the “Track Shipments” button and track multiple shipments for USPS, UPS and FedEx all in once place!

Now, each shipment will be updated with an icon indicating its current status. Hovering over the tracking status icon allows you to view detailed information:

You can also filter your shipments by tracking status. This will help you to identify any problems in shipping before the customer reaches out to you.

One additional benefit of Bulk Tracking is to be able to identify Express Overnight shipments that have not been delivered by the guaranteed date and time. You are entitled to a full refund of the postage cost when this happens.

Your free 30 day trial of ShipStation will give you full access to all our features. Simplify your shipping process today!

We are continuing to enhance the features of the “Products” area of ShipStation and this week we released a feature that can be extremely handy in the process of automating your shipping selections. We now allow products to automatically “Tag” orders that contain them. This can have several advantages from simply informational to surprisingly functional. Here’s a quick example of how you can use product tags to save money using cubic rates.

Intelligently Qualifying Orders for Cubic Pricing

Cubic pricing can provide some fantastic cost savings on certain packages, but not all.  In this example, we’ll tag some specific products that we know fit the cubic pricing “sweet spot”.  We’ll then create a filter and automation rule that will automatically assign a cubic package and service for the orders.

Step 1)  In the products area, we can open a product to modify the settings.  We’d typically use a Regional Rate box to ship this product, which is a decent rate, but if it’s shipping to Zone 5 or higher, we can do even better with cubic rates!  We start by creating a new order tag called “Cubic Option” and apply the tag to this product.

Since product tags are automatically assigned to orders that contain them, any new order that is imported will also have the “Cubic Option” tag assigned to it.

Step 2) In settings, we create a new filter that will isolate orders that  contain the “Cubic Option” tag.  We also want to make sure it’s a domestic shipment.  Finally, we want only orders that are going to Zone 5 or higher.

Now we can isolate any order that is appropriate for cubic rates.

Step 3) Lastly, let’s create an automation rule that will setup cubic shipping settings for any order that matches the filter we created in step 2.

After we save the rule, we should start seeing orders for this product automatically configured to ship with cubic rates!

Other uses for Product Tags

• Identify orders that are back-ordered, made-to-order or otherwise take longer to fulfill.  You can even create an automation rule for those products to automatically place them On-Hold for a period of time.
• Identify orders that might need special care or handling.  You can add an internal note for your packing team with an automation rule.
• Identify orders that should be insured and automatically request  insurance.
• Identify orders that contain sensitive materials.  You can create an automation rule to require adult signature confirmation if needed.

We are excited to offer USPS Priority Mail Cubic Pricing to our customers! USPS Cubic service is a good substitute for UPS and FedEx ground services. We are now able to offer this service to our users through our relationship with Express 1. Please contact Express 1 at (800) 399-3971 to learn more about this service and to see if you qualify.

Cubic rates are ideal for small, heavy packages

Cubic rates are ideal for small, heavy packages since the pricing is based on the volume of the package instead of the weight. Any package that measures 0.50 cubic feet or less and is 20 pounds or less is eligible.

Here is how the cubic measurement is calculated:

Cubic Feet = Length X Width X Height / 1728

Also note that the length, width, and height measurements should be rounded down to the nearest 0.25 inch. Here’s an example for a package that measures 6-1/8″ x 5-7/8″ x 6-3/8″:

6 x 5.75 x 6.25 / 1728 = .125 cubic feet

There are 5 tiers for cubic pricing:

Tier 1 – mailpieces measuring up to .10 cubic foot
Tier 2 – mailpieces measuring more than .10 up to .20 cubic foot
Tier 3 – mailpieces measuring more than .20 up to .30 cubic foot
Tier 4 – mailpieces measuring more than .30 up to .40 cubic foot
Tier 5 – mailpieces measuring more than .40 up to .50 cubic foot

So our example above would fall into Tier 2. Let’s say this package weighs 4 pounds and is a zone 7 shipment. This would typically cost $13.12 via Priority Mail. However, the cubic price for this package is only $6.46.  That’s more than a 50% savings!

Sound complicated?  It’s Not!

ShipStation’s Rate Calculator makes it easy to determine the cubic rate.  Simply choose the “Cubic” package type, enter the package dimensions, and ShipStation will display the rate.

Please let us know if you have any questions about this new service.

We recently released new features to allow our sellers to have improved visibility to shipping rates for individual orders. Unofficially dubbed “Quick Rates”, this feature will allow you to very quickly price one or more shipments based on the currently selected carrier, service and package. This feature consists of a few new user interface elements that reside in the order management screen of ShipStation.

Austin, Texas Oct 18, 2011 — Auctane introduces ShipStation, allowing online retailers to fulfill orders faster while reducing shipping costs.  ShipStation consolidates orders from numerous marketplaces and shopping cart solutions, and allows shipping labels to be printed in batch. This initial release includes support for eBay, Amazon, Buy.com Marketplace, Etsy, Magento, Volusion, Zen Cart, PayPal, Google Checkout, and Payvment.

ShipStation is a web-based solution that is compatible with both PCs and Macs, and does not require any software to install. With support for batch label printing as well as multiple users and warehouses, ShipStation is ideal for mid to high volume sellers.  Feature highlights include:

• Intuitive, easy to use web interface with no software to install

• Unprecedented shipping discounts

• Full 360-degree synchronization with each marketplace

• Streamlined shipping system processes numerous orders in just a few clicks

• Configurable order processing engine automates tedious tasks and reduces human error

• Innovative order management features such as the Sales Channel Inbox and Priority Order Tagging

“Shipping is often a pain point for an online retailer selling across multiple channels and marketplaces”, said Jason Hodges, President of Auctane. “ShipStation helps by allowing retailers to sell their products anywhere and ship in one convenient place.”

Each ShipStation subscription includes a free DYMO Endicia account, which allows users to print all classes of USPS postage. ShipStation also integrates with Express 1, a government partner of the US Postal Service, providing discounted rates on Priority and Express Mail.

For more information, or to start a free 30-day trial, please visit http://www.shipstation.com.

About Auctane:

Auctane provides turn-key shipping systems for online retailers and shippers. With a focus on efficiency and simplicity, Auctaneʼs web-based tools allow shippers to process orders faster and more easily than ever before. Auctaneʼs shipping solution for eBay sellers, Auctane Shipping Manager, has been the top-rated shipping application in the eBay App Center for the past two years.