This video goes through Printful's recent COVID update (delivered via email on 5/27/2020)
They've been able to improve production times
& they are working on optimizing shipping times as things slow return to normal
One interesting thing they mentioned was that they've been "continuing to sdee order volume that's typical during the Black Friday shopping season"
* hint hint *
If you're not selling print on demand products yet, you need to be!
There's a huge opportunity to make money online with little-to-no downside
(customers place their order before you have to worry about spending a dime!)
Printful Email Content
Hey [NAME],
Since our last Covid-19 update email, we've been keeping our teams safe and scaling up to meet demand. We're continuing to see order volume that's typical during the Black Friday shopping season. So adapting to that spike in growth while following social distancing and health guidelines has been challenging.
We've been making good progress, but we're not in the clear yet. We want to share another update about what we've been doing and what you need to know.
Production
We're still experiencing longer than usual fulfillment times for DTG, embroidery, and all-over print products, especially in the US. We're working hard to improve these categories, mainly by investing in more printing equipment and hiring additional fulfillment staff. This week in Charlotte, we've grown our DTG output by 18% and our embroidery by 16% compared to the previous week. Our goal is to continue increasing our weekly output at a fast pace.
Fulfillment times in Europe are getting faster, especially for non-apparel products. This is thanks to the hard work of our fulfillment team in Latvia, as well as being able to route more orders to our new facility in Barcelona and backup facilities in the UK.
A lot of product categories are getting faster. Some are being fulfilled in under 4 business days, like jewelry and phone cases. Take a look at our Covid-19 FAQ for current estimates.
Shipping
You can continue to expect shipping delays worldwide. It's hard to give specific estimates because not all carriers update detailed data, and not all orders have tracking. As of now, we've observed that US domestic orders may take up to an additional 5 days on top of the estimated delivery time. Orders from the US to Canada can take an additional 7 days.
Shipping times within Europe are also longer, but airlines are starting to ease restrictions so that means delivery times may start to gradually improve.
Orders shipping from Europe to North America and Australia/New Zealand are taking much longer to ship; on average, we're seeing an additional 25 business days. Now, we're only routing North American and AUS/NZ orders to Europe when it's a product that can't be fulfilled in the US or Mexico.
Customer support
Our support team is doing their best to answer each customer query thoughtfully, although it's taking longer than usual. Our phone service is temporarily disabled, and we're usually available on live chat Monday-Friday during US business hours. We are working around the clock to answer emails; our average reply time is approx. 1 day. We're actively hiring more customer service teammates so we can get back to supporting you faster.
Thank you for reading, and thank you for your patience. We're doing everything we can to continue supporting your business and adapting to the challenges ahead. Keep checking in on our Covid-19 FAQ for the latest updates.
Stay safe!
