Fashion shopping app Poshmark and the US Postal Service have embarked upon an exclusive partnership featuring Poshmark-branded shipping labels for their sellers. The new program, called PoshPost now features a shipping rate for buyers of $4.99 on all orders, beginning March 20th.
The fashionable arrangement was virtually tailor-made for a deal with USPS. “In the case of Poshmark the overwhelming majority of shipped packages were less than 5 lbs. and the sheer volumes being shipped lent itself perfectly to a one-size-fits-all label,” said USPS spokesperson Darleen Reid-DeMeo.
She commented further on the exclusive aspects of the deal. “Although the Negotiated Service Agreement with Poshmark is not unusual, the PoshPost label is a collateral development unique to Poshmark Inc. Our collaboration with Poshmark to design an innovative and practical solution for our shared customers will surely be a perfect fit for shoppers and shippers alike.”
Other ecommerce pros interested in shipping solutions should visit usps.com and click on the “business solutions tab.” or call USPS-4-SMBIZ (877-747-6249).
Poshmark is changing its seller fees to accommodate the new shipping rates:
“Flat Poshmark commission for orders less than $15. In order to support lower-priced shipping for all orders and provide a more robust label to simplify shipping we are making our first ever change to our commission. Beginning March 20, 2014, we will be changing our commission for orders less than $15 to a single flat rate of $2.95. Commission for orders $15 and up will remain unchanged at 20% of the selling price. This also means that all items below $3 will no longer be available for purchase on Poshmark.”
Poshmark CEO Manish Chandra also participated in a brief question and answer session with EcommerceBytes about the business.
EcommerceBytes: How many packages are your seller’s shipping on a quarterly basis?
Manish Chandra: “When we created Poshmark, it was very important to us that every woman in America could buy and sell directly from her closet with ease, so it was imperative to make the entire process super simple right from their mobile phones. Today, we have over 350,000 closets open for sale on the marketplace, that’s more than the number of fashion boutiques in the U.S., and as a result of Poshmark’s simple mobile shopping experience, women in our community have bought, sold and shipped over 1.5 million items in 2013 alone.”
EcommerceBytes: How much has your shipping volume grown over the past year?
Manish Chandra: “In 2013 we grew 10x over 2012. With that growth, the shipping volume has increased tremendously. While from the start we have made the shipping process super simple, sellers just print out the pre-paid label, package their item and send it out the door, we knew there were additional steps we could take to make the process even more friction-less for our community.
“We proposed to USPS in the first half of 2012 to work with us to create a revolutionary new shipping label that is exclusively used to sell and ship fashion items – it took a year and a half to go through processes, and today we finally have PoshPost.
“The volume of fashion packages being shipped out of closets across America on Poshmark coupled with data that showed us 99.5% of all packages shipped via the marketplace weigh in at under 5lbs, led us to be able to innovate around fashion shipping on a mass scale.”
EcommerceBytes: What goals do you anticipate meeting with the implementation of PoshPost?
Manish Chandra: “We are a marketplace for fashion and what we traditionally see as one of the challenges in the closet-sharing economy, women selling directly out of their closets, is the ability to accept payments and ship items with ease.
“Our biggest goal is to make it convenient for any woman in the country to participate in the closet-sharing economy, right from her phone. PoshPost has tremendously simplified shipping for the everyday woman because they no longer have to worry about weighing items and thinking about shipping zones, they can just slap the universal label onto any box and out the door it goes.
“Fashion is an interesting category since there are so many variables to size and weight. For example, a lightweight Diane Von Furstenberg dress could weigh in under a pound, a blazer could be 1.5 pounds while other packages like a heavily studded Alexander Wang bag or knee high boots might be closer to 4 or 4.5 pounds.
“For the buyer, PoshPost is introducing the most inexpensive price for 2-3 day priority shipping, at a subsidized flat rate of $4.99 for up to 5 pounds. With PoshPost, we are changing the way fashion is being shipped in the U.S. As the first mobile commerce company to partner with the USPS, we are excited to offer this new and easy solution for shipping fashion items across the country.”
