We've talked to a lot of brands who switched fulfillment partners. The story is almost always the same: the pitch was smooth, the software was impressive, and three months in they were staring at fees they didn't know existed.
Here's what to actually look for when evaluating a fulfillment partner.
Ask for the full fee schedule before anything else
Not the rate card for pick and pack. The full fee schedule — every line item that can ever appear on an invoice. Ask specifically for:
- Receiving fee per pallet or per unit
- Storage fee structure (per pallet, per cubic foot, per SKU)
- Pick fee per order
- Pack fee per order
- Packaging materials cost or markup
- Monthly platform or account fee
- Account minimum (what you pay if you don't hit it)
- Returns processing fee
- Special project fee (anything that isn't standard pick-pack-ship)
- Carrier rate structure — are they passing through actual cost or marking up?
A 3PL that can hand you a clean, complete fee schedule in the first conversation is telling you something important about how they operate. One that hedges or says "it depends" for every line item is also telling you something.
Understand the shipping math before you sign
Shipping is where the margin games happen. Two common structures:
Actual carrier cost, passed through: You pay what the carrier charges. No markup. This requires the 3PL to trust that you'll pay your invoice, which is why some require weekly billing for this structure.
Carrier cost plus a markup: Common on net-30 terms, where the 3PL is carrying your receivable. A disclosed markup of 15–20% for net-30 terms is reasonable and honest. An undisclosed markup buried in a "proprietary rate card" is not.
Ask directly: "What is your shipping markup, and does it change based on payment terms?" If the answer is unclear, that's the answer.
Monthly platform fees compound at low volume
A $300/month platform fee sounds small. For a brand doing 50 orders a month, it adds $6 per order to your fulfillment cost before a single item is picked. For a brand doing 200 orders a month, it's $1.50/order. The fee is the same — the impact on your unit economics is very different.
Know your order volume and model the platform fee into your per-order cost before you sign. Some 3PLs waive it above a volume threshold. Some don't have one at all.
Account minimums are a hidden fixed cost
Many 3PLs require a minimum monthly spend — $500, $1,000, sometimes more. If you don't hit it, you pay it anyway. For a brand in early growth, this is a fixed cost that eats margin regardless of how many orders you ship.
Ask: "Is there a monthly minimum, and what happens if I don't hit it?" Get the answer in writing before you sign.
What actually matters operationally
After fees, the operational questions that matter most:
- How fast do orders ship after received? Same day? Next day? This directly affects customer experience and your return rate.
- Who do you call when something is wrong? A ticket system with a 48-hour SLA or a person who picks up?
- What is the error rate and how do they handle mistakes? Every fulfillment operation has errors. What matters is whether they own them and make them right.
- Can they scale with you? If you go from 50 to 500 orders a month, do they have the capacity?
The best fulfillment partner isn't the one with the best dashboard. It's the one who tells you every fee before you sign and picks up the phone when something looks off.
The co-packer-as-fulfillment-partner option
For brands doing under 500 orders a month with simple SKU structures, combining production and fulfillment with one partner is often significantly cheaper than using a separate 3PL. No platform fee, no receiving fee, no account minimum. Your product goes from the line to storage to outbound without changing hands.
The tradeoff: a co-packer doing fulfillment as an add-on typically has less carrier rate leverage than a large 3PL doing millions of shipments a year. That gap matters more as your volume grows. At 50 orders a month, it's negligible. At 5,000 orders a month, a large 3PL's carrier rates start to matter.
Model both options against your actual projected volume and fee structure. The math is usually pretty clear.