If you are on the Automated Fulfillment Program, shipping for your print or merch products fulfilled by your vendor is already set up, and your website will automatically charge the correct shipping amount for any and all orders, worldwide. You do not need to do anything from your end.
However, if you are selling items on your website that you are fulfilling and shipping yourself, or using an external, 3rd party vendor, you will need to set up shipping methods that will charge the correct amount for those products as well. Alternative to setting up your shipping methods would be to offer free shipping and add the correct amount to the cost of the product
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There are 2 ways to set up shipping methods for your self fulfilled products, and the setup and pricing might vary based on your preference. Shipping by Cart Weight, or Shipping by Cart Subtotal. Please select the correct tab for the way you prefer to set up. Also, instructions on how to set up Free or Discounted shipping can be found in the Free and Discounted Shipping tab.
Shipping by Weight
This will allow you to set up shipping for self-fulfilled products which you are selling through your site such as originals, limited editions, or merchandise products you are fulfilling yourself (ie, not through Gooten). This method uses a weight-based system to determine the shipping cost for different products. This does take some setting up though, as every self-fulfilled product will need to have a weight value set up for it to be priced correctly.
Note: You will need to know how much shipping will be for your products before you begin, so you will need to contact the shipping company you intend to use to get quotes for shipping packaged products. This will usually be based on the weight of the piece and the dimensions of the packaging. If you have a wide range of sizes of your products, you will need multiple quotes (3-5 to cover both smallest and largest, and some in the middle) to account for each.
Open your site, and in the Jump To menu, select Shipping Methods.
From here click on + Add Shipping Method to create a new method.
On this page you’ll need to name your method. As this is going to be a method covering shipping within the US, I’ve named this US Shipping. Once you’ve entered the name, click on the Next button.
Now you’ll be on the page where you’ll set up the shipping costs and specify the country which the method applies to.
Important: The Force Local Tax When Selected switch should only be turned on if you are setting up a Local Pick-up method for customers to pick up orders. This is usually only needed for artists who have a physical business location where orders can be collected. Enabling this will cause all orders placed with this shipping method enabled to automatically add sales tax for the state in which your business is located to be added at checkout, even if it’s not otherwise applicable to the order. Please refer to this article for more information: https://artstorefrontssupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/225933367-How-To-Create-An-In-Store-Pick-Up-Option
Note: The Available On Child Sites switch is a setting for “Parent” sites, functionality which is unavailable for new sites. This option has no effect in most cases and can be left set as On.
Scroll down until you reach the Countries section, and click on United States to select it. (Keep in mind that this won’t be saved until you click on Update at the bottom of the page)
Scroll down a little further, and under Calculate Shipping Based On change this from Cart Subtotal to Cart Weight.
This section is where we will set up the shipping information that we gathered earlier.
For this example, I’m going to use three values to represent three different sized originals.
8x10 artwork on paper, in reinforced flat mailers that are 9x11.5”, which costs $5
12x18 wrapped canvas in an 18x24x5” shipping box, which costs $25
18x27 wrapped canvas in an 24x36x5” shipping box, which costs $75
I’m going to turn this into three tiers, plus there will be a 0 weight tier to allow free shipping of Gift Cards through the site. As the weight values being used here don’t need to use real weight values, that can be set up to represent different groupings of products with the need to be exact. Also remember to account for any additional costs and build them into the costs you are charging your customers, although larger pieces generate more profit so some of that can be used to offset these.
The first tier will have 0 weight and $0 cost.
The second tier will be for the 8x10 pieces, which will have a $6 cost.
The third tier will be for the 12x18 canvases, and will cost $30.
The fourth and final tier will be for the 18x27 canvases, and will cost $85.
Now we need to assign weight values to each, to keep the tiers clearly differentiated. A simple way is to start with a weight of 1 for the first non-zero tier, and multiply that by 10 for each subsequent tier.
The first tier has weight set at 0.
Second tier has the weight set at 1.
Third tier has the weight set at 10.
Fourth tier has the weight set at 100.
Important: These are example Values that do not represent real shipping costs. You will need to use values which represent the costs that You are charging, using the prices of Your products, to ensure you are covering the shipping costs of your self-fulfilled products
Now you may have one size for your artwork, which would simplify the table significantly, however we would still always recommend having a 0 weight, $0 cost tier even if you don’t currently offer Gift Cards on your site.
Also if your artwork covers a much wider range of sizes, we would suggest grouping products into 3-5 collective groups (plus the $0 cost tier) to simplify your pricing. You shouldn’t be trying to exactly cover the shipping costs here, just group them so the shipping costs covers the average cost for each tier. (For more information about this approach, you may find the Learn: Everything You Need To Know About Shipping article here to be a useful read, especially the last section: https://artstorefrontssupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360010862172-Learn-Everything-You-Need-to-Know-About-Shipping-)
Now you can click on Update to save your shipping method, which is ready to use. However you’re not done yet.
The next step is to make sure that each self-fulfilled product has been assigned a weight value that will ensure it shows up correctly on the pricing table above. In my example it means that each 8x10 paper original will be given a weight of 1, each 12x18 canvas will have a weight of 10, and each 18x27 canvas will have a weight of 100.
You will find the Weight field at the bottom of the Info tab of each Standard Store product, and each product on your site will need to be checked to ensure that they’ll be assigned the correct shipping cost at checkout.
Shipping by Cart Subtotal
This will allow you to set up shipping for self-fulfilled products which you are selling through your site such as originals, limited editions, or merchandise products you are fulfilling yourself (ie, not through Gooten). This method uses the value of the self-fulfilled products in the cart to determine the shipping cost for the order. Because it doesn’t require weight data to be added to each self-fulfilled product on your site,
Note: This is not necessary if you are only offering prints through a fulfillment vendor or merchandise fulfilled by Gooten. In this case you don’t need to make any changes to the default shipping method for your site, as those products will be using the methods set up by the respective vendor..
Note: You will need to know how much shipping will be for your products before you begin, so you will need to contact the shipping company you intend to use to get quotes for shipping packaged products. This will usually be based on the weight of the piece and the dimensions of the packaging. If you have a wide range of sizes of your products, you will need multiple quotes (3-5 to cover both smallest and largest, and some in the middle) to account for each. You may wish to also get quotes shipping to nearby and distant locations within the US. You may also want to limit shipping self-fulfilled orders to within the US in order to simplify this process at the start, as you can add additional destinations in the future.
Open your site, and in the Jump To menu, select Shipping Methods.
From here click on + Add Shipping Method to create a new method.
On this page you’ll need to name your method. As this is going to be a method covering shipping within the US, I’ve named this US Shipping. Once you’ve entered the name, click on the Next button.
Now you’ll be on the page where you’ll set up the shipping costs and specify the country which the method applies to.
Important: The Force Local Tax When Selected switch should only be turned on if you are setting up a Local Pick-up method for customers to pick up orders. This is usually only needed for artists who have a physical business location where orders can be collected. Enabling this will cause all orders placed with this shipping method enabled to automatically add sales tax for the state in which your business is located to be added at checkout, even if it’s not otherwise applicable to the order. Please refer to this article for more information: https://artstorefrontssupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/225933367-How-To-Create-An-In-Store-Pick-Up-Option
Note: The Available On Child Sites switch is a setting for “Parent” sites, functionality which is unavailable for new sites. This option has no effect in most cases and can be left set as On.
Scroll down until you reach the Countries section, and click on United States to select it. (Keep in mind that this won’t be saved until you click on Update at the bottom of the page)
You should disable the option Calculate Subtotal After Discount. If enabled, it would use the discounted price in the cart to determine how much the shipping will be, which may generate a lower shipping cost and lower the profit you receive from the purchase further than would be the case from the discount by itself.
This section is where we will use the shipping costs that we gathered earlier to determine how customers will be charged.
For this example, I’m going to use three retail prices from the example site and three shipping costs for each of the three different originals as quoted by the shipping company I’m using.
$25 8x10 artwork on paper, in reinforced flat mailers that are 9x11.5”, which costs $5
$150 12x18 wrapped canvas in an 18x24x5” shipping box, which costs $25
$400 18x27 wrapped canvas in an 24x36x5” shipping box, which costs $75
I’m going to turn this into three tiers, plus there will be a $0 tier to allow free shipping of Gift Cards through the site. Remember to account for any additional costs and build them into the costs you are charging your customers, although larger pieces generate more profit so some of that can be used to offset these.
The first tier will have $0 subtotal and $0 cost.
The second tier will be for the 8x10 pieces, which will have a $6 cost.
The third tier will be for the 12x18 canvases, and will cost $30.
The fourth and final tier will be for the 18x27 canvases, and will cost $85.
Important: These are example Values that do not represent real shipping costs. You will need to use values which represent the costs that You are charging, using the prices of Your products, to ensure you are covering the shipping costs of your self-fulfilled products.
Now you may have one size and price for your artwork, which would simplify the table significantly, however we would still always recommend having a $0 subtotal, $0 cost tier even if you don’t currently offer Gift Cards on your site.
Also if your artwork covers a much wider range of sizes, we would suggest grouping products into 3-5 collective groups (plus the $0 tier) to simplify your pricing. You shouldn’t be trying to exactly cover the shipping costs here, just group them so the shipping costs you charge covers the average cost for each tier. (For more information about this approach, you may find the Learn: Everything You Need To Know About Shipping article here to be a useful read, especially the last section: https://artstorefrontssupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360010862172-Learn-Everything-You-Need-to-Know-About-Shipping-)
Now you can click on Update to save your shipping method, which is ready to use.
Shipping Options and how to set up Free or Discounted Shipping
Offering free shipping is a very powerful incentive. On your Art Storefronts website you can mark any shipping method as free, regardless of are those shipping methods of the Vendor, or your own methods for Self Fulfilled items.
With regards to you offering Free International shipping on your site, it is important to factor into your pricing things like shipping costs based on but not limited to the size, weight, and the number of items in an order. While free shipping may be a great incentive to offer and utilize for orders within the US, Art Storefronts would not recommend discounting or setting up free shipping for International orders received to your site. Given that shipping costs can vary it will be extremely difficult to predict the cost, making it hard to calculate an appropriate price where you will not loose out on a profit from your order.
Instructions below will show you around the Shipping Options tab on your Shipping Methods page, and explain how to mark a shipping method to be free or discounted.
On this tab you should first enable the option Prevent Visitor Checkout If No Shipping Methods Are Available. This will prevent customers from placing orders for your self-fulfilled products if their shipping destination doesn’t have a shipping method set up for it. If this is triggered, they will remain on the checkout page and the message in the next field will be displayed at the top of the checkout page. You can change this text to suit your situation. A good example you can use would be: “I’m sorry, but we currently do not ship to this location. If you wish to make a special order, please reach out to me through my Contact page.”
If you scroll down, you’ll see the section Apply Free Or Discounted Price To Shipping Methods. We’re looking for the first section within this, Free Shipping Options. To enable free shipping on your self-fulfilled products, click on the checkbox next to any Shipping Methods you'd like to mark as free. Shipping of products through your print vendor will be listed below this, with the name of the vendor in parentheses to the right of the description.
To the right of this is the Minimum Cart Subtotal which you can set, which will limit free shipping to orders over the value set here.
If you do would only like to offer free shipping after the user has reached a certain cart subtotal enter the threshold value to the Minimum Cart Subtotal For Free Shipping To Apply.
Note: This will require the cart subtotal, after discounts, to meet a certain minimum before free shipping will be applied to the shipping methods you have selected here.
If you would like to only discount the shipping options by a certain %, scroll down to the Discounted Shipping Options section.
Under Apply Discounted Shipping To Specific Methods, you will see all your shipping options (in the example image below ASF Team), as well as the options from your vendor (if you are connected to one). Checkmark the ones that you would like to discount.
Under Discount Percentage To Apply, enter % by which you would like to discount the selected shipping methods. This feature allows you to override the price of any shipping method and will display and apply discounted shipping instead.
Note: If you select Free Shipping for a Shipping Method, that selection will take precedence over the discounted one.
Click Update.
At the bottom of the page you will find an Update button to save the changes you’ve made.
