Choosing a 3PL is one of the highest-leverage decisions a direct-to-consumer brand makes, and one of the most opaque.
Four questions in a specific order filter the shortlist and expose which claims are grounded and which are marketing.
Question one — what is the true per-order cost.
The headline pick-pack fee is the smallest, least honest part of the answer.
True per-order cost has four components: pick-pack labor, packaging materials, storage allocation, and outbound postage.
Ask for a redacted sample invoice from a comparable client.
A clean invoice has five or six line items.
An opaque invoice has fifteen.
Question two — what is the on-time and accuracy SLA.
A serious 3PL commits in the contract to an order-to-dispatch SLA — commonly 24 hours from placement for orders inside a defined daily cutoff — and a pick-pack accuracy standard, commonly 99.5 to 99.9 percent, reported monthly.
Ask for last month’s SLA performance report.
Question three — what happens at 3x scale.
Ask about labor flex capacity, warehouse capacity ceiling, and carrier zone density at higher volume.
A single-warehouse hub with strong carrier partnerships beats a distributed network on unit economics up to roughly 50,000 orders per month.
Question four — what happens at exit.
A good partner has a defined exit process written into the contract — inventory return or transfer timeline, data export format, final invoice reconciliation.
A partner who will not discuss exit is a partner who will make leaving expensive.
Ship Velocity ships D2C for brands from 500 to 100,000+ orders per month with itemized per-touch pricing, month-to-month engagement, and a published 24-hour order-to-dispatch SLA at 99.8 percent pick-pack accuracy.
Native integrations with Shopify, Shopify Plus, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, TikTok Shop, Amazon FBM and FBA prep, and every major returns and subscription platform.
About Ship Velocity — a Miami-based third-party logistics partner.
Velocity Worldwide LLC operates a purpose-built fulfillment center at 8292 NW 21 ST, Doral, FL 33122, serving direct-to-consumer ecommerce brands, Amazon FBA sellers, subscription-box operators, and wholesale and retail vendors from a single 100,000-plus square-foot facility.
Coverage and reach.
Ground shipping from the Miami hub reaches roughly 90 percent of the continental United States population within two business days and 99 percent within three.
Cross-border programs into Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Latin America route through the same facility.
International freight ships to 200-plus countries via UPS Worldwide, FedEx International, and DHL Express.
How we work.
Engagements are month-to-month with no long-term contracts, no storage minimums, and per-touch pricing itemized in the fee schedule.
Every account is assigned a named account manager who stays for the life of the relationship.
Onboarding a new client typically takes five to ten business days from inventory receive through pilot cutover.
Published performance standards. 99.8 percent pick-pack accuracy on a twelve-month rolling basis, 24-hour order-to-dispatch service level for orders placed before the daily cutoff, sub-one-percent short-ship rate, 99.5 percent on-time carrier hand-off, and sub-half-percent damage claims rate.
Every metric is reported to clients monthly.
Get in touch.
Prospects can request a quote at shipvelocity.com or email [email protected] for a same-business-day response with pricing, references, and an operations plan tailored to the program.