A 3PL — third-party logistics provider — is a company that stores your stock and ships your orders for you. You sell; they pick, pack and dispatch. That is the whole idea, and everything else is detail.
This guide explains what a 3PL actually does day to day, what it typically costs in the UK, and how to tell when it is time to stop packing parcels on your kitchen table.
What a 3PL actually does
When you work with a 3PL, you send your products to their warehouse in bulk. They check the delivery in, store it, and connect to your sales channels. From then on, every time a customer orders, the warehouse picks the item, packs it, labels it and hands it to a courier — usually the same day.
- Goods-in: receiving and checking your stock deliveries
- Storage: shelf, bin or pallet space for your inventory
- Pick & pack: pulling the right item and packing it properly for every order
- Dispatch: courier labels, same-day handover, tracking back to your channel
- Returns: receiving, inspecting and restocking what comes back
What it costs in the UK
Most UK 3PLs charge per action rather than a flat monthly fee: a pick fee per order (typically 55p–£1.50), packaging, storage per shelf or pallet per week, and the postage itself — often cheaper than you pay now, because 3PLs ship at bulk rates.
For a small seller doing 300 orders a month, total fulfilment cost usually lands somewhere between £1.50 and £3 per order including postage — often less than the true cost of doing it yourself once you count your hours.
When a 3PL makes sense — and when it does not
If you ship fewer than about 50 orders a month and enjoy packing, keep doing it yourself — the economics rarely justify outsourcing that early. The tipping point comes when packing eats hours you should spend on products and marketing, when orders spike beyond what you can handle, or when a holiday means your shop has to close.
A good rule: the moment fulfilment becomes the reason you cannot grow, it is time to hand it over.
What to look for in a fulfilment partner
Look for transparent per-order pricing with no setup fees or lock-in, direct integrations with your channels (TikTok Shop, eBay, Vinted, Etsy, Shopify), same-day dispatch as standard, and a portal where you can see stock and shipments live. Above all, look for a partner who answers messages — when a customer asks where their parcel is, you need an answer in minutes, not days.
Shiplo is a UK 3PL built for small and scaling sellers — no minimums, no lock-in, same-day dispatch.
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