How to Streamline Packing and Shipping in Your Online Store

The order is paid — in theory the hard part is behind you. In practice, this is exactly where the most time-consuming part of the day begins: picking, packing and dispatching the parcel. It’s here, between “paid” and “shipped”, that time leaks away, parcels get mixed up, and the “where’s my package?” questions pile up. The good news: this is also the easiest area to bring under control — no revolution required, just a change in the order of steps and a handful of rules.

In this article we break the fulfillment process into its parts: we show you where the time actually goes, how to organize queuing and pick lists, what to do about labels and statuses, and how to handle notifications and customer tracking. We’re also honest about what Sellaro does today versus what’s on the roadmap.

Where you really lose time between “paid” and “shipped”

Before you improve anything, it’s worth naming the bottlenecks. In most small and mid-sized stores, time leaks in the same places:

• Context switching — orders live in several panels (marketplace, your own store, another marketplace), and you hop between tabs manually gathering what needs to go out today.
• A chaotic order of work — packing “in the order they came in” instead of by priority (courier cutoff, express parcels, cash-on-delivery).
• Walking the warehouse — no pick list, so you gather each parcel separately instead of collecting several orders on a single route.
• Manual statuses and tracking numbers — after dispatch someone clicks “shipped” and pastes the tracking number, separately in each panel.
• Notifications done by hand — or not at all, which triggers a wave of support questions.

Each of these costs a few to a few dozen seconds per order. At a few hundred parcels a day that adds up to several hours a day of pure mechanics. The goal of streamlining is simple: shorten the order’s path from “paid” to “dispatched” without adding mistakes.

Queuing: one “ready to ship” view of your orders

The first step is one shipping queue instead of five panels. Rather than asking “what do I need to ship on the marketplace today? and in my store? and elsewhere?”, you want a single list: every paid, picked order ready to pack, regardless of channel.

That’s the job of an OMS (order management system). Sellaro pulls orders from connected channels into one normalized view — today the PrestaShop, Sylius and WooCommerce modules are ready, while Allegro, Amazon and Shopify are on the roadmap and added on request. With a single view, you build the shipping queue once, by your own criteria:

1. Priority — parcels with a tight courier cutoff and priority orders first.
2. Shipment type — parcel lockers separately, courier separately, cash-on-delivery separately (they’re packed and dispatched differently).
3. Contents — group orders containing the same product so you can pick them in one pass.

Simply ordering the queue before anyone picks up the tape can shave a good chunk off packing time — because you eliminate the “what next?” decisions made at every single parcel.

Pick lists and packing — fewer steps around the warehouse

Picking is collecting goods from the shelves. The biggest gain here comes from moving away from “one parcel = one walk around the warehouse” to batch picking: you take a list of several to a dozen orders at once, collect all the needed products on a single route, and pack only at the station.

What helps in practice:

• A pick list sorted by warehouse location, not by order number — you follow one route instead of going back and forth.
• Scanning instead of retyping — barcodes/SKUs during picking reduce “wrong variant” mistakes.
• A fixed packing station with materials at hand (boxes in several sizes, filler, tape, printer).
• A check at packing — comparing contents against the order spec before the box is sealed.

The foundation of all this is reliable stock levels. If you pick an order for a product that physically isn’t there, the entire gain from streamlining vanishes into explaining the shortage. That’s why shared inventory and stock levels from all channels in one place aren’t an add-on but a precondition for smooth shipping — we wrote more about the fulfillment cycle itself in the piece on e-commerce order automation.

Courier labels — the most expensive manual step

Dispatching a parcel is usually the most time-consuming manual step: logging into the courier’s panel, retyping the address, choosing the service, generating and printing the label, then pasting the tracking number back into the order. With multiple couriers, you multiply that by the number of panels.

Ultimately you want to collapse this into one action: a label generated from order data with a single click, the tracking number returning automatically to the order. That’s the classic goal of a shipping platform — we laid it out in detail in a separate guide on courier label software.

An important, honest note about Sellaro’s status here: generating InPost and other courier labels is on the roadmap — it doesn’t work yet today. Store integrations are also read-only — Sellaro reads orders but does not write changes back to the store, nor create shipments for you. The principle, however, is simple: a missing integration (couriers included) is added within your plan, on request.

Statuses and customer tracking — this already works today

The final step of the process is informing the buyer. And this is the part where automation already works in Sellaro today — because it doesn’t require writing to the store, only sending a notification.

Sellaro has an automation engine on domain events in a WHEN → IF → THEN formula: when something happens, if a condition is met, then run an action. Available actions today are email (SMTP) and SMS notifications, webhooks (HMAC-signed with retries), and a log entry.

WHEN “order marked as shipped” → IF “channel = WooCommerce” → THEN “send an email and SMS with the tracking number and a link to the shipment”.

A few rules worth setting up right away:

• WHEN order paid → THEN email “we’ve received your order, we’re picking it”.
• WHEN parcel dispatched → THEN status “shipped” + save tracking number + SMS/email with tracking.
• WHEN order flagged “needs review” (out of stock, bad address) → THEN alert to the team, don’t push further.

The effect is immediate: fewer “where’s my package?” questions, a calmer support desk, and a buyer who knows where things stand — without a single extra click on your side.

Frequently asked questions

Where do I start streamlining shipping if I’m short on time?

With two things: one shared “ready to ship” order queue, and automatic status and tracking notifications. These are the cheapest changes with the fastest payoff — they need no new hardware and immediately cut panel-switching and the wave of support questions.

Does Sellaro generate courier labels and dispatch parcels?

Not yet. Generating InPost and other courier labels is on the roadmap and added on request within your plan. Today Sellaro centralizes orders and automates notifications and statuses on its own side; store integrations are read-only.

How does batch picking differ from regular picking?

With regular picking you collect goods for one order, come back, take the next. With batch picking you take a list of several orders at once and collect all the products on a single route around the warehouse, splitting them only at the packing station. Fewer steps, less time.

Do customer notifications require a store integration?

No. Email (SMTP) and SMS notifications in Sellaro go out based on events on the system side, so they work regardless of whether writing back to the store is possible. That’s why customer tracking is a feature you can switch on right away, before courier labels arrive.

Summary

Streamlining packing and shipping isn’t about one magic tool — it’s about shortening the order’s path from “paid” to “dispatched”. Gather orders into one queue instead of five panels, pack by priority, introduce pick lists and batch picking, and inform the customer automatically — with a status and a tracking number. Courier labels are the most expensive manual step and the natural next target once the rest of the process is humming.

Sellaro today gives you a central, normalized view of orders from all connected channels, shared inventory, and a working automation engine (email, SMS, webhook, log) — so you can set up statuses and customer tracking right away. Courier labels and the Allegro integration are added as roadmap modules, on request. See Sellaro pricing — a flat fee with a generous limit, all integrations included, and 0% commission on sales value. Missing the courier you need? Drop us a line — we’ll add it for free.