Recent Articles
When Should I Accept a Return That Violates My Policy?
January 9th, 2024
By Jim Cahill
Your returns policy is an important rule that protects the company from return-related losses. Returns and refunds are often used as a way to scam a company and tax their resources. It's valuable to prevent frivolous returns or returns long after an order is purchased or delivered. However, there are also situations where there is more benefit from side-stepping your returns policy for the customer.
When should you accept a return that violates your typical returns policy? Let's explore the different reasons and scenarios where this might be a smart business decision.
To Accommodate a Good and Loyal Customer
Customer credibility is an...
2023 eCommerce Holiday Season Recap: A Record-Breaking Year
January 2nd, 2024
By Jim Cahill
The 2023 holiday season began with uncertainty due to the harsh economic times, but it registered record spending. Larger discounts impacted customers' impulse buying and willingness to spend.
Between the 1st and 27th of November, shoppers had already spent $109.3 billion online, a 7.3% year-over-year (YoY) increase from 2022. The following five categories made up 60% of the sales: Electronics ($21.7 billion), Apparel ($19.2 billion), Furniture ($14.7 billion), Grocery ($6.8 billion) and Toys ($3.1 billion).
We've compiled a helpful 2023 eCommerce holiday season recap below, so read on to learn more about trends from this holiday season.
Amazon Record Prime Big Deal Days...
Seasons Greetings from Freestyle Solutions
December 21st, 2023
By Jim Cahill
As the holiday season is in full swing, we'd like to wish you and your loved ones a very happy and healthy holiday season!
Warm wishes from all of us at Freestyle Solutions...
2023 eCommerce Holiday Return Projections
December 7th, 2023
By Jim Cahill
Let's face it, most of us are frankly quite terrible at predicting what kind of gifts our loved ones will truly appreciate. We go out of our way to try to find things that we believe our loved ones will appreciate, but it doesn't always pan out as we might have hoped.
According to data from the National Retail Federation, holiday gift purchases are returned at a far higher rate than other everyday purchases. Online eCommerce stores can see a return rate as high as 35% on holiday gifts compared to just 16% on everyday purchases.
So what does the forecast for...
2023 eCommerce Sales: Cyber Monday/Black Friday Recap
November 27th, 2023
By Jim Cahill
The holiday shopping rush is in full swing!
Preliminary data shows that 2023 Black Friday and Cyber Monday were record-breaking days for online retailers as more consumers did their holiday shopping online. While most major retailers easily handled the high volumes, a few experienced outages or long delays that frustrated shoppers and led to lost sales.
eCommerce platforms and order management systems were pushed to their limits, processing unprecedented order volumes over the busy Cyber Monday shopping period. The massive surge in online orders exposed weaknesses in some companies' systems that struggled under the weight of more traffic and transactions than ever...