What is ship from store?

Real-time store inventory visibility is essential.
When a customer places an order, the system must check store stock availability before presenting ship from store as a delivery option. Accurate inventory data ensures: Only available items are offered, overselling is avoided and store teams are not assigned impossible fulfilment tasks. Once the order is confirmed, the allocation process begins.

During allocation, stock is validated again to ensure accuracy. The system can apply business rules such as:

• Selecting the nearest store within delivery range
• Prioritising specific stores
• Considering opening hours
• Applying cost or margin logic
• Balancing store workload

Advanced OMS platforms automatically determine the best store based on these configurable rules.

After allocation, the store receives the picking request automatically via the OMS or store fulfilment application. deally; the store confirms receipt of the order, staff pick items using in-store software, stock levels update in real time, and order status is synchronised across systems. This reduces manual intervention and improves inventory accuracy.

Shipping can be handled in several ways:

• Store staff prepare and dispatch parcels
• Orders are dropped at a local carrier collection point
• A delivery partner collects from the store
• Local bike couriers or green delivery services are used

The right model depends on cost, delivery speed and sustainability goals.

Last but not least, before you can start with ship from store, it is important to have seamless integrations and alignment between all parties and parties involved. These can be between internal stakeholders, like the DC, stores and customer service, but also between external stakeholders like a delivery partner. Decent software integrations are important along every step of the ship from store process, so it should be a priority to focus on from the beginning. 

Without strong system alignment, store-based fulfilment becomes operationally complex.