Automated Dropshipping: What You Can Automate and What Stays with You

Automated dropshipping means software handles the repetitive work between your store and your supplier: importing products, setting prices, keeping stock in sync, and passing orders on. You still choose what to sell, market your store, and look after your customers.

With us, the BrandsGateway app or plugin imports designer fashion into your Shopify, WooCommerce, Wix, BigCommerce, or Shift4Shop store and keeps product information and stock updated in real time. Each order from your store appears in your BrandsGateway account, where you review and pay for it before we ship it to your customer. Below are the types of automation, what to set up first, and what stays with you.

What is automated dropshipping?

In dropshipping, you sell a supplier’s products in your store, your customer pays you, and the supplier ships the order directly to your customer. Automated dropshipping is the same model, with software doing the routine steps you would otherwise copy by hand, one product or one order at a time. If the model itself is new to you, start with what dropshipping is and how it works.

Automation runs the routine, not the business. It does not pick your products, write your ads, or answer your customer when a parcel is late. It also repeats whatever you set up, so a wrong setting reaches every product until someone checks it.

Types of dropshipping automation

Most of the work falls into five groups. A supplier’s store integration usually covers the first four. The fifth depends on the supplier, the carrier, and your store.

• Product import. Titles, descriptions, images, variations, SKUs, and quantities come into your store from the supplier’s catalog, filtered to what you want to sell. New arrivals that match your filters are added as they appear.
• Pricing rules and currency conversion. A markup turns the supplier’s price into your retail price, and conversion puts it in your store’s currency. Change the rule, and every product it covers follows.
• Stock sync. When an item sells out at the supplier, it is marked unavailable in your store, so you stop taking orders you cannot fill.
• Order hand-off. An order placed in your store reaches the supplier without anyone typing the address and items again.
• Shipping and tracking. The supplier ships the parcel, and a tracking number is issued for you to pass to your customer.

Around these sit the automations your store platform or other apps run: order confirmation emails, abandoned-cart reminders, and review requests. They speak to your customer in your name, so write and test them yourself.

Stock sync: why it matters most for designer fashion

Overselling is the costliest mistake in dropshipping, and designer fashion makes it easy. A basic T-shirt may be stocked by the hundred. Many designer items are held as a single piece per size, and once that piece sells, it is gone. If your store still shows it, the next order is one you cannot fill.

So stock sync is the automation that earns its keep first. With the BrandsGateway app or plugin, a product that goes out of stock in our catalog is marked unavailable in your store automatically. Product information and stock update in real time as the catalog changes, and new arrivals that match your import filters are added for you.

Sync takes over the counting. These decisions stay with you:

• Sold out or removed. With the Remove Out of Stock setting on, sold-out products are removed from your store at the next sync. With it off, they stay listed as out of stock, and the product pages can keep bringing in search traffic. The Helpdesk explains both options.
• Draft or live. On Shopify, the New Products as Draft setting holds new arrivals as drafts until you publish them, so you can check prices and descriptions first. If you rewrite titles or descriptions, do not combine it with Remove Out of Stock. A restocked product would come back as a new one, and your edits may be lost.
• Your store’s own settings. On Shopify, a product can show as sold out while stock exists if a BrandsGateway location is disabled or a market has no shipping rate. Check it in your store.

What to automate first, and what not to automate

Start where a mistake costs the most. For a designer catalog, that is stock sync and the order hand-off. An oversold item means a canceled order and a customer who may not come back. A product imported a day late costs you nothing.

Pricing comes next, and it needs the most care. A markup rule applies to every product it covers, so a wrong figure is wrong across the whole category at once. After any change, open a few products in each category and compare their prices with the rule.

Do not automate the choice of supplier or of products. Before you connect anything, find out what the supplier sells, where its goods come from, and what happens when an order goes wrong. These are the questions to ask a dropshipping supplier before you start.

Then keep a short weekly check: a few prices against your rule, a few sold-out items against your store, and any orders still waiting for payment.

How automated dropshipping works with BrandsGateway

1. Choose a plan and connect your store. The integration comes with a paid dropshipping plan, and each plan sets how many products you can import: see our dropshipping plans. Install the BrandsGateway app for Shopify, Wix, or BigCommerce, or the BrandsGateway plugin for WooCommerce or Shift4Shop. A custom-built store can use the REST API or a CSV file.
2. Filter and import. Choose products by brand, category, gender, price, and other filters, then import them. Images, titles, descriptions, and variations come with each product.
3. Set your prices. The app sets retail prices at a default 150% markup on the wholesale price. You can change the markup for each category and build a fixed shipping cost into your prices. If your store sells in another currency, choose it at import: product and shipping costs are converted from euros, and you can set your own exchange rate.
4. We keep your store in sync. Product information and stock update in real time, and new arrivals that match your filters are added.
5. Review and pay for each order. An order placed in your store appears in your BrandsGateway account automatically. Open it under Orders, choose the shipping and payment method, and pay. The Helpdesk shows how to purchase a dropshipping order.
6. We ship it. Orders are dispatched within 24–48 hours, white-label, with your company name as the sender. We deliver worldwide using UPS, FedEx, DHL, or your own shipping label. Economy shipping takes 3–5 business days within Europe and 5–8 outside Europe; Express shipping takes 1–3 and 3–4.
7. Pass on the tracking number. Once the parcel is prepared for shipment, its tracking number and carrier appear in your BrandsGateway account. Copy them into the order in your store, or send them to your customer.

The payment step is yours by design: nothing ships until you have seen the order and paid for it. We do not contact your customer, and every notification comes to you. Automatic order placement covers the order step in more detail.

What stays with you

• Your store and your customers. The dropshipping subscription does not include an online store. Your website, domain, marketing, and the work of bringing in customers remain part of your business.
• Customer service. Questions about sizes, delivery, or a late parcel come to you. The tracking number in your account answers most of them.
• Returns. Dropshipping orders have a 14-day return policy, counted from the day your customer receives the parcel. You request the return and choose our label or your own. The terms are on the shipping and returns page.

Is automated dropshipping worth it for your store?

It pays off once your catalog is too large, or changes too fast, to keep up with by hand. A designer range of a few hundred products, with sizes selling out every day, is past that point. A store selling a dozen products of its own may not need it.

The cost is your dropshipping plan plus your store platform. Set against it the hours you would spend updating stock and prices yourself, and the orders you would cancel each time an update is missed.

Illustrative example: an item with a €100 wholesale price is imported at the default 150% markup, so its retail price is €250. When your customer pays €250, the €150 difference is a 60% margin before shipping and fees. The two numbers are explained in markup vs. margin.

If you offer free shipping, build its cost into the price with the fixed shipping cost setting. Baymard Institute’s research on US online shoppers (page updated September 22, 2025) sets aside those who were just browsing. Of the rest who abandoned a cart, 40% named extra costs such as shipping, tax, and fees.

We supply over 47,000 products from over 800 brands: designer clothing, shoes, bags, and accessories. All products are 100% authentic and come with original tags, bought from the brands, their licensees, or official distributors. Create a free account to browse the catalog and wholesale prices before you choose a plan.