Run sheet
Post-Launch Checklist for a New Online Store
What to check in the first weeks after your store goes live: payouts, shipping labels, returns, taxes, customer emails, inventory and backups.
Store operations
What an order really earns, and how to run the store behind it
Shipping, returns, payments and platform choices for small online brands, explained with worked numbers you can swap for your own. Start with the margin calculator.
Order Margin Calculator for Online Stores
Profit per order after product, shipping, packaging and payment fees.
Enter price, product cost, shipping, packaging and payment fees to see profit per order, margin and the lowest price that breaks even.
Sections of the paper
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Shipping and fulfillment
Carriers, rates, packaging and when a fulfillment partner makes sense.
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Returns
Writing a returns policy people can follow, and processing returns without losing margin.
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Store platforms
Choosing an ecommerce platform and moving between them.
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Payments
Processor fees, chargebacks and payout timing.
The stockroom
The working reference behind the articles: a launch checklist, a glossary, a returns policy guide, a shipping comparison and a margin calculator. Examples use invented numbers you can swap for your own.
- Lexicon
Ecommerce Operations Glossary for Small Stores
Thirty-five operations terms, from abandoned cart to zone.
- Feature
How to Write a Returns Policy Customers Can Follow
The decisions behind a returns policy, a worked cost example and a plain-language template.
- Table
Shipping Options Compared by Service Type
Service types side by side, plus how weight and surcharges build the price.
- Charter
How Cart and Courier Tests Its Advice
How the editors check numbers, label examples and fix mistakes.
How the numbers get checked
Numbers get worked through before they get published.
- No rate cards
- Carrier and processor prices change often, so pages explain how a charge is built and where to read the current schedule.
- Sums run end to end
- Each example goes from price to profit, and the calculator pages use the same formulas, written out in plain words.
- Invented, and labeled
- Prices, fees and weights in the guides are placeholders. A page that uses them says so, and you swap in your own.