Your shipping deadlines for Sinterklaas and Christmas: here's how to count back from the delivery date
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by Verpakkingdeals.nl
6 min reading time
A shipping deadline is a promise you keep. This means counting back from the delivery date, placing the date where your customer looks, and ensuring your stock and packing station can handle the peak.
In mid-December, there's always one order that costs you sleep: Tuesday evening at eleven, with "must be delivered Thursday, it's a gift" in the comments. You know it's probably not going to work out. What you're missing at that moment isn't an extra carrier—it's a date you should have set and published in October.
A shipping deadline is nothing more than a promise you keep. It consists of three parts: the time the carrier needs, the time you need, and a margin for bad luck. Below, you'll calculate it back step by step, and then make sure you actually meet it.
Start with the delivery date, not your own calendar
First, write down the days when the package needs to be with the customer. For most Dutch webshops, there are two: the evening before Sinterklaas eve, and the last working day before Christmas. Those who also ship to Belgium and Germany need a third date, as delivery days there are earlier. Count back from that day:
Carrier transit time. Carriers publish their final delivery dates for the holidays every year. Look them up with your own carrier as soon as they are announced and adopt them—do not estimate them based on last year.
Your own processing time. How many hours pass between "order received" and "box at the drop-off point"? For most small webshops, that's not an hour but half a day, because you drop off shipments once a day.
One working day margin. Not for the carrier, but for yourself: an item that turns out not to be in stock, a printer that stops printing labels, a day of illness.
What remains is your cut-off: the day and time by which an order must be placed. Write it down as one sentence. "Order before Monday 3 PM? Then it will be on time for Sinterklaas eve." That's more concrete than "order on time" and it's verifiable.
Know what your own process really costs
Most deadlines are missed not at the carrier but at the packing table. Therefore, measure one ordinary day: how many minutes does an order take from picking slip to sealed box, and how many orders do you process per hour? Multiply that by your expected peak volume. If it exceeds the number of hours you have that day, your deadline is merely a wish.
One line in your terms and conditions is not communication. Put the deadline in at least four places:
A bar at the top of your site. Short, with the date included, and update it as soon as it has passed.
The product page. Near the shipping block, close to the button. That's when someone is hesitating.
The shopping cart and checkout page. This is where a gift buyer drops off if they're unsure.
The order confirmation. Repeat when the package will be shipped, so your customer doesn't email after two days.
Also mention what is still possible after the deadline: ordering with delivery after the holidays, pickup if you have a location, or a package sent directly to the recipient. This keeps the order instead of someone closing their shopping cart.
Make sure you can actually fulfill the promise
Meeting a deadline is primarily an inventory issue — not of your products, but of your consumables. Tape, void fill, and seals are cheap and small, which is precisely why you forget them. In early November, count what you have and double it for December:
Store that inventory in one place and keep it flat and dry, for example, in a 50-liter moving box (€3.50) per type. If you have someone helping out, tape a brief work instruction to the wall: which box for which product, where the tape is, and at what time the last shipment needs to go out.
What to do if an order still doesn't make it
There will always be an order that comes in just too late. Decide now what you'll do then, so you don't have to figure it out in the rush. Three workable options: you send a message within an hour with an honest expectation, you offer to send the package directly to the recipient with a card, or you split the order so that the part in stock ships and the rest follows later. What you definitely don't do is stay silent and hope: a customer who receives a package late but was informed on time rarely complains.
After the holidays, note two numbers: how many orders you processed on the peak day, and how many were late despite your deadline. These are the two numbers you'll start with next October.
Everything ready in one place
Want to replenish your autumn stock all at once? Check letterbox packaging for bundles of 100, boxes for larger sizes, tape for rolls and dispensers, and protection & void fill for film and filling material. Under bulk packaging for webshops, you'll find large packages together. Not sure how much you need for your weekly order volume? Email your average weekly volume and most frequently used box size to info@verpakkingdeals.nl, and we'll calculate a proposal for you.
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