Let's just say it out loud: it's November, Black Friday is basically on your doorstep, and your peak season plan is either half-finished, sitting in a "next week" folder, or doesn't exist at all. Maybe your Q3 marketing worked way better than anyone expected and now you're staring at order volumes you've never seen before, or maybe this year was a total shit show and you've been so busy keeping your head above water that peak planning never made it onto the to-do list. Either way, you're not the first company to end up here and you won't be the last, but failing to plan for peak doesn't mean all is lost. Luckily I am here and there is still a lot you can do between now and December to keep your shipping spend under control, still deliver what your customers expect, and retain your sanity (mostly).
18 Things You Can Still Do
Call your carrier rep today. Find out your peak surcharges, volume caps, and pickup limits now, because finding out your account is capped in the middle of Cyber Week is a very bad day.
Line up backup delivery options. You don't have time to onboard a new contracted carrier, but local couriers and multi-carrier shipping platforms can usually get you options within a day or two.
Move your order cutoff dates earlier than you think. Then publish them everywhere (site banner, checkout, emails) so customers know the real deadline for holiday delivery.
Reset your delivery promises. If your site says two to three days and reality is going to be five to seven, change it now, because it’s better for items to show up earlier than expected rather than later.
Back your bestsellers and pull back on the problem children. Pause promos on slow movers or bulky items that eat up space and shipping budget, and put your spend behind the products you can ship easily.
Turn off ads for anything running low. Paying to send people to a product you're about to sell out of is lighting money on fire and setting up a customer service issue at the same time.
Set order limits on hot items. Capping how many units one customer can buy keeps resellers from cleaning you out and spreads your stock across more happy customers.
Add extra shifts or weekend shipping days. Running a Saturday shift through December is usually cheaper than paying for expedited shipping to dig yourself out of a backlog later.
Pre-pack your top sellers this week. Bundle your bestsellers and gift sets before the rush hits so those orders become grab-and-label instead of build-from-scratch packages.
Offer local pickup if you can. If customers can get to your store or warehouse, curbside pick up takes those orders out of the carrier network completely.
Adjust your free shipping threshold. Bumping the minimum up a little can help cover peak surcharges without tanking your conversions.
Give customers a slower, cheaper option. Plenty of shoppers will happily choose "arrives by December 20th" at a lower price, which takes pressure off your pricier service levels.
Decide who gets priority before things get tight. Know ahead of time which orders ship first if capacity crunches, whether that's your VIPs, your high-margin orders, or anything with a holiday deadline attached.
Have a plan for after the cutoff. Once shipping deadlines pass, push digital gift cards so the last-minute shoppers still buy from you instead of bouncing to someone else.
Talk to your customers before they talk to you. Proactive tracking emails and honest delay notices cut way down on "where's my order?" messages, and people are much more forgiving when they hear it from you first.
Prep your customer service team. Update your FAQs, build saved replies for the top ten questions, and think about extended hours.
Freeze anything non-essential. Now is not the time to launch a new website, switch software, or rearrange the warehouse, so park the shiny ball projects until February.
Run a daily 15-minute check-in. Look at orders shipped, backlog, carrier performance, and complaints every single day so you catch problems while they're still small.
Important to Note
If you only do one thing, get every department on the same page. Marketing, shipping, production, and customer service all need to know what the others are doing, because nothing blows up peak faster than marketing launching a flash sale the warehouse never heard about.
Realistically, you won’t get through this whole list, and that’s fine. Pick the ones you can actually pull off now, accept that the rest will have to wait until next year, and tackle one a day for the next week before you take stock again. If you have room to do more, go for it, and if things are just too busy, don’t beat yourself up about it. The goal is to survive until January and get through returns season. Then, once the dust settles, sit down and write out what went sideways so you can work on a plan for next year. Because the only thing worse than scrambling through one unplanned peak season is scrambling through two.
