Shopify will print packing slips for as many orders as you select. What it won't give you is a picking list, and the two aren't the same thing. A packing slip tells the customer what's in the box. A picking list tells your team what to go and collect, in an order that makes sense on your shelves.
That's manageable while one person picks every order and knows the range by heart. It stops being manageable earlier than most people expect. A few hundred orders a month, a second person on the bench, or a product range where several items look alike, and walking the shelves from a stack of slips stops being reliable.
The errors that follow are expensive in a way that doesn't show up in your shipping costs. A mispick means a return, a replacement, the postage on both, and a customer who now knows you get things wrong.
A working pick and pack process removes the two places errors get in: the walk, and the pack.
- Decide what a batch looks like for your operation
A batch is the group of orders you pick in one go. Single item orders are usually worth batching separately, since they need no consolidation and move fastest. Beyond that, batch by whatever reflects how your stock is laid out, by product type, storage area or order size. Get this right and the rest of the process follows from it.
- Assign the carrier before anyone starts picking
Build rules in Zenstores Automations so each Shopify order arrives with its carrier and service already set, based on weight, destination, order value, SKU or channel. Doing this before picking means the label is ready when the parcel is, and nobody at the bench is making a shipping decision while holding a box.
- Pick the batch in one route
Zenstores prints your labels and paperwork in picking order, so the sequence through your shelves is set before anyone starts walking. One trip collects everything the batch needs rather than one trip per order. This is where most of the time comes back, and it's the change that scales furthest as volume grows.
- Verify each item by scan before sealing
Your packer scans each item's barcode against the order at the bench. The mismatch gets caught there, with the box open, rather than by the customer three days later. This matters most with new starters, temporary staff and products that look alike, which is exactly when eyeballing it stops working.
- Dispatch and Shopify updates
Shipping labels, packing slips and customs documentation print as part of the run rather than as separate jobs. Marking the batch dispatched pushes tracking numbers back to Shopify and fulfils the orders, so customer notifications go out without anyone copying numbers across. Anything that didn't match a rule is waiting in a flagged list rather than sitting unnoticed in the queue.
Would give 10 stars if I could. Alex and the team at Zenstores have pulled out the stops to help our warehouse team be more efficient. Zenstores added additional functionality to add stock locations to our picking sheets. It's a great app that ties in Royal Mail and DPD into one system that integrates with Shopify in one click. Love it! Keep up the good work
VELCRO Brand
Frequently Asked Questions
Isn't a packing slip the same as a picking list?
No, and using one as the other is where a lot of errors start. A packing slip lists what's in a single parcel, for the customer. A picking list groups what a batch of orders needs, sequenced for your shelves, so your team walks the route once instead of once per order.
Is Zenstores a 3PL?
No. Zenstores is shipping automation tech that runs your own pick, pack and dispatch process in your own space. If you're looking to outsource fulfilment entirely, that's a 3PL, which is a different decision with different trade-offs.
Do I need a barcode scanner?
For scan to pack, yes, and an inexpensive USB scanner is enough to start. A thermal printer isn't required, since integrated labels put the shipping label and dispatch note on one A4 sheet, so a laser or inkjet printer works.
What order volume makes this worth doing?
Lower than most people assume. It's less about a number than about whether more than one person picks, and whether anyone packing could confuse two of your products. Once either is true, the verification step pays for itself quickly, and batching pays back from the first busy week.
Does this work if I sell on other channels too?
Yes. Zenstores integrates with Shopify, Amazon, eBay, Etsy, TikTok, WooCommerce and Magento. So if your business is multi-channel a batch can span every channel and your team packs in one run instead of working channel by channel.
How does this handle bundles and multi-item orders?
Each item in the order is scanned individually, so a bundle is verified component by component rather than treated as one line. That's usually where mis-picks happen, because the packer is working from memory about what a bundle contains.
What happens to orders that don't fit the rules?
They're flagged for review rather than assigned a service automatically. Your team deals with the batch, then the exceptions, which is a much shorter list to check than the whole day's dispatch.
