Prestashop is a complete turnkey solution for creating an online store quickly and easily.
You can fully customize your store, manage products, customers and orders… If dropshipping is becoming increasingly popular in e-commerce, what about Prestashop?
Is it possible to dropship with Prestashop, and under what conditions?
That’s what we’ll be looking at in this article.
What is dropshipping?
Dropshipping could be translated as “direct shipment” or “direct delivery”.
In traditional dropshipping, the customer orders a product from the e-commerce site, which collects payment, manages inventory and handles shipping.
In practice, with dropshipping, the e-commerce site acts not as a direct supplier, but as a reseller.
In simple terms, the customer orders a product on the website.
This order is then passed on by the merchant to the supplier.
It is this supplier (usually a wholesaler) who will deliver or ship the goods, and who will manage the inventory.
In dropshipping, the e-commerce site acts as an intermediary, collecting the proceeds of the sale and transferring part of them to the supplier.
To put products on sale, the site manager selects the products he wishes to offer from one or more suppliers.
There’s no need to build up or manage stock, as everything is handled by the suppliers themselves.
This is a significant advantage, since it’s possible to set up an online store without building up stock.
As for suppliers, their products can be promoted and ordered without having to manage the development of a customer base. 
Customers and dropshipping
As with any business, it’s vital that customers are satisfied.
Without this, not only will they not remain loyal to the site, but they are likely to give it bad publicity.
Good communication
Customers need to receive regular information on the progress of their orders and product deliveries.
This will help establish a relationship of trust between the site and the customer.
Secure payment
Customers also need to be reassured that they can order from the site in total security.
It must be clearly stated that payment is totally secure.
Transparent information
The origin and provenance of the products must be mentioned, as well as the various suppliers.
Once again, transparency is key, so that customers know they can buy with confidence.
Responsive customer service
Customer service that responds to enquiries via the contact form within 48 hours is also a plus.
All these “little” things will lead the customer to trust the site, place an order and recommend it. 
Suppliers and Prestashop dropshipping
Here again, it’s vital to choose your suppliers carefully, so as to build a relationship of trust with them.
Don’t settle for just one supplier.
It’s important to get in touch with several wholesalers to find out which one can supply the products you’re looking for.
Ideally, you should meet a supplier at least once to see how they work, and to make sure that the quality of their products and services are up to scratch.
Dropshipping with Prestashop
Prestashop is perfectly suited to setting up a classic online store, where the merchant sells stock, manages customers and sales, and ships products.
But is dropshipping possible with Prestashop?
Not only do you need to manage a catalog of products potentially sourced from several suppliers, but you also need to manage orders, transmit them and process payments to the right recipients.
Needless to say, without a good dose of automation, managing orders to different suppliers, accounting, VAT… will quickly become a headache. 
Dropshipping Prestashop steps
As we saw earlier, before you even think about how to dropship with Prestashop, you naturally need to find out about potential suppliers and select the ones you’re going to work with.
Once you’ve selected your suppliers, you’ll need to :
- import their products into the site catalog,
- price information,
- update inventories,
- forward orders to suppliers when they arrive
- etc…
All these tasks, while not complicated in themselves, are time-consuming when added together, and above all, they are repetitive.
Free Dropshipping Prestashop
One of the great advantages of Prestashop over other dropshipping competitors is that it’s free.
While some companies charge several dozen euros a month for access to this functionality, Prestashop offers it natively.
You can therefore use Prestashop’s native functionality toimport a catalog from a file (transmitted by the supplier, for example).
It’s efficient, but still requires a certain amount of work.
To ensure that the catalog corresponds exactly to what you want to present, you’ll need to adapt the supplier’s file, which can take some time.
And once the catalog is ready, you’ll still need to manage the orders. 
Automated Prestashop dropshipping with modules
Since Prestashop is scalable, the best solution is undoubtedly to use modules to automate all the repetitive tasks involved in dropshipping.
The downside is that most of these modules are not free.
You may need several to cover all your needs and suppliers.
But it’s probably better to invest a few hundred euros in modules and end up with an efficient, stable Prestashop dropshipping system than to try to manage everything yourself.
There are many modules available for managing dropshipping functionalities.
Most are priced between 50 and 250 euros.
They enable you to trade with one or more suppliers.
Your choice of module will undoubtedly be influenced by the supplier(s) you have selected.
Read the module descriptions carefully, so you can choose the one that best suits your needs, and possibly your supplier.
If you want to offer items from a single supplier, there may be a module dedicated to that supplier.
It may cost a little more than a “generic” dropshipping module, but it will take into account the supplier’s specifics and be optimized for working with them.
There is, for example, a specific module for BigBuy (a generalist supplier offering over 80,000 items) or for Cdiscount.
To conclude about Prestashop dropshipping
A dropshipping store can be set up quickly and easily with Prestashop.
Thanks to its many basic functions and the dedicated modules available, it’s possible to get started for a relatively modest sum.
Select your suppliers carefully, and don’t try to cut corners on the modules you use.
It’s these that will largely make or break your project.
By choosing the right modules, you’ll relieve yourself of the technical side of things and be able to concentrate on what’s most important: developing your business and satisfying your customers.
And if you need to customize certain features, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me.
As an expert Prestashop developer, I’ll be able to help you with your Prestashop dropshipping project.
