3PL · Ecommerce Fulfillment Same-day Chicago fulfillment for Shopify, Amazon FBA, and ecommerce brands. 5 PM CT cutoff, custom-scoped pricing, no annual contract.
Trusted by brands shipping across midwest
Toyota
Pacific Foods
Rad Power
Mystery Ranch
Brooklyn Bicycle
Cobian
BOCCI
Merkury
Written by the Vertex operations team
Marco, Kim, Tom & Sara · Receiving, Pick & Pack, FBA Prep, Account Management
Last reviewed by our team on May 10, 2026 against current CBRE Chicago + NAI Hiffman + CIC Joliet/Elwood data.
Your Chicago 3PL is in Will County, and that's the whole point. The address every "Chicago" 3PL pitch quietly skips is 50 miles southwest of the Loop, on top of the largest inland port in North America.
CenterPoint Intermodal Center at Joliet/Elwood runs 17M SF across 6,400 acres and 50-plus tenants, moves 3M+ TEUs per year (roughly Seattle and Tacoma combined), and sits inside the I-80/Joliet Corridor (122M SF, the single largest industrial submarket in the United States). All seven Class I railroads converge here. ORD ranks #1 in the Americas by cargo value. FTZ #22 lets you defer duty on Asian-origin inventory and stage it for FBA, retail, or DTC as tariff policy moves.
We operate from the Chicago area as part of our 20+ warehouse US and Canadian network. This page covers what we ship from where, what we charge, where we win, and where we send you to a competitor.
Key takeaways
Chicago is the U.S. centroid. From Will County, 2-day truck reach covers 80%+ of the U.S. population, and we hold a 5 PM CT cutoff so orders placed at end-of-business East Coast still ship same day.
The real Chicago inbound advantage is intermodal, not just air. CenterPoint Joliet/Elwood handles 3M+ TEUs/year (roughly the Ports of Seattle and Tacoma combined), and BNSF Logistics Park Chicago was the first U.S. intermodal facility to clear 1M annual lifts (2016). ORD adds 2.07M MT of air cargo (2024) for time-sensitive lanes and ranks #1 in the Americas by cargo value.
CBRE Q1 2026 reports 8.6 percent Chicago availability with 12.4M SF in the pipeline. Colliers shows 4.91 percent direct vacancy and 3.8M SF of absorption the same quarter. We hold capacity in the I-80/Will County rate band rather than in-Loop or O'Hare-South premiums.
We fit brands shipping 500+ DTC orders per month with national or Midwest-heavy demand, or import volume that benefits from West Coast rail intermodal to CenterPoint. Below 200 orders per month, smaller Chicagoland boutiques like Ware-Pak, HexPrep, and Cold Chain 3PL beat us on cost.
Why Chicago
CenterPoint Intermodal Center at Joliet/Elwood is the largest inland port in North America: 6,400 acres, 50-plus tenants, 17M SF occupied, and 3M+ TEUs moved every year (CIC Joliet/Elwood; FHWA). It combines BNSF's 770-acre Logistics Park Chicago (the first U.S. intermodal facility to ever hit 1M annual lifts in 2016) with Union Pacific's 785-acre Joliet Intermodal Terminal on adjacent campuses, was built on the former Joliet Army Arsenal, is owned by CalPERS, and operates inside FTZ #22. CIC's tenant roster reads like a national-DC org chart: Amazon (4.2M SF), Walmart (3.5M + 1.1M SF), Target (1.4M + 1.2M SF), Home Depot (2.2M SF, equivalent to all 20 of its Chicago-area stores combined), IKEA (~1M SF), plus J.B. Hunt, Schneider, NFI, Saddle Creek, CJ Logistics, Mars, and Samsung. The Houbolt Road Extension toll bridge opened in 2024 to drop intermodal trucks straight onto I-80 without crossing Joliet city streets.
The I-80/Joliet Corridor itself is 122M SF, the single largest industrial submarket in Chicagoland and bigger than the entire Nashville industrial market (NAI Hiffman Q3 2025). Chicagoland's total inventory is 1.373B SF, ahead of DFW and the Inland Empire and the largest in the country. CBRE Q1 2026 puts availability at 8.6% with $9.03/SF NNN asking rents and a 12.4M SF pipeline; Colliers Q1 2026 shows 4.91% direct vacancy and 3.8M SF of absorption the same quarter. Will County's multimodal freight is projected to hit $1.2 trillion by 2040. All seven Class I railroads (BNSF, UP, NS, CSX, CN, CPKC, KCS) converge in Chicago, the only U.S. metro with full coverage, and Chicago handles roughly 50% of all U.S. intermodal trains.
Two beats most "Chicago 3PL" pages bury. First, Chicago is the U.S. cold-chain capital: Lineage Logistics, the world's #1 cold-storage operator at 2.1B cu ft across North America, runs flagship facilities at 2500 S. Damen and the Bedford Park cluster, and in April 2025 GEODIS opened the Americas' first dedicated healthcare cold-chain cross-dock at ORD (CEIV Pharma certified, the fourth U.S. GEODIS site to earn it). Second, FTZ #22 is the only Foreign Trade Zone in the Chicago region; it covers Cook, DuPage, Grundy, Kankakee, Kendall, Lake, and Will counties (the entire CenterPoint footprint sits inside it). AbbVie's Subzone 22S in North Chicago runs a $25B+ pharma operation on FTZ duty deferral. Same tariff-arbitrage playbook as Houston's FTZ 84, layered on top of intermodal rail instead of ocean drayage. Honesty paragraph: Warehouse Workers for Justice estimates ~70% of Will County warehouse workers are temp, averaging ~$12.81/hr across roughly 100 staffing agencies; IDOT rates I-80 truck parking "high need" with 40% of District 1 facilities over capacity; truck miles in Will County are forecast to rise 57% by 2050. Drivers describe Joliet/Elwood ramp queues as "stealing half a shift" during peak. We staff a dedicated DTC pool, pre-book rail slots 5 to 10 days out, and route through Houbolt Road to bypass Joliet city traffic.
What it unlocks
We operate in the Chicago area as part of our 20+ warehouse US and Canadian network, positioned for CenterPoint Joliet/Elwood intermodal drayage, BNSF + UP rail access, ORD air-cargo pickup, and the I-80 / I-55 / I-57 / I-294 interstate convergence that puts 80%+ of U.S. population in 2-day ground range.
3M+ TEUs per year (roughly Seattle and Tacoma combined) and 50-plus tenants on the largest inland port in North America. BNSF + UP rail terminals on adjacent campuses, with Houbolt Road dropping intermodal trucks straight onto I-80.
Chicago availability sits at 8.6 percent. We hold capacity in the broader I-80 / Will County rate band rather than in-Loop or O'Hare-South premiums that run 25 to 40 percent higher.
We route direct to Amazon ORD4, ORD5, MDW2, MDW6, and MKE5. West Coast rail intermodal feeds inventory to Midwest FBA the same week without an LA staging leg.
From a Chicago footprint, 2-day truck reach covers 80%+ of the U.S. population. Chicago is the only U.S. metro served by all seven Class I railroads, and we handle ~50% of U.S. intermodal trains.
For Shopify brands
A Chicago 3PL is the right call for a Shopify brand when national 2-day reach, intermodal-fed imports, or Midwest concentration matters most. From Will County, 80%+ of the U.S. population sits inside 2-day ground without paying for Express. Below 200 monthly orders, a Chicago 3PL at our cost-to-serve almost never pencils out.
Yes if
No if
If "yes" lands on you, the next question is which Shopify-side workflow tests separate ops-grade Chicago 3PLs from ones that look good on a sales call. Six questions to ask any operator below.
| Workflow | What should happen | What usually breaks | Question to ask |
|---|---|---|---|
| New order arrives | In the pick queue near real time | Polling intervals over 5 minutes; orders missed during peak | How often does your sync run, and what is the worst-case lag? |
| Inventory level changes | Pushes back to Shopify in real time | Daily batch updates → oversells during peak hours | Is inventory sync push or pull, and at what frequency? |
| Tracking number written | Posts to Shopify the moment carrier scans | Manual upload at end of day; customer emails arrive late | When exactly does tracking hit Shopify? |
| Pre-order / backorder | Order holds, ships when stock arrives | Order silently fails or ships partial without notice | How does your WMS handle backorders without losing the customer relationship? |
| Returns refund trigger | Refund triggers on return scan-in (or on inspection pass) | Returns sit unprocessed for days, customer service workload | What event triggers the refund: receipt, inspection, or restock? |
| Subscription orders | Routed separately, with subscription-specific packouts | Sub orders treated as one-time DTC, no recharge protection | How do you tag and prioritize Recharge / Skio subscription orders? |
For Amazon FBA brands
A 3PL in Chicago alongside Amazon FBA gets specific value when you import via West Coast rail or ORD air freight and want first-port prep before routing to Amazon's Chicagoland fulfillment centers (ORD4, ORD5, MDW2, MDW6, MKE5). Pure FBA-only domestic-supplier brands rarely need it.
Yes if
No if
Most multi-channel Amazon sellers importing through the West Coast benefit from a Chicago 3PL specifically because CenterPoint shortens the inbound cycle to Midwest FBA and gives you optionality on FBA versus DTC routing per SKU.
Scope
A common mistake brands make when scoping a Chicago 3PL is treating it as a generic warehouse. Warehouses store things. A 3PL is closer to an operations team that happens to live in a warehouse. Knowing the line between what we own and what stays with your team prevents the most common onboarding fights.
✓ The 3PL owns
✗ The brand owns
Order flow
Chicago doesn't have a deepwater port. Inbound is BNSF or UP rail intermodal from the West Coast (LA / Long Beach, Tacoma, Seattle) into CenterPoint Joliet/Elwood, or ORD air cargo for time-sensitive lanes. Drayage runs the final miles to our Will County / I-80 facility along the Plainfield / Bolingbrook industrial cluster. Here is the exact path from rail or air arrival to porch. Ten steps, mapped to who does what and where the typical 3PL drops the ball.
Your supplier or freight forwarder sends an ASN (Advance Shipping Notice) or simple email with PO, expected SKUs, container count, and ETA. We pre-allocate a receiving dock window at our Will County facility.
An ASN is a structured file (EDI 856 or our standard CSV / spreadsheet) that lists every SKU, expected quantity, container or pallet ID, and ETA before the freight arrives. With an ASN, our receiving team pre-prints labels, pre-assigns rack locations, and starts unload the moment the rail container or truck checks in. Without an ASN, every container takes 2 to 4 extra hours because we have to reverse-engineer the shipment on the dock. We accept both EDI and a simple template if your supplier is small.
Container arrives at BNSF Logistics Park Chicago or UP Joliet Intermodal Terminal via West Coast rail (LA/LB, Tacoma, Seattle), or air freight clears ORD. Drayage truck moves it the short hop to our Will County / I-80 facility.
Most Asia imports rail from the West Coast (Los Angeles / Long Beach, Tacoma, Seattle) to CenterPoint Joliet/Elwood, then drayage runs the final miles to our facility along I-80. CenterPoint moves 3M+ TEUs per year (roughly Seattle and Tacoma combined), and BNSF LPC was the first U.S. intermodal facility to ever clear 1M annual lifts. ORD handles 2.07M MT of cargo per year for time-sensitive air-freight lanes and ranks #1 in the Americas by cargo value. We route through Houbolt Road to bypass Joliet city traffic.
Cases are unloaded, scanned, counted against the ASN. Discrepancies (short / over / damaged) are flagged and photo-documented inside 24 hours.
Every case gets a barcode scan against the ASN line item. If the count matches, the SKU moves to putaway. If it does not (short ship, over-ship, damaged outer), our team photo-documents the variance with timestamps and dock-door ID, then logs it in our exception queue. You get an email within 24 hours with the photos, the variance, and our recommended next step (claim with carrier, request supplier credit, accept and adjust on-hand).
SKUs are binned to designated rack or floor locations using our WMS. Lot codes and expiry dates captured at this step for food / supplements / beauty SKUs.
Putaway is the act of moving received cases from the dock to a permanent rack or floor location. Our WMS assigns the location based on velocity (fast-movers near the pack table, slow-movers in deep storage), pallet height, and lot rotation rules. For food, supplements, and beauty SKUs we capture lot code and expiry at putaway so FIFO (First-In-First-Out) picks always grab the earliest-expiring stock first.
A good WMS pulls orders from Shopify, Amazon, BigCommerce, and your ERP near real time. New orders appear in the pick queue automatically. We run Datex Footprint for this.
Order sync is the live link between your sales channels and our pick queue. A good WMS polls Shopify, Amazon Seller Central, BigCommerce, and ERP systems frequently so the order is in the pick queue shortly after checkout. We run Datex Footprint for this. Inventory levels push back to your store when the pick is confirmed, which prevents oversells during traffic spikes.
Orders are batched into pick waves based on carrier cutoff time. DTC same-day orders run first, B2B and retail run second.
A wave is a batch of orders released to the floor as a single pick task. We organize waves by carrier sweep time (UPS at 4 PM, FedEx at 5 PM, USPS at 5:30 PM CT) and by service level. DTC same-day orders run in the first wave because their cutoff is tightest. B2B and retail outbound run in later waves where the carrier sweep is later. This sequencing keeps small fast orders from waiting behind a large pallet pick.
Pickers scan each item against barcode and bin location. A good WMS rejects mispicks before they reach the pack table. That is how an operator holds pick accuracy in the high-nineties consistently.
Picking is the moment a worker grabs the right SKU off the shelf for an order. A good WMS forces a barcode scan at every pick, comparing the scanned SKU against the order line. If they do not match, the system blocks the pick and routes the worker back to the correct bin. That double-check is what keeps a 3PL at high-nineties shipped-correct accuracy across high order volumes.
Packers select carton, add inserts, generate carrier label, weigh, and tape. Each pack table runs a triple-check process before the parcel leaves the station.
At the pack station, the worker selects the right-size carton (we calculate dim weight to keep your shipping costs low), adds any inserts (thank-you cards, samples, marketing flyers you supply), prints the carrier label, weighs the parcel, and tapes. Three checks happen before the parcel leaves: SKU match, label match, and weight sanity check. If any fail, the parcel goes to a re-pack station before it ships.
Parcels stage by carrier (UPS, FedEx, USPS, DHL, Canada Post). Carrier sweeps happen at fixed daily windows. Tracking pushes back to Shopify and Amazon automatically.
Parcels stage in carrier-specific zones near the loading dock. UPS, FedEx, USPS, DHL, and Canada Post each have their own daily sweep window with us; Chicago is the U.S. centroid, so 2-day ground reaches 80%+ of the country from a single node. The moment a carrier scans a label at sweep, that scan event pushes back to your Shopify or Amazon order page so the customer sees a tracking number in real time. No manual tracking uploads, no end-of-day batch lag.
Inbound returns are received, inspected against your disposition rules (restock, refurbish, scrap), and the result writes back to inventory. You get a daily returns report.
Returns come back to a dedicated returns dock. Our team inspects each item against your disposition rules (which you set during onboarding): restock if A-grade, refurbish if B-grade and re-label, scrap if damaged. The result writes back to your inventory in real time. Your refund logic can fire on any of three triggers (parcel scan-in, inspection pass, or restock complete) so you control whether the customer gets refunded fast or only after we confirm condition.
Pricing reality
Most 3PL pricing comparisons get hung up on pick-and-pack rates, which are usually within a penny or two between providers. The real difference shows up in receiving, storage, and how exceptions are billed. Here is where to look:
| Cost area | How it's charged | What raises the invoice | What you must define |
|---|---|---|---|
| Receiving | Per pallet or per container | Mixed SKUs per pallet, no ASN, damaged outers | ASN format, palletization standard, damage tolerance |
| Storage | Per pallet / per cubic foot / month | Long-tail SKUs, slow-movers, packaging that wastes airspace | Storage type (rack vs floor vs bin), long-term tier breakpoints |
| Pick & pack | Per order, per item, sometimes per SKU | Multi-item orders with kitting, gift wrap, custom inserts | Standard SKU vs kit, included vs add-on packout steps |
| Carrier costs | Pass-through, sometimes with markup | Use of 3PL's carrier account vs your own, dimensional weight pricing | Whose carrier account, who pays surcharges (residential, peak) |
| Rail intermodal | Per container | CenterPoint Joliet/Elwood ramp queues during peak (drivers report queues "stealing half a shift"); chassis availability; Houbolt Road tolls | Whose drayage account at the BNSF / UP ramp, container detention tolerance, Houbolt routing preference |
| FBA inbound prep | Per unit prepped | Polybagging, FNSKU labels, bundle requirements | Prep scope, who buys polybags, which FBA codes you ship to |
| Returns | Per return + handling | Inspection beyond visual, refurbishment steps, photos required | Disposition rules: restock / refurbish / scrap, photo requirements |
Failure modes
Five failure modes specific to LA-region fulfillment. Not generic 3PL problems. The ones that hit when port congestion stacks with peak-season demand and shared labor goes thin.
| Failure mode | Why it happens | How Vertex handles it |
|---|---|---|
| Container stuck at Joliet/Elwood ramp | CenterPoint ramp queues during peak (Lunar New Year imports, BFCM build-ups); chassis shortages at BNSF LPC or UP Joliet; drivers describe peak queues as "stealing half a shift." | A good Chicago 3PL pre-books rail slots well ahead of peak, holds relationships with multiple drayage carriers at the CenterPoint ramps, routes through Houbolt Road to bypass Joliet city traffic, and flags urgent containers (live shows, FBA peak) so they do not sit. |
| Inbound takes 5+ days to pickable | Receiving team buried under stale POs, no ASN discipline, rail container offload delays. | We enforce ASN format upfront, cap unannounced inbound, and stage rail containers with chassis-stay programs so we are not waiting at the ramp. |
| Same-day cutoff slipping | Pickers shared with retail B2B during peak; Will County temp labor reality (Warehouse Workers for Justice estimates ~70% temp, ~$12.81/hr avg, ~100 staffing agencies); carrier sweep moved up without notice during BFCM. | We staff a dedicated DTC labor pool with vetted operators (not generalist temp), and lock carrier sweep windows in writing during onboarding. |
| FBA inbound rejected | Polybag or FNSKU spec changed without notice; wrong FBA code routed (ORD4 versus MDW2 mix-up). | We subscribe to Amazon prep updates, re-validate FNSKUs on a recurring cadence, and route by ZIP rather than salesperson preference. |
| Storage tier surprise | Colliers Q1 2026 reports 4.91% direct vacancy and rents climbing 5.2% YoY (CBRE); some operators reclassify slow-mover SKUs into higher tiers to pass through pressure. | We send a monthly slow-mover report, flag any SKU approaching the tier breakpoint, and write a clear-out plan into onboarding. |
When this isn't a fit
We are not the right 3PL for everyone shipping from Chicago. Here is the honest list of cases where you should pick someone else.
You ship under 200 DTC orders per month. Smaller Chicagoland boutiques (Ware-Pak, HexPrep, Cold Chain 3PL, Axis Warehouse, NorthPoint Fresh) and match-services (Fulfill.com, Third Person, WareMatch, 3plhub.co) will run cheaper at your volume. We work best at 500 orders per month and up, or B2B and retail programs that justify dedicated handling.
Your customer base is 90%+ coastal. Chicago is the centroid play. We will split your inventory across our Chicago + LA + East Coast nodes if you want national reach (and we will quote that), but a single-node Chicago setup for a coastal-only brand is the wrong shape.
You need walk-in retail or B2C drop-off. We do not run customer-facing counters at our facilities.
You require unstable or undefined inbound (no ASNs, surprise containers, ad-hoc SKU labeling). We can onboard this, and we will quote with a higher cost-to-serve to match.
You need cold-chain freezer fulfillment (frozen or refrigerated pharma). Our Chicago facility runs ambient-only. Lineage Logistics, Americold, and Cold Chain 3PL handle the freezer 3PL tier; GEODIS at ORD runs the Americas' first CEIV Pharma cold-chain cross-dock.
You need a bonded sufferance customs warehouse or FTZ #22 direct duty deferral. We are not a designated FTZ #22 operator. For brands where the AbbVie-tier FTZ math justifies the overhead, we point you to FTZ #22 specialists in the Chicago region.
Reach from Chicago
From our Chicago footprint, your inventory reaches a defined 1-day and 2-day ground zone, plus cross-border to Canada through our Canadian network. No separate Canadian 3PL setup required.
1-day delivery
Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, Missouri, Kentucky, Ohio, Minnesota
2-day delivery
80%+ of U.S. homes, including New York, Atlanta, Dallas, and Denver
Cross-border to Canada
1 business day to Toronto and Vancouver via our Canadian network.
5 PM CT
Same-day cutoff
9.4M (Chicago MSA)
Metro pop served
5+
FBA codes routed
Comparison
A few honest comparisons. We're not the right fit for every brand shipping from LA, and where we're not, here's where we'd send you.
Chicago-area footprint + CenterPoint intermodal positioning + 20+ warehouse US/Canadian network
Founder-led, no-minimum operators (Ware-Pak, HexPrep, Cold Chain 3PL)
Mid-market regional 3PLs (RJW Logistics, WSI, NFI, CJ Logistics)
ShipBob HQ'd in Chicago (Cicero FC), plus DHL 1.21M SF Plainfield SPEC, GEODIS, CEVA
Lineage Logistics (2.1B cu ft N. America #1), Americold, GEODIS ORD pharma
Vertex pricing
Pick-and-pack starts at $1.05 per DTC order. Everything else — receiving, storage, FBA prep, kitting, returns — is scoped to your SKU mix, channel set, and packout spec. Show us your current 3PL invoice and we'll tell you where we beat it, line by line.
Pick & pack
Per DTC order, standard SKU
from $1.05 /order
Everything else
Receiving, storage, FBA prep, kitting, returns, multi-channel routing — quoted on a call against your real order volume and SKU profile. We do not publish a per-pallet or per-cu-ft rate sheet because the honest answer depends on what you ship.
Bring your current invoice
Already at another 3PL? Send us your last three invoices. We will reply with a side-by-side and tell you whether we can beat it. If we cannot, we will say so.
What every brand gets
Bring your current invoice. We will reply with a line-by-line comparison.
FAQs about Chicago fulfillment
We operate in the Chicago area as part of our 20+ warehouse US and Canadian network. The actual ecommerce operations market sits in Will County along the I-80 corridor where the inland-port intermodal cluster lives. Our footprint is positioned for CenterPoint Joliet/Elwood intermodal drayage, BNSF Logistics Park Chicago and UP Joliet rail access, and ORD air-cargo pickup.
CenterPoint Intermodal Center is the largest inland port in North America: 6,400 acres, 50-plus tenants, 17M SF, and 3M+ TEUs per year, roughly the combined volume of the Ports of Seattle and Tacoma (CIC Joliet/Elwood; FHWA). BNSF Logistics Park Chicago was the first U.S. intermodal facility to ever hit 1M annual lifts (2016). For brands importing via West Coast rail, this is the fastest port-to-Midwest-warehouse cycle in the country.
Orders placed before 5 PM CT ship the same business day. Orders after the cutoff ship the next business day. Saturday cutoffs are available on request for high-volume DTC programs.
Yes. We prep and route to ORD4, ORD5, MDW2, MDW6, and MKE5 directly from our Chicago-area facility. FBA labeling, polybagging, and inbound shipment plans are all included. We re-validate FNSKUs on a recurring cadence so Amazon spec changes do not cause inbound rejections.
Yes. Cross-border to Canada is 1 to 2 business days from our Chicago footprint via our Canadian network. Toronto is a straight shot on I-94 and Detroit. We handle Section 321 entry, DDP / DDU shipping, and customs paperwork in one workflow.
We are not a designated FTZ #22 operator. FTZ #22 is the only Foreign Trade Zone in the Chicago region, covering Cook, DuPage, Grundy, Kankakee, Kendall, Lake, and Will counties. AbbVie's Subzone 22S in North Chicago runs a $25B+ pharma operation on FTZ duty deferral. For brands where the FTZ math justifies the overhead (typically high-tariff inbound at AbbVie scale), we point you to FTZ #22 specialists in the Chicago region. For most ecommerce brands, the FTZ overhead does not pay back versus standard duty entry.
Possibly, and we plan around it. Drivers describe peak queues at Joliet/Elwood as "stealing half a shift." During Lunar New Year imports and BFCM build-ups, slot booking windows extend from 2 to 5 days. Our mitigation: we pre-book 5 to 10 days out, hold relationships with three drayage carriers at the BNSF LPC and UP Joliet ramps, route through Houbolt Road to bypass Joliet city traffic, and quote with a 48-hour buffer during peak.
Warehouse Workers for Justice estimates roughly 70 percent of Will County warehouse workers are temp, averaging ~$12.81/hr across about 100 staffing agencies. We staff a dedicated DTC labor pool with vetted operators (not generalist temp), pay above the county average, and lock carrier sweep windows in writing during onboarding so cutoff slippage does not show up in your tracking.
We work best with brands shipping 500+ DTC orders per month or running B2B and retail replenishment programs. Below 200 orders per month, smaller Chicagoland boutiques (Ware-Pak, HexPrep, Cold Chain 3PL, Axis Warehouse) and 3PL match-services (Fulfill.com, Third Person, WareMatch, 3plhub.co) will beat us on cost. We say so on the discovery call.
Standard onboarding runs 1 to 2 weeks: discovery call, integration setup (Shopify, Amazon, your ERP), SOP design, and first inbound receiving. Brands with clean SKU data and a single sales channel can be live in under a week.
No. We use service agreements, not contracts. You can pause, scale up or down, or move volume across our nodes (Chicago, LA, East Coast, Canada) without penalty. Termination is 60 days written notice.
Datex Footprint paired with TechDynamics. The combination gives us near-real-time inventory sync to Shopify and Amazon, barcode scanning at every pick, and EDI-compliant retail outbound for B2B programs.
Returns are received and inspected against your written disposition rules (restock, refurbish, scrap). The result writes back to your inventory in real time. You get a daily returns report. Refunds can trigger on receipt, on inspection, or on restock. You pick during onboarding.
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Ready to ship from Chicago?
Get a custom quote in 24 hours, based on your SKU mix, order volume, and Midwest delivery needs. 5 PM CT cutoff. 24-hour receipt-to-pickable. No annual contract.
5 PM CT cutoff · 24h receipt-to-pickable · No annual contract
