Between our dock and a buyer's doorstep, a fragile unit gets tossed into totes, ridden down conveyors and dropped more times than anyone will admit. ProShip3PL preps glass, ceramic, liquid and breakable products to take that abuse: full-coverage bubble, leak-checked seals, double-boxed packouts and drop-test thinking applied before a SKU ships at volume — all from our Medley, FL warehouse.
Sellers picture their product being carried. Fulfillment networks pour it: into totes with heavier neighbors, down chutes, across sorters, onto trucks where the last parcel loaded rides on top of yours. None of that handling is malicious and none of it is gentle — it's a system built for speed, and fragile goods either arrive dressed for it or arrive broken.
Breakage costs more than the unit. A shattered jar means a refund, often a "used, arrived broken" review, and sometimes damage to neighboring inventory when liquid is involved. A pattern of damage complaints can put a listing's health at risk. The margin on a candle doesn't survive many of those events.
Our fragile line answers with layered defenses. Every unit gets full-coverage bubble — body, top and base, not a token band. Liquids pass a seal check first, because cushioning a leaker just hides the evidence. Contents are immobilized so nothing shifts, and where retail packaging is presentation-grade, a cushioned outer box takes the hits instead.
Before any fragile SKU runs at volume, we build one sample packout and interrogate it: where does a corner drop send its energy? If the answer is wrong, we change the packout, not our hopes. Prep after that follows a written per-SKU procedure — the same wrap, the same layout, every unit, every shipment.
| Threat in the network | Packout answer |
|---|---|
| Drops onto corners and edges | Coverage bubble plus cushioned outer box — energy dies in the gap |
| Vibration over hundreds of miles | Contents immobilized; nesting padded so surfaces never grind |
| Compression under heavier parcels | Board grades chosen for stacking load, not just product weight |
| Pressure and temperature on liquids | Seal checks at intake; secondary containment where the category needs it |
| Unit-on-unit contact in multipacks | Dividers and interleaving — glass never rides against glass |
Body, shoulders, top and base wrapped and secured — sized to the unit, applied to a per-SKU standard, never a loose token layer.
Caps, induction seals, liners and pumps verified at intake; any unit with external residue pulled and reported before it can contaminate a carton.
Retail unit suspended in an outer carton with cushioning on all six sides — the standard answer for ceramics, stemware and premium glass.
Cells, interleaving and void fill that stop movement entirely — a packout that rattles is a packout that fails, just later.
One unit packed, evaluated and — with your sign-off on sacrificial stock — drop-checked before thousands follow the same design.
Anything that arrives broken or fails in handling is photographed and logged, so your sellable count is real and your supplier claims have teeth.
Material, weak points, current packaging and seal integrity reviewed — liquids get their leak check here, first.
A sample build absorbs our worst assumptions about the network; the design that survives becomes the SKU's written procedure.
Every unit wrapped, immobilized and boxed to that procedure, with FNSKU labels applied where they'll stay scannable.
Cartons cushioned, palletized and released within 24–48 hours — with any breakage found along the way logged and reported.
That's a packout failing in production. We rebuild it — coverage wrap, immobilization, usually a cushioned outer box — and the review stream tells you within weeks whether the physics now work.
Factory packaging optimizes for the container, not the last mile. The batch lands here, gets real protection per unit, and enters FBA dressed for how Amazon actually moves things.
One leaker can cost a whole box of neighbors. Our intake seal check exists for exactly this — the failing unit comes out at our dock, photographed for your supplier conversation, before the batch ships anywhere.
A flag like that is a warning shot before stranded inventory. We re-prep the affected stock to a compliant, cushioned packout and set the procedure so future shipments never draw the flag again.
Each jar is wrapped in bubble with full coverage — rounds of cushion around the body plus protected top and base, since jars fail at the shoulder and rim first — and secured so the wrap can't migrate in transit. Lids are checked for tightness before wrapping, because a loose lid turns a survivable drop into a leak. Jars then go into cartons with separation between units; glass touching glass is the one thing we never allow.
Yes, and glass-jar candles are one of our most common fragile SKUs. The wax actually stabilizes the vessel, but the rim and any glass lid remain vulnerable, so wrap coverage concentrates there. Florida heat is the other enemy: candle stock waits inside the warehouse rather than on a hot dock, and we flag summer shipping lanes where soft wax and rough handling combine badly. Scent throw means nothing if the vessel arrives cracked.
Every liquid batch gets a seal review at intake: caps torqued snug, induction seals or inner liners confirmed present on sampled units, pumps and droppers locked or clipped, and any unit showing residue on the outside pulled immediately — external wetness means an upstream failure somewhere in the batch. Liquids that pass are bagged as secondary containment where the category calls for it, then cushioned. A leaker inside Amazon can damage neighboring inventory, and that's a problem you want caught in Medley.
Ceramics fail from edge contact and vibration, so sets are built like a mover would pack them: plates wrapped individually or with foam interleaving, bowls nested with padding between each, cups and mugs wrapped with handles protected, and everything immobilized so nothing rattles. A dinnerware set that ships with audible movement inside is already broken — it just hasn't finished yet. Sets usually also get double-boxed, since retail gift boxes for ceramics are presentation, not protection.
When the retail packaging can't absorb a drop on its own — thin gift boxes, window boxes, anything where the product sits against the box wall. Double-boxing puts the retail unit inside an outer carton with cushioning on all six sides, so impact energy spends itself in the gap instead of the glass. We recommend it for most ceramics, stemware, framed items and premium glass packaging; simpler rounds of bubble handle sturdier vessels. The call is made per SKU, not by habit.
Before a fragile SKU ships at volume, we build a sample packout and evaluate it the way a carrier will treat it — including controlled drops on corners and edges when you approve using sacrificial units. The question is always the same: where does the energy go? If the answer is 'into the product', the packout changes — more cushion, a gap, a stronger box — before thousands of units commit to it. It's cheaper to break two jars in Medley than two hundred across Amazon's network.
It's documented, not hidden. Any unit broken during receiving or prep is photographed, logged against the batch, and reported to you with the shipment summary — you'll always know your true sellable count. Breakage on our line is rare because fragile SKUs are handled to their own written procedure, and where it happens it usually reveals a packaging weakness worth fixing. For coverage questions on goods in our care, ask us during onboarding and we'll walk through how that works.
Poly bagging is containment — a compliant bag that keeps a product enclosed and meets Amazon's bag rules, covered on our poly bagging page. Fragile prep is impact protection: bubble, cushioning, separation and boxing that manage drop and vibration energy. A leak-prone liquid may need both, in order — bag for containment, then cushion for impact. Neither substitutes for the other, and treating a bag as protection is how glass sellers learn expensive lessons.
It can — bubble layers and a second box add real dimensions and weight, which may move a borderline product across a size threshold. We treat that as part of the packout design: protection sufficient to survive the network, in the least material that achieves it, with the finished dimensions reported to you before a full run. If a packout would tip a tier, you'll know and choose with the numbers in front of you rather than discovering it on a fee report.
Tell us what the product is made of, how it's packaged now, unit count and where it's coming from — photos of the current packaging help a lot. We'll reply within one business day with per-unit fragile prep pricing and a recommended packout: wrap level, whether double-boxing earns its cost, and any leak-check step for liquids. No setup fees, no minimums.
Tell us the material, the current packaging and the volume — photos welcome. Within one business day you'll have per-unit fragile prep pricing and a packout recommendation your product can actually survive in.
