Food is the category where prep volume and prep precision collide: hundreds of cases, each carrying a best-by date, half of them in packaging built for a shelf rather than a sort center. ProShip3PL runs grocery prep as a production line in Miami — dates read and logged per lot, crush-prone cartons protected, case packs built with clean box content data, meltables routed on Amazon's seasonal calendar, and reserve rotating first-expired, first-out.
A grocery seller's pallet is a different object from anyone else's. It might hold sixty cases of one sauce — but across three production lots with three best-by dates. The retail boxes inside dent if you look at them wrong. And a chunk of the catalog can't even enter Amazon's network between spring and fall because it melts.
Meanwhile the margins are grocery margins. A prep process that treats each jar like a one-off craft project destroys the economics; a process that skips the date discipline destroys the inventory. The workable version is an assembly line with a checkpoint: fast hands on labeling and cartonization, exact eyes on lots and dates.
That's how the grocery flow runs in Medley. Pallets break down by SKU and lot at intake, dates get logged once and drive everything after — what ships, what racks, what gets flagged as too short-dated for FBA. Case packs are built one-lot-per-carton so box content data never lies about a date.
And since Amazon exited FBA prep and item labeling in January 2026, there is no downstream safety net: a food shipment that arrives mislabeled or under-protected is stranded or damaged on your account, with unprepped units outside reimbursement coverage. The checkpoint has to be on your side of the dock now.
| Grocery format | How it's prepped here |
|---|---|
| Jars & canned goods | Date-labeled per lot; glass protected before cartonization |
| Boxed dry goods | Crush-prone cartons oriented and packed with fill on the strong axis |
| Pouches & sleeves | Seals checked; bagged where Amazon's packaging rules call for it |
| Chocolate & meltables | Routed on the meltable-window calendar; held here off-season |
| Uniform staples | Case-packed, one SKU and one lot per carton, box content data supplied |
| Multi-lot pallets | Split by date at intake; earliest lot ships, later lots rack FEFO |
Every SKU-lot pair recorded with its best-by date at intake — the single source of truth that drives labeling, rotation and short-date flags downstream.
Compliant date labels applied as a production run, not a craft project — the scaled-up sibling of our expiration-date labeling service.
Retail food cartons cartonized with fill, weight-capped, and oriented so the fragile display face never carries the load through Amazon's handling.
Uniform grocery SKUs built into spec case packs — one lot per carton, accurate box content data on every one, faster receiving on Amazon's side.
Chocolate, gummies and heat-sensitive SKUs planned around Amazon's meltable window — the calendar logic lives on our meltable storage page.
Multi-lot reserve racks by date and replenishes Amazon first-expired, first-out — so the back of the rack never becomes where inventory goes to die.
Pallets counted against the PO and split by SKU and production lot — mixed-date pallets get separated on day one.
Dates checked against Amazon's dated-goods thresholds and the meltable window; short-dated and out-of-window stock flagged to you.
Date labels, FNSKUs, protective cartonization and case packs — grocery volume through a 24–48 hour turnaround.
Earliest lots ship to FBA; later lots rack as reserve and move out in strict date order as you trigger replenishments.
Standard for grocery, fatal if ignored. We split by lot at intake, label each truthfully, and rotate them out in date order instead of shipping the pallet as one dishonest block.
Display cartons lose to conveyor belts. Fill, weight caps and load-axis packing turn the survival rate around — the review feed follows.
The meltable window closes every spring, and stock caught inside is a forced exit. Next season, the summer buy waits on our racks and enters FBA the week the window opens.
Loose mixed cartons invite miscounts. Spec case packs with clean box content data give Amazon's receivers nothing to interpret — and your counts stop drifting.
Grocery prep is dated-goods handling run at case-pack volume. Pallets are received and reconciled against your PO, best-by dates are read and logged per lot, units get compliant date labels and FNSKUs, fragile-format packaging gets crush protection, and case packs are built with accurate box content data. Amazon's grocery requirements call for real remaining shelf life at check-in — we screen to the current rules before anything ships.
Pallet scale is where grocery prep actually lives. We receive full truckloads and 20–53 ft containers, break pallets down by SKU and lot, and run date labeling as a production line rather than a bottle-at-a-time craft. High-volume grocery sellers care about per-unit cost and throughput, and the flow is built for both — 24–48 hour turnaround holds at case-pack volume.
Each SKU-lot combination is logged with its date at intake, and everything downstream keys off that record: which lot ships now, which racks as reserve, which is too close to its date for Amazon at all. Sauces, snacks, coffee, canned goods — the formats differ but the discipline is identical: read the real date on the real unit, never trust the packing list's version of it.
Crushed corners are the grocery category's signature damage, because retail food cartons are engineered for shelf display, not conveyor systems. We cartonize with fill, orient crush-prone boxes so weight loads on their strong axis, cap carton weights sensibly, and case-pack where uniformity allows — the difference between a box that survives Amazon's handling and one that arrives as a customer complaint.
Meltables are a season inside the grocery category: Amazon restricts them to a cooler-months window, and everything shipped in must sell through or exit before the window closes. We plan those SKUs on that calendar — holding stock in the warehouse through the hot months and timing send-ins to the window. Our meltable inventory storage page walks through the full seasonal model.
Yes — grocery is the most case-pack-friendly category on Amazon because identical units in uniform cartons are the norm. We build case packs to your shipment plan spec, keep one SKU and one lot per case so dates stay truthful, and supply accurate box content data with every carton. Details of the case-pack service live on our case packing page.
Grocery reserve racks by lot with dates on record, and any replenishment to FBA pulls the earliest-dated sellable lot first. That matters more in food than anywhere else because a single SKU can hold four or five active lots at once — without enforced first-expired-first-out, the newest pallet always ends up in front and the oldest quietly times out at the back of a rack.
Yes, and it should. Lots flagged too close to their best-by for FBA can ship from our racks to your Shopify or FBM buyers, to discount and wholesale channels, or back to your supplier — while the stock still has commercial life. The screening happens here precisely so the short-dated portion becomes a routing decision instead of an Amazon disposal fee.
Some formats do: pouches with weak seals, multi-unit sleeves, glass jars needing protection, and anything that could leak or sift. Amazon's packaging requirements decide it per product type, and we apply the current rules at the bench — bagging with suffocation warnings where called for. The general bag specifications are covered on our poly bagging page; grocery adds the leak-and-sift judgment on top.
Tell us your monthly unit volume, SKU count, how freight arrives (pallets, containers, parcel), which SKUs are dated or meltable, and whether you want case packs built. Per-unit grocery prep pricing comes back within one business day, with no setup fee and no monthly minimum attached.
Tell us what you sell, how many pallets or units move monthly, and which SKUs carry dates or melt. You'll have per-unit grocery prep pricing and a rotation plan within one business day.
