The Company

The Light Phone is a minimalist phone designed as, in the words of Operations Manager David Wheeler, “a tool to help customers disconnect from the infinite attention economy while still staying in contact with friends, family, and handling other daily needs.” It’s a powerful mission. This is an age where Big Tech companies are building better and better ways to capture attention, time, and data. Light provides an alternative for people who want more intentional technology use.

Light’s customers range from children to older adults, but the bulk fall firmly in the Gen Z and Millennial brackets. Around 85% of the business is domestic, with growing sales in other English-speaking countries like Canada, the UK, and Australia. The Light Phone is sold exclusively through the company’s website, thelightphone.com, and Fulfillrite ships every order, both domestic and international.

The Challenge

In the company’s early days, Light shipped phones directly from a small office in Brooklyn. As the brand grew, that stopped being realistic. “Logistics is a whole department in itself,” says David.

And phones are not a simple product to fulfill. Consumer electronics come with complications most products never face: lithium battery shipping rules, carrier restrictions, international shipments, and the added care that high-value devices demand. Light needed a fulfillment partner that could handle all of it. And it had to do this at a price that worked for a small company with tight margins.

There was one more wrinkle: demand for the Light Phone consistently outpaces production. Rather than a steady daily drip of orders, Light regularly builds a backlog of preordered devices, all of which need to ship the moment new inventory arrives.

The Solution

Light partnered with Fulfillrite in 2019, and Fulfillrite has shipped their orders ever since.

On the tricky parts of shipping phones, David is direct, saying that, “Fulfillrite has handled [lithium battery rules, carrier restrictions, international shipments, and high-value devices] very well for us! The expected price per shipment and range of carrier options are very helpful, especially considering we are still a small company with tight margins.”

When a shipment of phones arrives at Fulfillrite’s warehouse, the team receives it, loads it into inventory, and ships the entire backlog of waiting orders right away. This process was put to the test during the Light Phone III launch, one of the company’s biggest moments to date.

“Fulfillrite has been marvelous with our launches!” says David. “Your team has been good about loading them into inventory and shipping them right away. We also feel nicely prioritized when these shipping blitzes arise.”

The relationship has stayed personal even as it has grown. Light has worked with dedicated account representatives throughout, first Josh and now Sol. “Sol always responds quickly and helps us when needed,” says David.

The Results

“We’re never concerned about shipping orders on time, or errors,” says David. “We see one or two here and there, but the error rate is so negligible it’s not a factor for us.”

Volume has grown substantially, too. Light ships far more orders today than in the early years of the partnership, sometimes as a steady daily flow and sometimes as thousands of preorders shipped in bulk over a few days after a launch. And the whole time, the Fulfillrite customer portal gives the team real-time visibility into orders and inventory. No hands-on management required.

Asked what he would tell another electronics or hardware brand choosing a fulfillment company, David keeps it simple: “We’d let them know that receiving, safe storage and shipping are always reliable, and that we never worry about fulfillment.”

Fulfillrite handles an important business function in a way that allows us to be totally hands off, and never concerned about the work being done. Their customer portal is clean, clear and easy to use.

David Wheeler, Operations Manager, Light Phone

The Light Phone is a minimalist phone company helping people step back from the attention economy without losing touch with the people who matter. Fulfillrite handles eCommerce fulfillment for all of Light’s orders worldwide, from everyday shipments to high-volume launch surges, including the lithium battery compliance and carrier requirements that come with shipping consumer electronics.

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