Withfriends suggests building a subscription box membership program with a monthly billing schedule, even if you ship your member benefits on a quarterly schedule. Monthly billing helps reduce churn, as members won’t be shocked by an occasional large bill, and they’ll be able to take advantage of other benefits, like discounts, between shipments.

Setting up a custom delivery schedule on Withfriends is simple, but requires careful consideration.

Let’s say you ship a curated Teas & Snack Box to your members every three months. You want to ensure that your members pay for a full three months before receiving their subscription boxes, but you also want to ship exactly at the three-month point. Our custom delivery schedules allow you to accomplish just that.

Custom Delivery Settings

First, set up your membership tier by pressing + Subscription Box on the tier builder.

Second, click the pencil icon under the subscription box name, and choose Custom schedule from the delivery drop-down menu. This will reveal new fields where you can build your custom schedule.

How frequently do members receive their boxes?

Next, enter 3 Months after “Your subscribers receive a box…” to set that members get their boxes quarterly, or 3 months between each shipment.

How frequently do you make shipments?

Instead of shipping a box every 3 months relative to the exact signup date of each member, you’d like to group member shipments to make fulfillment easier. To do that monthly, enter 1 Month to ship monthly.

How many payments do members need to make before the first shipment?

To ensure that your subscribers are paid-in-full before shipping, enter 2 Months in the final field.

(Note: after 2 months, a subscriber has made 3 payments. Initially when they sign up, then after 1 month, then after 2 months)

When is the next shipment date?

Finally, enter your first shipment date in the last field. All future shipment dates will be calculated based on this schedule, allowing you to ship with a regular rotation.

Example: Thyme Teas & Snack Box

Let’s say Josie signs up for a Thyme Teas & Snack Box membership on April 13. Since you’ve set up a custom schedule with shipping starting on May 1, Josie will receive a subscription box after paying three times.

The timeline looks like:

April 13: Josie is billed for a monthly membership a first time

May 1: You ship a Thyme Teas & Snack Box to all members who signed up before March 1

May 13: Josie is billed a second time

June 1: You ship a Thyme Teas & Snack Box to all members who signed up before April 1, but not those who received a box on May 1.

June 13: Josie is billed a third time

July 1: You ship a Thyme Teas & Snack Box to all members who signed up before May 1, but not those who received a box on March 1 or April 1. Josie receives a Thyme Teas & Snack Box!

As you can see, this ensures that your members receive their boxes based on their signup date, and not based on a fixed schedule. This way, you can reduce your member churn with monthly benefits, while ensuring that you never ship to someone who hasn’t paid in full.

Of course, once you've set up your schedule, we'll generate orders and send you notifications with the right shipments on every shipment day, so you don't have to worry about it.

Questions? Use our in-app chat to ask, and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can!