The Christmas last order dates email: when to send it and what to say after

Work out your own date before you write anything

Royal Mail publishes its recommended last posting dates for Christmas every autumn, and the couriers put out their own. Those are the dates a parcel has to be handed over. They aren't your last order date, because your warehouse still has to pick it, pack it and get it on the van.

1. List every delivery option you offer at checkout and the carrier behind each one
2. Write down each carrier's last date for that service
3. Take off the time your warehouse needs in December, which is probably longer than it needs in June
4. Check the last collection from your warehouse, especially around a weekend
5. Leave a margin you'd be happy to defend to a customer whose parcel is late

You'll end up with one date per delivery option, and usually a later one for your fastest service. Agree them with whoever runs the warehouse, and write them down somewhere the whole team can see. Royal Mail calls its dates recommended, so we wouldn't plan to the last possible day.

Three sends before the date, and one the day after

One email isn't enough, because plenty of people will miss it and the date is useful to them when they're ready to buy. Four sends will cover most shops, and each one has a slightly different job.

Send the last call early in the day, since it's no use to anybody at nine at night if orders closed at noon. The wider run this sits in is covered in Christmas email marketing for ecommerce.

Who should get it, and who you can leave out

A last order dates email is still a marketing email, even though it's helpful. The ICO says a service message stops being one if you add advertising or marketing material, and an email telling people to order by Friday is promoting your shop. So it goes to people you're allowed to market to, and it needs the usual unsubscribe link.

You can usually leave out anybody who ordered in the last few days, at least from the reminder, as they've probably done their shopping. Klaviyo's Smart Sending will also skip people who've had a marketing email recently. It can be turned off for a single campaign, and we'd only think about that for the last call.

Be careful with location. Klaviyo can build a segment by country or region, and that works for sending overseas customers their own dates. It tells you where the buyer is, though, and a gift often goes somewhere else. If your carrier has earlier dates for the Scottish Highlands, the islands or Northern Ireland, put them in the email for everyone.

What the email has to say

Put the date in the subject line and again in the first line of the email. Most people are checking one fact, and they shouldn't have to scroll past a banner to find it.

• The date and the time orders close
• Which delivery option that date applies to
• Any later date for a faster service, and what that service is
• Any areas with an earlier date
• A few gift ideas that are in stock and can make that date
• What your returns policy is for gifts
• What to do if they've missed it

Then think about how firmly you're wording it. Under section 28 of the Consumer Rights Act, a customer can treat the contract as ended if delivery on time was essential to them given the circumstances, or if they told you it was before they bought. Promising delivery for Christmas is easy in an email, and it's harder when a courier has a bad week. We're not lawyers, so ask one if you want to check your wording.

The date also has to be the real one. Setting it early to create a rush is the same problem as a fake sale deadline, which is covered in what a countdown email is allowed to count.

What to say once the date has passed

Plenty of brands go quiet here, and it's when the people who forgot start looking. They still need a present and they've stopped expecting a parcel. Open with the plain fact that standard delivery won't arrive before Christmas, then tell them what will.

A gift card is the obvious one. Shopify lets a buyer add a recipient to a gift card, but only if your theme supports the recipient fields, so test that this month. If you have a shop or a warehouse people can visit, pickup in store lets them choose collection at checkout. Give the opening hours for the days before Christmas, including when you close on the last day.

You can keep selling parcels if you're honest about it. Some people are happy for a present to arrive between Christmas and New Year, as long as they know before they pay. Don't send anything that implies otherwise.

Separately, if you know an order placed in time is going to miss Christmas, tell that customer as soon as you can. That's a service message with no selling in it, and it should go out on its own.

Get the rest of the shop saying the same thing

The campaign is the easy part. The problems tend to come from everything else that keeps running after the date, like a cart reminder that still says order today for Christmas. Go through these in November, while there's time to fix them.

• The site banner and the delivery text on product pages
• The delivery options and wording at checkout
• The order confirmation email
• Any live flows that mention delivery or gifting
• Your delivery FAQ and the answers your support team give
• A named person who changes all of it on the day

Write all four emails at the same time and schedule them once your dates are agreed. December isn't a good month to be writing copy from scratch, and the Thermos case study shows how much of a peak gets decided in the weeks before it.