Notes for owners · Websites and conversion
Footwear sizing online: how to stop buyers ordering two sizes and returning one
Buyers order two sizes when they cannot trust your chart. Find the two-size carts in your order export, fix the fit note, message before dispatch and swap the wrong pair at the door.
The GullySales team · Updated 17 Oct 2026 · 6 min read
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You know the order. The same black loafer in size 7 and size 8, cash on delivery, and one pair waiting for a reverse pickup a few days later. Buyers order two sizes when they cannot trust your chart. Fix the page with foot length in centimetres and a fit note for each model. Then catch the two-size carts before they ship, and make an exchange easier than the hedge. The buyer is not being difficult. They are covering a risk your page left with them.
Why do buyers order two sizes in the first place?
Because the number on the box means less than they think. A buyer can be a 7 in one sports brand and an 8 in a formal shoe, and both labels are honest.
Then checkout makes hedging free. With cash on delivery and a free return, the second pair costs the buyer nothing but a doorstep conversation with the courier. You pay for two outbound shipments and a reverse pickup. Meanwhile the size 8 sat in a van while another buyer saw "out of stock" on your page.
The page fix is a centimetre column measured from your own pairs and a fit note beside the size buttons. Size and fit guides for sports shoes sets out the measuring and the wording, and it holds for any closed shoe. What follows is what that post leaves out.
Formal and ethnic pairs fit differently
A sports-shoe note talks about length and width. Formal and ethnic shoes add a third question: how the pair changes once it has been worn.
| The pair | What the buyer gets wrong | The line for your fit note |
|---|---|---|
| Plain leather juttis and mojaris | Orders a size up because the first wear feels tight, then the pair slips at the heel once the leather gives | "Snug on the first wear; the leather softens. Between sizes, take the smaller." |
| Embroidered or lined juttis | Expects the same give, but a stiff lined upper stretches far less | "Lined upper, little give. Take your usual size." |
| Women's formal heels | Chooses by their flat-shoe size, but a higher heel pushes the foot forward into the toe | The heel height in centimetres, and whether a narrow toe needs the next size up |
| Men's leather Oxfords and loafers | Buys snug, expecting the pair to stretch in length | "Leather gives a little in width with wear, hardly at all in length." |
Some juttis are cut roomy and need no warning, so try one pair from each batch before you copy a note across.
Find the two-size orders already in your system
Your order export already shows which models attract the hedge.
- Export recent orders with the buyer's phone number, the model or style code, the size, the payment type and any return reason.
- Sort by phone number, then by model.
- Mark every phone number that has the same model in two sizes. Look across orders too; some buyers split the hedge into two orders minutes apart.
- Count the marks for each model and note which size was kept.
The kept size is the useful column. If buyers keep the larger pair of one model most of the time, that model runs short and its note should say so. If the marks spread across every model, your chart is the problem, not one shoe.
The message to send before dispatch
When one phone number holds two sizes of the same model, message before you pack. Send it by hand from your WhatsApp Business app:
Hello [name], thank you for your order of the [model] in sizes [7] and [8]. Inside length: size [7] is [] cm, size [8] is [] cm. Send us your foot length in cm and we will tell you which fits, then send one pair. If it is wrong, we exchange it free. Or reply "both" and we will send both.
If you already confirm COD orders, as in how to confirm a COD order on WhatsApp, fold this into that message.
If no reply has come by the time you pack, send what was ordered, without argument; some people like to compare at home. Skip the message for children's shoes, where parents buy a size up on purpose.
Swap at the door instead of a second trip
Why the exchange should be free is argued in our returns policy post for fashion sellers. For shoes, the extra step is the swap. Where your courier offers an exchange delivery, the agent hands over the new size and takes back the wrong pair in the same visit.
Two things make it work. Put a size card in every box with the centimetre chart and one line: try the pair on a rug or a bed, and keep the box and tissue. A clean sole is the one thing an agent can check at the door. Ask your courier what it checks and what it costs; terms differ and change. Leave made-to-measure pairs out, and settle their size before you cut.
For example: a leather shoe maker in Agra
Imagine an invented family unit in Agra making men's formal shoes and a line of wedding mojaris, selling on its own website and one marketplace. The figures are made up too. The owner ran the order export and found 60 of 85 two-size carts on the mojaris, not the formal range. Buyers kept the larger pair. Then the reviews began: the mojari slipped at the heel.
The mistake was a fit note copied from the formal range: "true to size". It was true on the day the box opened. After two wedding functions the leather had given, and the larger pair was loose. The owner rewrote the line under the mojari size buttons: "Snug on the first wear; the leather softens. Between sizes, take the smaller." Every two-size mojari cart now gets the message before dispatch, and every box carries the size card. The Oxfords kept "true to size", because the export showed no hedge on them. Better, with a catch: two-size mojari carts fell from 60 to about 35 a month, and each hedge that still shipped cost ₹250 in reverse pickup.
When sizing is not your returns problem
Read the return reasons before you touch the chart. If most say "looks different from the photo" or "sole came apart", better sizing will not move them. Fix the photographs or the factory first.
On a marketplace you control less of the page, so check the platform's current rules on the size field and put the centimetre figure and fit note in the description.
Run the export before anything else. The model with the most two-size carts gets its fit note first, then the message before dispatch, then the size card. Footwear sits with clothing and bags in our e-commerce sales and marketing section, and conversion rate optimisation is the service for the product page. If the return reasons point somewhere else, tell us what you need.
