A shipment origin location for a product purchased by a customer is predicted. A merchant evaluator receives information from a user about a purchase transaction completed by the user with a merchant for a product, including the user's location. When the product is shipped, the merchant evaluator receives tracking information about the shipment. The merchant evaluator determines from the tracking information a point of origin for the shipment and updates its records to reflect the shipment origin point for that merchant and product, given the user's location. As the merchant evaluator compiles similar data for many products shipped by many merchants to many destinations, the merchant evaluator develops a searchable index, enabling a prediction to be made about a shipment origin point for a particular product from a particular merchant, given the location of the user ordering the product. A time-in-transit prediction can also be made.