Location-Based Collections: Tailoring Your Shopify Store for B2B and B2C
Sorting Shopify Collections by Warehouse: A Community Discussion
Hey everyone! I was browsing the Shopify Community forums the other day and came across a really interesting question about displaying different collections based on warehouse location. User jas407 was looking for a way to show products from warehouse 1 to B2C customers and products from warehouse 2 to B2B customers, all within the same Shopify store. It's a common challenge when you're trying to juggle both types of sales, so I thought I'd share some insights from the discussion and offer a few solutions.
The Challenge: B2B vs. B2C Collections
jas407's specific issue was that Shopify collections default to showing products, and they needed a way to filter these collections based on which warehouse the product was located in. Their initial thought was to avoid paying $50/month for an app and instead find a code-based solution or even just create a second Shopify store. Splitting into two stores can definitely work, but it also adds overhead in terms of management and inventory syncing. So, let's explore some alternatives.
Solution 1: Leveraging Shopify Flow and Metafields
One clever suggestion came from tim_1, who proposed using Shopify Flow and product metafields. Here's the gist:
- Use Shopify Flow to automatically update product metafields. These metafields would indicate which warehouse a product is available in (e.g., "Available at warehouse 1: true/false").
- Use these metafields to filter your collection pages. This could involve some custom theme code to dynamically filter the products displayed based on the customer type (B2B or B2C).
This approach is pretty powerful because it's relatively automated. Flow can monitor your inventory and update the metafields whenever stock levels change at each warehouse. The downside is it requires some technical know-how to implement the filtering on the collection page.
Here's how tim_1 described it:
"One way I’ve used is to run Flow automations to surface this data in product metafields, like “Available at warehouse 1” and “Available at warehouse 2”. Then it can be used as a filter on collection page (maybe even semi-automatically, depending on the logged-in customer, this filter can be pre-checked )."
Solution 2: Exploring Apps (But Maybe Not!)
While jas407 was trying to avoid app costs, it's worth acknowledging that there are apps that can handle this. The user mentioned one costing $50 AUD per month. While that might seem steep, it's important to weigh the cost of the app against the time and effort required to implement a custom solution. Sometimes, paying for an app is the most cost-effective option in the long run, especially if it saves you hours of development time.
Solution 3: Custom Theme Development
If you're comfortable with code, you could potentially modify your theme to achieve the desired filtering. This would likely involve:
- Adding logic to your theme to detect whether a customer is B2B or B2C (e.g., based on login status or a customer tag).
- Modifying the collection page template to only display products that are available in the appropriate warehouse based on the customer type.
This is the most flexible option, but it also requires the most technical expertise. You'll need to be comfortable working with Liquid, Shopify's templating language, and potentially JavaScript.
Weighing Your Options
Ultimately, the best solution depends on your specific needs and technical skills. If you're not comfortable with code, an app might be the easiest option. If you're willing to put in the time and effort, Shopify Flow and metafields can be a powerful and cost-effective solution. And if you're a coding whiz, custom theme development offers the most flexibility.
Remember to consider the long-term maintenance costs of each option. A custom solution might require ongoing maintenance as your store evolves, while an app might be updated automatically by the developer.
It's great to see people in the Shopify community helping each other out with these kinds of challenges. Hopefully, this breakdown gives you a good starting point for tackling location-based collections in your own store!