Selling Car Show Tickets on Shopify: Conditional Approval & Vehicle Submission Guide

Hey there, fellow store owners! As a Shopify expert who spends a lot of time digging through community discussions, I often come across fascinating challenges that real businesses face. One recent thread really caught my eye, and it's a perfect example of how to tackle a niche but crucial problem: selling event tickets with a conditional approval process on Shopify.

Our friend cmc.collective was organizing a car show and needed a way to sell spots. But here's the kicker: they couldn't just take money from anyone. They needed participants to upload a picture of their vehicle, maybe answer a few questions about it (like "is it modified?"), and only be charged if cmc.collective personally approved their car. Talk about a specific workflow! This isn't your typical "add to cart and buy" scenario, and it brought up some excellent points about leveraging Shopify's flexibility.

The Payment Puzzle: Authorize, Don't Capture (Yet!)

The first big hurdle was the "only charged if I accept" part. This is where the community really shone, with experts like tim_1 and askably_rod chiming in with a brilliant, straightforward payment solution: "Authorize only".

Think of "Authorize only" as placing a temporary hold on the customer's funds. Their card is validated, and the money is reserved, but it isn't actually transferred to your account until you manually approve it. If you decide the vehicle isn't a good fit, you simply void the authorization, and the customer is never charged. This is absolutely perfect for a conditional approval process like a car show entry.

How to Set Up 'Authorize Only' Payments:

1. Go to your Shopify Admin and navigate to Settings > Payments.
2. Find your primary payment provider (e.g., Shopify Payments, Stripe, PayPal) and click Manage.
3. Look for the "Payment capture method" setting. Change it from "Automatically capture payment" to "Manually capture payment for orders".
4. Don't forget to Save your changes!

A Quick Heads-Up: askably_rod wisely pointed out that authorization holds typically expire after a certain period (often 7 days, but check with your payment provider). This means you'll need to review submissions and either capture the payment or void the authorization promptly. Keep an eye on your pending orders!

Collecting Vehicle Details: The Magic of Line Item Properties

Next up was gathering all that crucial vehicle info – the picture, modification checkboxes, and details. As PaulNewton initially guided, for most Shopify plans, this means using line item properties. These are custom fields you can add to your product page that attach information directly to the specific item in the customer's cart and, ultimately, their order.

cmc.collective shared their progress, showing a nice setup for uploading a file and a prompt for adding a picture. Here's a screenshot of what they were working with:

They even shared some of their code:

This code attempts to add validation for the "Add to Cart" button, which is a great start! However, as cmc.collective quickly discovered, the "Buy Now/Apple Pay/Pay with Paypal" (accelerated checkout) buttons still bypassed this validation. We'll get to that challenge in a moment.

For a robust solution, askably_rod provided an excellent Custom Liquid code snippet that you can drop directly into your OS 2.0 theme. This creates the necessary input fields that become line item properties on your orders:

  Upload a photo of your vehicle (required):
  

  

    
      
      Is your vehicle modified?
    
  

  

    
      
      Custom paint or wrap?
    
  

  

    Vehicle year, make, and model:
    
  

How to Add Custom Liquid for Line Item Properties:

1. From your Shopify Admin, go to Online Store > Themes.
2. Find your current theme, click Actions > Customize.
3. Navigate to the product page where you're selling your car show tickets.
4. In the left sidebar, under "Product information" (or a similar section), click Add block and choose Custom Liquid.
5. Paste the code provided by askably_rod into the Custom Liquid block.
6. Save your theme.

Once implemented, any data entered into these fields, including the URL of the uploaded image (which Shopify hosts on its CDN), will appear right in your order details in the Shopify admin. This makes reviewing applications a breeze!

The Accelerated Checkout Conundrum

Now, let's circle back to the challenge cmc.collective faced with those pesky "Buy Now/Apple Pay/Pay with Paypal" buttons. These accelerated checkout options are designed to speed up the purchase process, often bypassing the regular cart and any client-side validation scripts you might have on your product page.

cmc.collective wanted the same validation prompt for these buttons as for the standard "Add to Cart," but that's a tough nut to crack because these buttons typically operate outside your theme's direct JavaScript control. PaulNewton offered a few options:

• Remove them entirely: As tim_1 also suggested, you can often disable these buttons through your theme settings. The payment methods will still be available in the regular checkout flow, just not as direct "buy now" options. This is the simplest, most reliable way to ensure everyone goes through your required form fields.
• Hide them dynamically: This involves custom JavaScript to make them disappear until the required file is uploaded. It's more complex and can be brittle if Shopify updates its checkout scripts.
• Use a CSS trick: PaulNewton mentioned pointer-events:none in CSS to create a click-blocking overlay. This can visually keep the buttons there but prevent interaction until conditions are met. Again, this requires custom code and careful implementation.

Given the goal of ensuring all required information is submitted, removing or dynamically hiding these buttons until the form is complete is generally the most robust approach for conditional sales. While it might add an extra click for some customers, it guarantees you get the data you need before they proceed to payment.

So, there you have it! By combining Shopify's "Authorize only" payment setting with custom line item properties for data collection, you can create a powerful, conditional event registration system. It might take a little custom liquid and some thought about those accelerated checkout buttons, but as cmc.collective's journey shows, it's totally achievable. This approach gives you the control you need to approve participants while still offering a streamlined experience for your customers. Happy car showing!