How to set the customer type
ProductCart supports two main customer types:
retail and wholesale customers. It also supports unlimited
Pricing Categories, a feature that is discussed separately. For now, keep in mind that a pricing category can have “wholesale privileges”, which means that the customer is considered a wholesale customer when it comes to features such as payment options or applicable discounts.
You can change the customer type:
- One by one, by locating a customer and then editing his/her account. On the Edit Customer page you will be able to easily change the customer type from Retail, which is the default setting, to Wholesale.
- In bulk, by specifying the customer type during a customer import or update.
How wholesale status affects the storefront experience
There are many features in your e-commerce store that work differently depending on the customer type. Here is a list of them:
Store settings
You can set your entire store to work as a catalog, without ecommerce, when retail customers browse the storefront, reserving the ability to purchase a product only to wholesale customers. You can also set a different minimum order amount for wholesale customers.Product pricing
Retail customers are shown and charged the online price. Wholesale customers are shown and charged the wholesale price. You define the two prices when you add or modify a product to your store. If you are adding a Configurable Product, you can specify a different base price for retail vs. wholesale customers.Option pricing
When options alter a product’s online price by adding or removing an amount, the retail option price is used for retails customers, and the wholesale option price is used for wholesale customers. When the wholesale option price has not been defined, the retail option price is used instead.For example, if a “Wood Frame” added $10 to the price of a poster purchased by a retail customer, wholesale customers would also be charged $10 when purchasing the same product, unless a wholesale price had been specified for that option attribute.
You cannot specify different option prices for different pricing categories: depending on whether a pricing category has been setup to have or not have wholesale status, the retail or wholesale prices will be used.
Configurable Products
When you assign products and/or Configurable-Only Items to a Configurable Product, you have the option of specifying a different price for wholesale customers. If you don’t, the price specified for retail customers will be used. If you add pricing categories to the store, you will also be able to specify different prices for each pricing category.Quantity discounts can be different for wholesale customers. These are the price breaks that you may offer to customers that order large quantities of a certain product. To configure quantity discounts, select Discount by Quantity from the Marketing menu.
You cannot specify different discount levels or discount amounts for different pricing categories: depending on whether a pricing category has been setup to have or not have wholesale status, the retail or wholesale prices will be used.
Payment options
Payment options can be set differently for wholesale customers. This feature, for instance, allows you to grant wholesale customers special payment terms (such as Net 30) that retail customers do not receive.To configure payment terms and assign them to wholesale customers only, select Add New Payment Option from the Payment menu, and then add a Non Real-Time Payment Option. When you add the new option, make sure to check the box: Apply to wholesale customers only.