Quantities for Made-to-Order Products

[toddmitchell]

Hey! We make made-to-order furniture. People shop through our furniture designs and then we make the items they purchase. I am running into a problem with adding quantities to our product pages because we do not have stocked products. Is there a way to allow shoppers to add a quantity of a particular item without us adding a quantity number in the backend of the product information?

Here is an example product https://zxv2d4uqzi9hpc4y-14444942.shopifypreview.com/collections/living/products/slab-counter-stool

If someone wanted 6 of these chairs they'd have to add one to the cart and then increase the quantity in the cart. Or got to the page 6 times and manually add 6 chairs to the cart.

I want a quantity selector on the product page that is not connected to available stock. Can anyone help?

[Kimi]

Hi, @toddmitchell!

Thanks for reaching out about this.

When it comes to adding certain functionalities to your storefront, this is usually configured by the specific theme that you're using. I took a look at your linked example product, and can see that you're using the Pipeline theme from our Theme store. Pipeline is a third-party theme that's been created by our partner developers outside of Shopify, so our scope of support here can be a bit limited when supporting this theme. In saying that, when taking a look at Pipeline's demo store here, I can see that their product page does feature a quantity selector. So it's definitely a feature that your theme supports and have available, but there are a couple of things that you can double check on your store to see if you can get the quantity selector to show up:

1. Continue selling when out of stock: If you navigate to your Products page within your Shopify admin, and select one of your products, make sure that your store is tracking the product's inventory and that the Continue selling when out of stock checkbox is ticked. Because you mentioned that your products are made to order, when this feature is enabled, the system will allow customers to purchase the products without you having to input stock number within your Shopify admin's product page.

2. Check your Theme Editor: On your Shopify admin, head over to Online store > Themes > Customize. This will take you to your Theme Editor, where you can check your theme settings (found on the bottom of the page) to see if there is any toggle or checkbox that you can enable for the product quantity selector to show up on your storefront.

3. Ensure that you're using the latest version of your theme: It could be that the product quantity selector is a new feature of the Pipeline theme that the theme developers have recently shipped out. So you'll want to make sure that the version of the theme you're using is the most current one. Check out this Help Centre document on how you can check or update your theme version.

If after checking all of the above you're still unable to add the quantity selector onto your product page, you can get in touch with our internal Support Team so that we can take a look at your account further from our end. At this stage, we aren't able to provide account-specific support via the Shopify Community Forums. But if you visit our Help Centre and login to your store here, we'd be happy to take a closer look at your account to further help. As mentioned previously, because the theme that you're using is one that's been developed by our third-party partner developers, our internal Support Team may need to contact the theme developers for further help on this matter too. If this is required however, our team will be able to do this from our end on your behalf.

Since you mentioned that your products are made to order, have you thought about adding a third-party pre-order app to help with your store's workflow? An app such as this one here, for example, can help you send a separate pre-order email to customers after they purchase their products. It will also replace your Add to cart buttons with Pre-order buttons, to improve customer experience on your storefront.

Please note however that apps such as the one above has been made by third-party developers outside of Shopify, so if you do have any questions about them specifically I would also recommend getting in touch with the app developers!

Let me know how you get on with the information above! I'd be happy to help if you have any other questions.

[PouringSoulbyIG]

Hello!

I encountered the same issue, and found this answer really helpful. The only issue I have is after I add variants to my made o order product I cannot seem to find the option Continue selling when out of stock. Could you pls help?

Thank you

[PouringSoulbyIG]

Also, I have another question if you could help please. Giving as an example Resin Coasters, sets of 2, 4,6,8 I have a collection of items that are made to order, but I also have a section Ready to Ship. Some of the items from Ready to Ship are the same as Made to Order but for example I have 2 coasters available to sell. The only issue is, if I change the stock for Made to Order to be sold  even after is out of stock it will influence the Ready to Ship which I only have 2 coasters but it will show as all available. How can I go around about this?

thank you

[Kimi]

Hi, @PouringSoulbyIG.

Once you've added variants onto your products, you'll be able to bulk edit all of the variants together in order to allow them to continue selling when out of stock. We have a guide here that explains how you can edit your variants in bulk, which also includes instructions on how you can use the 'Columns' button to add or remove the 'Continue selling when out of stock' property within the bulk editor.

In regards to mixing made to order and ready to ship stock, at this stage your best way forward here is to install a third-party app to help you achieve what you're after. There are a few pre-order apps in the Shopify App Store here that you can browse, to see if they'll suit your business' needs. I recommend taking a closer look at this one to begin with though, as it looks like the app will allow you to configure your products so that if a product quantity reaches 0, the app will automatically switch the 'Add to cart' button into a 'Pre-order' one.

Just a reminder that because apps like these are made my third-party developers outside of Shopify, if you have any app-specific questions you can contact the app support team directly as they're best equipped to support you.