Help! - Local Pickup at Multiple Locations with One Central Warehouse Location for ALL Inventory

[JRogers410]

Help!

We have 4 coffee shops and an online store primarily selling coffee beans. We handle all inventory and fulfillment in our central warehouse, and in order to defray prohibitive shipping costs for local customers, would like to enable them to pick up an online order at one of our 4 physical shops. We stock and distribute other products to our shops from the warehouse as well; it would be relatively easy to simply package online orders at the warehouse and  include them in our existing deliveries to each designated shop 2 or 3 times/ week for free customer pickup.

However, we cannot physically keep online store inventory at each of 4 stores and fulfill from each; this would be far more complex/costly. Our fulfillment resources are at the warehouse, and we’d need to hold and redistribute far more inventory (which has a short shelf life), and Shopify seems to require independent inventory at each location. We have considered simply setting each shop’s inventory to 0, and enabling ‘oversell’, for the warehouse; however, this would require manually decrementing inventory for each order. Furthermore, if we truly ‘oversell’, our supplier’s processing / packaging time far exceeds our existing 2-day turnaround.

We have been trying to approach this from multiple angles:

- Shopify pickup option for multiple locations (above issues).

- Only Shopify: enabling local pickup from our warehouse location, and finding a way to allow customers to select one of our 4 actual pickup locations from a drop-down somewhere (?) but we’ve been told that we can’t edit or add anything to the checkout form.

- Finding a way to back into what we need using Shopify’s ‘delivery’ option; no luck as of yet.

- Multiple third party apps, e.g. pickup, delivery, inventory… none of which seem to fit the bill.

In summary, we’re desperately seeking a way to maintain a central inventory while enabling customers to select any one of 4 pickup locations. We’re hitting the proverbial wall on this, and are surprised; it doesn’t feel like this would be unique/niche functionality. We’re relatively small, but many national online retailers allow customers to allow local in-store pickup? Have any of you successfully dealt with this issue, something similar, or happen to have any ideas? Are there any other third party app recommendations? We would welcome any and all ideas and are happy to provide additional clarification as useful. Much appreciated, and thanks in advance! 

[BTO2]

I'm following this - we have the exact same issue.  I don't want to click every inventory item to show it is in more than 1 location, but this seems to be the only quick fix.

[SuperMario71]

This is also my problem...Following to await some replies.....Also in the search it says 4 replies - but I only see 1 reply......is that information inaccurate on the forum search facility?

[Crystalbynewage]

HI!!!

Facing a similar problem here :(((( were you able to get a resolution on this?

[zee_r]

same. 

[Moose907]

Following as also dealing with the same problem

[KatieL11]

Yes same here!!

One warehouse multiple pick up locations. Warehouse delivers products to location for customers to pick up. So we don't need inventory at each location only at the warehouse. 

Help!!!!!!!! (lol) need a solution asap

[help22]

did you find a solution?

[Excan-Nick]

No

[Nik7]

I'm having the same issue.

We also have one central stock location and an extra pick-up nearby. This pick-up has no stock, products are moved there as needed.

We're going to try and create an app that gives the pickup location a fictive stock that is always synchronized to the real stock location.

[WetKnotFarms]

Following! I’m stuck between Squarespace and Shopify. I can’t seem to find anything that works exactly how I want it to.

[StreamStudio]

We have exactly the same issue - on central stock that's available for pick up at three different locations. Hope someone has a solution for this!

[kritochin85]

Hi guys,

I end up using a webhook, that will execute every time an order is pay. This webhook executes an API we developed. This api uses the shopify APIs in order to update the stock of the other locations. So, it goes something like this:

- We have 5 locations for local delivery

- To all of our products we assigned the same amount of stock. So in real life, we only have 10 units of Product A, but in shopify we have 50, 10 for each location.

- So if someone buys 2 units of Product A on Location 1, we have to update the other four locations to 8 units. So at the end all the 5 locations hace 8 units eatch

To achieve this, as mentioned in the beginning we develop an API, that uses the shopify APIs. We had to use the following APIS:

https://{0}/admin/api/{1}/products/{2}/variants/{3}.json
https://{0}/admin/api/{1}/orders/{2}/fulfillment_orders.json
https://{0}/admin/api/{1}/inventory_levels.json?inventory_item_ids={2}
https://{0}/admin/api/{1}/inventory_levels/set.json

Im aware this is not a real solution, but is the only way we were able to achieve this. This means you will need a server, a domain and a SSL certificate in order to publish your api and call it from the shopify webhooks. 

Hope this can help someone.

[PaulNewton]

There are many apps that can sync inventory for various reasons.

One https://usemechanic.com  allows scripting for more complicated situations.

They even have a library of premade scripts including for inventory sync'ing

https://usemechanic.com/task/sync-inventory-for-shared-skus 

If you need such custom solution I can be contacted at paull.newton+shopifyforums@gmail.com 

[webdeveloperfbs]

Hello, after searching multiple forums thought I share an easy solution for multiple pickup locations without an app, or installing code or using multiple location inventory tracking.

Inside Shopify > Products > Scroll to Quantity > Choose Edit Locations and from here you can select the locations that will display on checkout.

You have to do this for every product but still a good workaround. Hope this helps.

[TVR_UK]

Don’t you need to put stock in each location as well?

[SLB2]

Wouldn’t you still need stock at both locations ??? Looks like a lot of us have the same issue 

[WetKnotFarms]

This is not a work around. This is what I was doing, but run the risk of over selling. If the item is not stocked at the place someone is checking out, then cart abandoned.

[SatoriAcademy]

Have you ever gotten a solution?  My situation is exactly as you have stated.

[jfiojfoi5476]

Its pretty similler case here in my project have to send or recieve my jigsaw products but i am facing the same difficulties i dont know how to find its solution its happening from four or five months if someone has an idea plz share with me 

[Scarfee]

Also want to know the answer to this!

[TheSilo]

Following

[SeanMullins]

Hello, 

We have the same issue! We have a working solution, but it is not ideal.

Here's our situation and what we do for our team at www.shush-fashion.co.uk

We have 11 stores and central warehouse to service our website. Our customers can order online and use "Click and Collect" from any of the stores.

What we did was edit the shipping rates, to include our Click and Collect locations. While it is not 100% the solution, it is a workaround we are currently using until Shopify sort this out. Here's what our Shipping Zones look like.

[anisgr75]

I'm using the same solution of editing the shipping profile to the pickup location but it's very confusing for our customers when they have to choose between ship and pickup?

Ship means home delivery so they choose pickup and stuck with the warehouse pickup choice only.

[TILTIL]

Following! We also have daily deliveries to our retail stores and would like to pick and pack the orders in our central warehouse, but let customers pick it up at one of our retail locations. It’s possible to put pickup as a shipping option, but a bit confusing.

[hobsonb3]

Hey all,

We just started using this app below for a student store that needs to have multiple pickup locations but keeps the inventory in one central warehouse.  Their customer support team is very helpful during the set-up and the user experience makes a lot of sense. 

One thing I'll point out is that it makes users selects pick-up days and time windows, which is great if you want to set exact times for pick-up.  If you don't you have to set it so people pick a day (with a large time window say 8-4pm) and then tell people that you will email them when their order is ready.  That's what we're doing.

https://apps.shopify.com/safe-curbside-pickup

[Kromannian]

Just wanted to surface this again. This is a fairly large limitation of the pick-up functionality — currently it's not really useful for us, unfortunately.

[Excan-Nick]

Just another merchant here looking to share inventory between locations. Disappointed Shopify seems to have just developed the bare minimum for local pickup functionality.

[SeanMullins]

Unfortunately they don't appear to be assisting, despite the several
requests and comments on this ticket.

I make the assumption that they prefer making money from the third party
developers that have created apps to manage this.

Unfortunately for us, despite our best efforts we have had to resort to
paying more for said app to manage this.

I feel your pain.

[Excan-Nick]

What app did you end up going with?

[SeanMullins]

https://apps.shopify.com/store-pickup-2

It has been a godsend!

[SeanMullins]

Unfortunately they don't appear to be assisting, despite the several requests and comments on this ticket. 

I make the assumption that they prefer making money from the third party developers that have created apps to manage this. 

Unfortunately for us, despite our best efforts we have had to resort to paying more for said app to manage this. 

I feel your pain. 

[PaulNewton]

---

@SeanMullins wrote:

I make the assumption that they prefer making money from the third party developers that have created apps to manage this. 

---

It's a bad assumption, creates false expectations and is a trap.

Shopify cannot be all things to all businesses, no ecommerce platform can.

Apps fulfill deeper requirements than the basic features a platform offers.

Shopifys built to meet the overlapping minimum needs of over a million different businesses.

i.e. most features are built to the least common denominator not the most specific.

---

@SeanMullins wrote:

Unfortunately for us, despite our best efforts we have had to resort to paying more for said app to manage this. 

---

Apps, services, lawyers & accountants MAKE a business money; viewing those things as a negative  instead of as investments to improve a businesses processes only serves to creates a weird mindset that first resents and then falls into the trap of avoiding using available solutions that can streamline operations or outright increase revenue.

Avoid that trap.

[PaulNewton]

Really in this situation merchants may need a group of apps|services to build this process , or to build a custom app.

Hoping a single off-the-shelf app meets all requirements, or expecting shopifys entry-level local pickup feature to solve specific business logistics rules is not the approach here. 

@Kromannian 

Some common apps 

https://apps.shopify.com/local-delivery-1 

https://apps.shopify.com/click-and-collect by zapiet

These apps mainly work by gathering location information early in the /cart instead of checkout(which isn't modifiable on standard plans).

@Excan-Nick just another merchant here looking to share inventory between locations

See my response about using an automation app like usemechanic to sync inventory

More advanced usage would be to create custom draft orders, such as swapping in variant.ids for a location chosen on the cart page if different from what's in the customers cart.

 https://tasks.mechanic.dev/create-a-draft-order-from-the-cart 

There's also creating a custom carrier service app to surface location selection in the checkout.

https://shopify.dev/api/admin-rest/2021-10/resources/carrierservice

While Shopify Plus stores can modify checkout liquid to try and present location information but that doesn't create shipping choices on the fly so even those stores may need a carrierservice app.

[kingstore]

@JRogers410 @SeanMullins @Kromannian Given the complexity of this order process it's likely you need to combine possibly two different apps together. One which will handle the interface to select a pick up location, and another to manage the inventory and logic for order allocation. 

You can't accomplish this easily because it's more of an advanced logistical setting where this would apply, even if it is a 'smaller' operation. That said, there are a few solutions out there that might handle a part of this.

• Store Pickup App
• Store Pickup 2
• Buy Online Pickup in Store

My suggestion is to work with a developer to handle the storefront interface side, then utilize SKUSavvy on the backend to handle a central inventory, then allocate orders to their respective warehouse for pick up. 

SKUSavvy is a Shopify WMS app that will manage all inventory across any warehouse or store, as well as enable you to pick and pack orders for delivery at a secondary store for pickup. Your central stock is managed with bin locations so you can use any mobile device to put-away products to bins, replenish bin locations, reorders product based on movement, pick order batches on warehouse layout map, pack orders, and print shipping labels (for orders not being picked up). For this reason, we put this option in for a few merchants that are requesting it. 

If it's something you'd like to customize for your (and perhaps others) store, please reach out and we can see about finalizing an optimal solution.

[KristenDScott]

Hey there... I don't know if you have figured out a way to fix this, but I think I've found a sort of workaround. I changed the language of the check out process to include both the words "shipping" and "drop-off service", so the customer hopefully knows to choose it when checking out (instead of pickup). We still have a local pickup at the shop, so I keep that.

We have a drop off service at a location where I don't want to create a new inventory, so I created a free shipping rate that has the name of the location on it. What you do have to modify are some of the language parts of the check out process, which can be found in the Languages area when you go to customize your site. I like to find it on the Themes page/Actions button (next to Customize)/ and then choose Edit Language. There you can start to modify any part of the Cart verbiage/language to reflect your delivery service. Hope this helps.

[User_999]

Rather than using the "local pickup", which takes stock from stores and limits customer collection options when stock can be moved between stores. Is it possible to use the normal shipping rates and setup a free rate titled "collection from store X", and another "collection from store Y".... etc etc then stock is allocated from either store?

Are there any issues with doing this?

[KristenDScott]

@User_999 Yes, there is an issue if you use the "Send Notification to Customer" and "Mark as Picked Up" features. Once you have an order that is configured for shipping, there is no way to change it in order to use those features. You have to manually alert the customer that their order is ready. 

[BTO2]

We only have one pick up option - so I don't know if this will work for 4, as in your situation.  We deliver from the warehouse to the store - as people order online.  They can purchase for pick up at the store.  On our end, that means that every product is available in all locations and that we click in Shopify "track quantity" and "continue selling when out of stock"... With a negative number of products - we know how many we sold that were picked up.  Unfortunately, we have to manually zero these out once a year.

[jeakley]

Exactly the same problem.  You would have thought it would have been figured out.  We pay for POS for all of our stores and our warehouse.  We pay enough to shopify to warrant a solution.  I really doesn't seem like a big ask.

[Freesoulpt]

Did anyone heard back from Shopify on this limitation? 

[UCFoodHub]

Same feature request needed here.  We have a farmers market that has all the inventory at that location but we offer free delivery to 3 locations in our town for pickup.  We do NOT want to have inventory at the drop off locations.  Just a simple custom shipping option would work.  Instead of showing UPS, FedEx, etc.  have it saw "Where would you like to pick up your order?"   And then offer the 3 locations for pickup.  

[Velfella]

I would like to add that this option would be great for me as well....have central warehouse and then free pick up at 4 locations.  No simple solultion that I can see at this point. 

[swamptromp]

I found a good solution to this, in case anyone else is still following. We use the paid app Stock Sync: Inventory Autosync. We have multiple pick-up locations listed, and their inventories are linked to the central location. When an item is purchased for pickup at any location, the inventory updates across the board. The inventory also updates if we manually adjust the numbers at one location. Works really well for us, seamless experience for customers, and worth the cost.

App link: https://apps.shopify.com/multi-store-stock-sync

[beans]

Do you need to worry about pickup times? We are in a situation where be need to roast our coffee and get it to one of our retail locations before the customer picks it up, so we would like a way to tell the customer when the product will be available to be picked up. Stock Sync: Inventory Autosync seems like a great solution, except for the product availability part. 

Also, Swaptromp, were you concerned about the lack of reviews of Stock Sync: Inventory Autosync?

[swamptromp]

Oh, great question. I know you can set an estimated pickup processing time for each store: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/shipping/setting-up-and-managing-your-shipping/local-methods/pick... On our shop it shows up when the customer selects a location to pick up their order (for example, "Usually ready in 24 hours"). But if your processing time varies for different items, I don't know of a way to customize that. Maybe you could include a note in the product descriptions and code a conditional message in the confirmation email they receive - like if they have ordered certain items, they get a note that says, "Coffee bean orders are ready the following Friday." And then of course they get an email when the order is ready for pickup. Just an idea.

One of those 3 reviews is ours. We didn't find another app that did the same thing as Stock Sync, so we just added it and tried it out. (Maybe there are other similar apps that we didn't come across.) It has worked seamlessly for us, and the interface looked very professional (unlike some other apps). It seems like a simple thing for an app to do, hard to mess it up. But we are not a huge operation yet, so it's not super high stakes for us to try out an app.

[marixsilveira]

Any news here? This is really something basic that Shopify should have as default. My problem is that I have home delivery, pick up at 3 stores (need to schedule a date) and zip code restriction. I use the "Bid pickup delivery" app for these functions. I would like to have a central stock in "online store" and for all orders to be shipped from this single stock, regardless of whether it is home delivery or pick up point. It is possible to use a single stock and create shipping rules such as the name of the pickup location. But I can't do this because of the other functions I need and the app replicates this at checkout, not just in the cart. Thanks,

[SeanMullins]

I used store pickup by CreativeR which works great.

[susanaya2]

What I did was set up "Store pick up" locations as free shipping options. The issue we ran into was that shopify wants to default to the first free option so many customers chose our store pick up Burlington location if they weren't careful. Shopify now has a Checkout Blocks app that is free where you can rearrange the delivery method order and we changed it to reorder from high $ to low $. This solved our issue.