When running an online store on Shopify that handles multiple brands or suppliers, you'll face various challenges around product management, inventory management, and improving the customer experience. Shopify's vendor feature is one useful way to solve these challenges. In this article, we'll cover everything from a basic explanation of the vendor feature to 7 practical, real-world use cases.
What Is the Shopify Vendor Field?
Shopify's vendor feature lets you set the supplier or manufacturer for each product when running an online store. With this setting, you can clearly display the vendor on the product page, giving consumers information about the product's reliability and its source.
Especially for businesses handling many brands or suppliers, clearly displaying the vendor is a way to increase transparency for customers and strengthen trust in the company. Vendor information is also used in analysis for inventory management and marketing strategy, helping to streamline the business as a whole.
Vendor Use Case 1: Displaying It on the Product Page
By displaying vendor information on the product page, consumers can better understand the background of the product when purchasing. In particular, showing information about a supplier with strong brand recognition increases trust with users and emphasizes the product's reliability. This also helps push buyers toward a purchase decision and contributes to building brand fans.
Vendor Use Case 2: Using It as a Collection Filter Condition
Setting up collections based on vendor is very convenient for offering customers all the products from a specific brand or manufacturer at once. By making it easy for users to browse the product listing page (collection page) for a brand they're interested in, you can improve how easily they can choose products.
Source: AniCure Pet Clinic Online Shop
You can also create collections by vendor to display a list of brands on your online store.
Vendor Use Case 3: Using It as a Filter Option in the Product List
On the product listing page, consumers can filter by vendor. This makes it possible to search based on a specific brand or manufacturer, helping users quickly find products from the brand they want.
To display vendor as a filter option, use the Search & Discovery app.
Go to "Filters" in Search & Discovery, and add "Vendor" as a filter option to display it.
Vendor Use Case 4: Using It to Filter Product Management
Filtering by vendor in product management is a convenient feature for administrators. It makes it easier to manage products sourced from multiple brands or manufacturers, and provides the convenience of quickly accessing the information you need. Using this feature improves operational efficiency, saves time, and enables more effective product management.
Vendor Use Case 5: Using It to Filter Inventory Management
The filtering feature based on vendor is also very useful for inventory management. It lets you list only the products from a specific brand or manufacturer and check their stock status in real time, making it possible to respond quickly to inventory changes. This greatly reduces the risk of stock shortages or overstock, achieving efficient inventory management.
Vendor Use Case 6: Displaying Sales Reports by Vendor
Creating reports by vendor and analyzing sales data enables more strategic business development. By understanding the sales performance and trends of each brand or manufacturer, you can see at a glance which brands are selling well. This can help optimize your marketing strategy and purchasing plans.
Shopify's reporting feature includes default reports such as "Sales by product vendor" and "Retail sales by product vendor."
Vendor Use Case 7: Using It for Combined Shipping Control
By using vendor information for combined shipping control, marketplace-style Shopify stores that offer products from specific brands together, or Shopify stores running dropshipping from different suppliers, can restrict customers from purchasing products from different brands in the same order.
The blog article below explains in detail how to use the Shopify app "RuffRuff Order Limits" to control combined shipping for products with different vendors. Please use it as a reference.
Recommended Shopify App for Combined Shipping Control by Vendor
RuffRuff Order Limits is a Shopify app that can implement all kinds of purchase restrictions. With a single app, you can enforce various purchase restrictions such as quantity limits, amount limits, combined shipping limits, customer limits, and payment limits. It was also the first in Japan to adopt the Cart and Checkout Validation API, achieving a more robust checking system than existing purchase-restriction apps.
In Conclusion
Shopify's vendor feature offers value far beyond being just one item of product information. As we've shown, it can be used in a wide variety of situations — improving trust on product pages, use in collections and search features, efficient inventory management, sales analysis, and even combined shipping control.
In particular, the vendor feature plays an important role in the following areas:
- Improving transparency and trust with customers
- Streamlining product and inventory management
- Optimizing marketing strategy
- Improving the user experience
Combining these approaches makes it possible to run a more efficient online store with higher customer satisfaction. Be sure to consider the best approach for your own store's challenges.
Finally, the blog article below introduces purchase restrictions you can implement on Shopify besides combined shipping control. Please use it as a reference.
