With customers based across four continents, the site required both exchange rate controls and region-specific shipping options to ensure a seamless experience for international buyers. In addition, certain products needed to be sold in fixed increments — for example, boxes of six — while still allowing for accurate stock control of individual SKUs. These operational challenges were addressed within the new Shopify platform, resulting in a robust and scalable solution that serves both retail and wholesale customers effectively.

Shopify’s built-in wholesale solution, part of its Shopify Plus offering, starts at $2,300 USD per month (approximately £1,800), a cost that is simply unaffordable for most businesses. Instead, by selecting and configuring a carefully chosen combination of third-party apps, we were able to replicate full wholesale functionality for just £125 per month — around 6% of the cost of Shopify’s own wholesale system.

This wholesale element was the most demanding aspect of the project — not because of technical limitations, but due to the need to deliver a wholesale experience that was exactly right for the business, while also simplifying and enhancing the user journey. Weekly review sessions with Nick played a vital role in refining and perfecting this setup.

The website launch was carefully planned, including a detailed communication strategy to notify thousands of wholesale customers about their newly migrated accounts and updated login details.

Overall, this was a complex project with many moving parts, but it was hugely rewarding to work alongside Nick and Viv to overcome each challenge. The result is a scalable, dual-purpose e-commerce platform that will support The Pattern Book Press for the next decade. Thank you to Nick for trusting Business Think with this project — the work we’ve done together has also created a proven blueprint for any business looking to implement effective wholesale functionality on Shopify without breaking the bank.