Let procurement buyers shop your own Shopify store

Built from Shopify's own parts

Theme app extension

During a PunchOut, the PunchRelay app embed places Add to PunchOut cart beside the product form on Online Store 2.0 themes with a standard product form, and shows a floating PunchOut panel with the cart. Where the button cannot be placed, the buyer adds products in that panel. You switch it on in the theme editor; your theme code stays as it is.

Checkout validation Function

A Shopify Function for cart and checkout validation keeps procurement-only customers out of your store's checkout. It runs on Shopify's servers.

App proxy

Shopify signs every request it passes to PunchRelay through the app proxy, and PunchRelay checks the signature before doing any work.

Customer accounts

Each procurement user signs in to your store with a Shopify customer account mapped to them on the connection.

How it works

Each procurement user signs in as a customer

You map each procurement user to a Shopify customer who belongs only to the connection's company location. Or PunchRelay sets one up from the email address and name you enter: it creates the customer, or reuses the one with that email address, and gives it ordering access at that location. After the PunchOut, the buyer signs in to your store with a Shopify customer account: one extra login. Shopify signs every request it passes to PunchRelay through the app proxy, and PunchRelay checks that the signed-in customer is the one mapped to that procurement user.

A PunchOut cart inside your theme

During a PunchOut, the PunchRelay app embed, part of a theme app extension, places an “Add to PunchOut cart” button beside the product form of your own theme, on Online Store 2.0 themes with a standard product form, and hides your store's own add to cart, dynamic checkout buttons and cart count there. The cart icon opens a PunchOut cart page shown in your theme's layout, and a floating PunchOut panel keeps the cart lines, the return button and Cancel at hand. Where a page's product form cannot take the button, or you turn off “Place PunchOut controls in your theme” in the app embed settings, the buyer adds products in that panel instead and your store's own buttons stay on the page; items put in the store's own cart are not sent to the procurement system. Settings shows for each theme whether the controls are placed. You switch the app embed on in the theme editor; PunchRelay does not edit your theme code. The buyer adds products at the prices Shopify gives their company location and returns the cart to the procurement system as a requisition. Your store's own cart is not touched, and no Shopify order is created at this step.

What your store needs

Shopify B2B with a company location for the connection, customer accounts in your store, the subject field (user ID or email) chosen on the connection, the PunchRelay app embed turned on in your published theme, and the app proxy path confirmed once in Settings. List the return addresses you expect, too: while the list is empty, returns go to any HTTPS address the procurement system sends.