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Creating and managing B2B catalogs with Markets

B2B catalogs let you customize the buying experience for the companies that you sell to. With catalogs, you can control the availability of products for your B2B customers and include all products or specific products to a catalog.

If you want to apply a percentage increase or decrease to all of your product prices, then you can set an overall adjustment. You can also set fixed prices and volume pricing that apply only to specific products or variants. A catalog can contain both an overall percentage and fixed prices. However, fixed prices for products or variants override any overall percentage adjustments that you set.

For example, your store sells candles at $10 USD each. You create a B2B catalog and enter -20% in the Overall adjustment field, which reduces the price of your candles by 20% for companies with access to the catalog. One candle costs slightly more to produce, so you set a fixed price of $9 USD for that product. When a customer with access to the catalog visits your store, they're offered your products at $8 USD, except for the candle that you entered a fixed price for. The fixed priced candle isn't affected by the overall adjustment, and is offered at $9 USD.

After you create a B2B catalog, you can assign it to a market or a company location to let B2B customers purchase products at specific prices. Assigning a catalog to markets helps you to manage pricing and product availability for all your B2B customers, or groups of company locations. For example, you can create an All B2B market and assign a catalog to it to create different prices for your B2B and D2C customers. You can also create catalogs for different B2B markets. For example, you could create a market to manage pricing for your B2B customers in Europe and North America. If you price your products on a per customer basis, then you can also directly assign a catalog to a company location.

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Before you begin

This guide is for stores that use Markets. If you don't use Markets, then refer to Creating and managing B2B catalogs instead.

Create a catalog with Markets

You can create a catalog in Markets > Catalogs of your Shopify admin. You can create an unlimited number of catalogs, but each company location can have a maximum of 25 catalogs assigned to it. This limit includes catalogs that are assigned using a market and catalogs that are directly assigned to the company location.

When you create a catalog, you can select the products that have the catalog pricing applied to them, and then assign the catalog to a company that the B2B customer is associated with.

Learn more about creating catalogs.

Assigning a catalog to company locations with Markets

If you choose to assign catalogs directly to the company location, rather than using a market, then you can assign a catalog directly to a company from the Catalog section of the Shopify admin, or in the company's profile. Each company location can have a maximum of 25 catalogs assigned to it.

Learn more about creating B2B companies.

Considerations for assigning multiple catalogs directly to companies

If you assign multiple catalogs to the same company location, then the following rules determine the price your B2B customers view on your online store:

  • If the catalogs include different products, then all products from each catalog are displayed.
  • If the catalogs assigned to the same company location include the same product at different prices, then your B2B store displays the lowest price for that item, not including quantity rules or volume pricing breaks. For example, you have a B2B customer with access to two catalogs. In one catalog, the price of a particular candle is set at $9 USD. In the other catalog, the price of that item is set to $7 USD. When the customer visits your store, they're offered that candle at a price of $7 USD.
  • Your store displays quantity rules and volume pricing from the catalog with the lowest price per variant.
  • If two catalogs have the same lowest price for a product, then the quantity rules and volume pricing from the first catalog that was created are displayed.

Considerations for assigning catalogs to a company location and to B2B markets

When you assign a catalog to a company location and the company location matches a B2B market that has a catalog assigned:

  • If the catalogs include different products, then all products from each catalog are displayed.
  • If the catalogs assigned to the company location and matching B2B markets include the same product at different prices, then your B2B store displays the most specific price for that item, and for the catalog assigned to the company location, including quantity rules or volume pricing breaks. For example, you have a B2B customer with access to two catalogs. In one catalog assigned to the company location, the price of a particular candle is $9 USD. In the other catalog assigned to the B2B market, the price of the candle is $7 USD. When the customer visits your store, the candle's displayed at $9 USD.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Markets > Catalogs.

  2. Click the catalog that you want to assign companies to.

  3. Under the Title, click Company location from the dropdown.

  4. Click Add a company location.

  5. Select the company locations that you want to add, and then click Done.

Assigning a catalog to a B2B market

You can assign a catalog to a B2B market when creating a market or any time afterwards from the Catalog section of the Shopify admin.

Considerations for choosing how to assign a catalog

  • Market Catalogs are beneficial for broader strategies where you want to manage multiple customers or regions under a unified approach. For example, you could set up a "B2B Canada" Market with associated catalog for all company locations in Canada.
  • Direct company location catalogs are more suitable for specific, tailored strategies where individual customer needs or agreements are a priority.
  • You will not be able to add region catalogs or catalogs that are directly assigned to company locations to a B2B market.

Choosing between the two depends on whether your focus is on broader market strategies or specific customer relationships.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Markets > Catalogs.

  2. Click the market that you want to customize.

  3. Click the + icon next to the Catalogs setting.

  4. Select the existing catalogs that you want to add to the market, then click Save.

  5. Optional: You can create a new catalog from this step. The new catalog will be linked to the market and auto-populate a title based on the market.

    1. Click the + icon in the Catalogs setting.
    2. Click Create catalog.

  6. Click Done.

Update a catalog with Markets

You can update a catalog from your Shopify admin, or by using a CSV file to update a single catalog, or update catalogs in bulk.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Markets > Catalogs.

  2. Click the catalog that you want to edit.

  3. Make any necessary changes to your catalog.

  4. Click Save.

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