Charge for Multiple Items on an Order separately (Now Available!)
At Barn2Door, our Product team talks to a Farmers on a regular basis, to gather their feedback, and to decide where to spend engineering resources (time and money). We love to build new capabilities that help Farmers make more money, while saving time.
Many Farmers sell products that have “variable” prices subject to the final weight. Farmers selling Direct to customers with convenient online purchasing might not know the final weight of an item when the Buyer is purchasing an item. In-person sales --- at a Farmer’s market or grocery --- items can be weighed at time of purchase. For online sales, items cannot be weighted at time of purchase.
Online purchasing should be as simple and pain-free for Buyers as possible. A Farmer can ask for set prices on items that are traditionally weighed --- medium and large chickens ($30 for 3.0 - 3.5 LBs, $35 for 3.5 - 4 LBs etc.) are a great example. Showcase a weight range and set a price for each ‘size’. A range is acceptable to Buyers purchasing online, and keeps the purchasing process simple and straightforward.
For large items (¼ cow or ½ hog) or expensive cuts (a tomahawk steak), it often makes sense to take a deposit then later weigh the item and charge the difference. Buyers expect this for expensive items even if it adds an additional step or unknown final charge.
We recently overhauled Barn2Door’s final charges feature in the “Orders” tab so that Farmers can now apply multiple final charges for a single order. As a result, a Farmer can now reconcile a deposit and charge a Buyer as individual products become available. This is particularly valuable when a Buyer has purchased multiple items, some that might be on hand and others that will be harvested at a later date.
For instance, if a Buyer makes a deposit to purchase a side-of-beef and a whole hog, then the Farmer can reconcile the final weights and automatically charge for those items separately --- when the products become available.
How Multiple Final Charges Work
Farmers can apply one or more final charges to an order as items become available:
A Farmer goes to an Order and selects item(s) that are ready to be reconciled
A Farmer then enters the final charges for each item - by weight or price. The Farmer can save the final amounts for later, or choose to "charge now" or "invoice" (we recommend charging for smaller items but invoicing for items worth hundreds of dollars or more).
Final changes that have been successfully completed will show as paid or invoiced.
A Farmer can return to this same Order later to apply final charges to some or all of the remaining item(s).
To further enable this feature we have also updated how promotions are applied as well. Many Farmers offer a “promo” to induce Buyers to make a commitment to purchase large ticket items. Promo codes can now be settled separately to individual items on an Order, too.
How Promos work with Final Charges
Apply a promo to individual items when making Final Charges:
Select items to reconcile
If a Promo code was used, it will automatically appear with each applicable line item
No Promo code will appear where it does not apply
For ($) dollar value Promo codes, the amount that remains is applied to final charges
For (%) percentage value Promos the full percent discount is applied to final charges
Promos can also be applied to final charges with $0 deposit
Note, Promo code expiration dates are ignored when applying them to final charges (given the Promo code must have been valid at the time of the original order)
These changes, while subtle, are important Product improvements that enable Farmers utilizing Barn2Door to save more time when reconciling multiple final charges on a single Order.
Thank you to all the Farmers who provided feedback to help inform the design of this new functionality; we encourage Barn2Door customers to share their thoughts with our team. We are always seeking to improve Barn2Door to best serve Farmers.
Barn2Door powers Farmers who sell direct, helping them increase sales, access customers and save time. If you’re curious how Barn2Door could help your Farm build a thriving direct-to-market business, watch this 5 minute video.