Map the customer organisation and its buying roles
One r/shopify poster asked how to show company-confirmed products and prices while keeping other products away from the general public on a non-Plus setup. This is one scoping question, not detail of typical demand or current platform behaviour. Start by writing down the relationship between the parent organisation, billing entity, delivery location and individual buyer.
Use a role matrix to match access to the customer's actual purchasing process. Treat platform permissions as examples to verify; a customer permission does not decide who has commercial authority.
| Business role | Access to define | What to verify |
|---|---|---|
| Buyer | View the confirmed products and prices for an assigned company location; place orders. | Can the buyer see only the intended location's catalogue and their own order history? |
| Location administrator | Manage permitted location details and view the location's orders. | Does access stop at the correct company location, and who can change billing or delivery addresses? |
| Order approver | Review an order before the business accepts or processes it, if review is required. | Who receives the draft, who records the decision, and what tells the buyer the order is pending? |
| Internal account owner | Maintain the company, contacts, location, catalogue and agreed payment settings. | Who verifies the commercial agreement and handles access changes when staff leave? |
Connect account rules to the commercial agreement
For each company or location, record the catalogue, price source, currency, tax details, delivery addresses, minimums, payment terms and order-submission rule. Name the source of each value, who can authorise a change and how the team checks that the site still matches the agreement.
Shopify is one current example, checked on 18 October 2026. Its B2B features are available on Basic, Grow, Advanced and Plus, but not Starter or Retail. Basic, Grow and Advanced allow up to three active B2B market catalogues across markets; assigning a catalogue directly to a company or location requires Plus. Verify the live plan and Markets setup before promising company-specific products or prices. Other platforms have different limits.
- Company and purchasing location
- Buyer and location-administrator permissions
- Order reviewer and review record
- Catalogue and price source
- Payment, delivery and tax configuration
- Authorised contact for account changes
Make the active account context visible
When a contact can buy for more than one company location, show which location is active before displaying its products, prices and delivery choices. Explain how to switch locations and what changes when a different location is selected.
Keep business-only terms and account support routes close to the decision. Shopify customer accounts show B2B-specific prices and products to signed-in B2B customers. The storefront is public by default; a dedicated B2B store can restrict whole-store access, while locking specific pages needs custom development or a third-party app. Test the guest and signed-in journeys separately.
If orders need review, tell buyers whether submitting creates a draft for review or automatically submits the order. In Shopify, that order-submission setting is configured for the company or location; it is separate from the buyer and location-administrator permissions. Name the internal reviewer and the point at which the buyer receives an update.
Test permission boundaries and account changes
Create test users for each role and verify what they can see and do: view a catalogue and price, change an address, see order history, place an order or review a draft. Shopify's customer permissions distinguish ordering-only contacts from location administrators: location administrators can see all orders for their location and update its billing and shipping addresses. They do not automatically become staff administrators or commercial approvers.
Use synthetic companies and test orders. Check a guest, a buyer at Company A, a buyer at Company B, a location administrator and an order reviewer. Confirm that each sees the intended products, prices, addresses and order records; also test a removed contact and a changed location. Resolve any access mismatch before launch.
Keep account setup aligned with sales operations
Define who creates an account, who verifies commercial details, how exceptions are confirmed and how the first login is explained. Give customer service a route to correct a location or contact without exposing data to the wrong account.
Review the process against actual anonymised order scenarios with sales, finance and fulfilment. The goal is to make the existing commercial arrangement easier to use, not to force a digital account model that does not match how the customer buys.