Case Study

Wholesale Whale

A Shopify app that lets merchants run wholesale and retail pricing from a single store. Built for Shopify certified. 5.0 stars.

5.0

star rating on Shopify App Store

BfS

Built for Shopify certified

130+

currencies supported

AI-first

built and maintained with AI

The problem

Shopify merchants selling to both retail and wholesale customers had two options: run separate stores (double the work) or use existing wholesale apps that were overbuilt and hard to configure.

Merchants didn't need a full B2B suite with custom portals and complex approval flows. They needed one thing: different prices for different customer groups, working with the store they already had.

The approach

Build the simplest thing that solves the core problem: tag a customer, they see different prices. No setup wizards, no onboarding flows, no configuration fatigue.

AI handled the volume — writing code, running test suites across every Shopify plan and currency combination, and catching edge cases a single developer would miss. One person made the product decisions.

Key decisions

Tag-based pricing over approval workflows

Shopify already has customer tags. Instead of building a parallel system, Wholesale Whale hooks into what merchants already use. Tag a customer “wholesale” and they see wholesale prices. No new concepts to learn.

Built for Shopify from day one

Not retrofitted — designed to meet Shopify's highest quality standard from the first commit. App Bridge for embedded experience, Polaris for UI, proper webhook handling, clean uninstall. This paid off: BfS certification on the first submission.

Free tier with real value

The free plan includes one discount rule with unlimited products. Enough to validate the app before committing. No feature walls that make the free tier useless.

What shipped

Tag-based pricing — automatic discounts by customer group
Volume discounts — tiered pricing by quantity or order amount
Quick order form — B2B ordering with CSV/XLSX bulk import
Net terms — Net 7/15/30/60/90 with automatic invoicing
Auto-tagging — hands-free customer segmentation based on purchase behavior
Analytics — real-time tracking of discount performance and revenue by group

Built with

Shopify APIPolarisRemixApp BridgePrismaPostgreSQLTypeScriptVercel

Same process, your project

The AI-first methodology that built Wholesale Whale is available for your Shopify app, iOS app, or custom software project.