How to Check Case Packs and Buyer Prices Before Creating a Shopify Draft

Short answer: first confirm what one Shopify variant represents. If it represents an individual item, convert cases only after confirming the pack size; if it already represents a whole case, do not multiply it again. Then decide whether the final price comes from the PO, your Shopify catalog or a documented buyer agreement. If the PO does not make the price basis clear, keep it in review.

This is a guide for merchants receiving buyer purchase orders for products they sell. It is not an inventory purchasing guide for supplier POs.

The two most expensive-looking wholesale mistakes are often quiet ones: a case count treated as an each count, or a case price treated as a unit price. Both can produce a valid Shopify draft with the wrong commercial value.

Why case packs need their own check

A Shopify draft line counts units of the selected variant. That variant may represent an individual item or an entire pack. The example below assumes it represents one individual item. Wholesale buyers may order cartons, displays, cases or packs, and the same product can appear differently across buyers:

• Buyer A writes 4 cases and always means six units per case.
• Buyer B writes 4 cartons for the same product but their carton contains 12 units.
• A legacy PDF simply says 4, without explaining whether that means cases or each.

A system cannot safely multiply the quantity until someone knows the pack basis. Shopify draft orders are suitable for wholesale-rate sales, but Shopify does not determine what a buyer’s “case” means. Shopify’s draft-order API documentation also notes that a new draft does not reserve inventory by default.

Worked example: one PO line, three price choices

Imagine a fictional incoming buyer PO from Harbor & Pine Retail:

Your Shopify catalog has the matching active variant at CAD 159 per individual unit. Your team also has a signed buyer price list, reference HP-FW-2026, that states CAD 150 per individual unit, valid through 31 December 2026.

The PO contains two separate questions:

1. How many individual units do three cases represent?
2. Does CAD 450 mean one case, one unit, or something else?

Step 1: confirm the multiplier

The buyer’s approved pack rule says one case contains three units. The order therefore becomes:

3 cases × 3 units per case = 9 Shopify units

That is the quantity that would appear on the Shopify draft. Tradefold keeps the source notation and multiplier in review. If the pack size is not confirmed, stop; do not infer it from the product title or price.

Step 2: identify the price basis

There are three possible readings of CAD 450:

If the PO clearly says “CAD 450 / case,” and the three-unit pack is confirmed, the calculation is straightforward: CAD 450 ÷ 3 = CAD 150 per individual unit.

If the PO just says “450,” the number is not enough. The reviewer should inspect the document header, the buyer agreement or ask the buyer. A price conversion based on a guess can be wrong even when all arithmetic is correct.

Choose a price policy deliberately

Tradefold’s review can use one of three price authorities:

1. Reviewed source price — use when the PO clearly provides the intended unit or case basis.
2. Catalog price — use when the current Shopify price is the agreed commercial price for this order.
3. Agreed buyer price — use a specific buyer price list that your team has entered and reviewed.

In the worked example, the buyer agreement states CAD 150 per unit and has not expired. That supports an agreed buyer price of CAD 150 per unit. It happens to match the inferred CAD 450 case price, but the reviewer should record the buyer agreement reference rather than rely on coincidence.

The catalog price is CAD 159 per unit. Tradefold displays it for comparison, allowing the reviewer to see the CAD 9 difference per unit before deciding. For nine units, that difference is CAD 81. It is not automatically treated as an error: it could be a valid wholesale agreement, a stale price list or a PO issue.

Tradefold buyer price books include currency, agreement or price-list reference, prices per individual unit and an optional expiry date. They do not synchronize Shopify B2B company catalogs or quantity tiers.

What to review before approval

The reviewer should be able to answer all of the following:

• Is Harbor & Pine the intended Shopify customer?
• Does VE-TRL-OLV-7 match the right active product variant?
• Is the source quantity three cases, not three individual units?
• Is the approved multiplier three units per case for this buyer?
• Does CAD 450 mean one complete case?
• Does HP-FW-2026 apply to this product, currency and date?
• Should the final unit price be CAD 150, CAD 159 or a different documented amount?

Only after these decisions should the team prepare the Shopify calculation and approve draft creation. Tradefold saves the approved price snapshot with the order workflow, so an exported pro-forma can show the unit price, final unit quantity and, where the mapping is unambiguous, the case price before discounts.

The pro-forma is a review document. It is not a tax invoice or payment receipt. Check addresses, shipping, tax and payment terms in Shopify before agreeing a payment date or sending a customer-facing document.

Make future imports faster without making them blind

Once a buyer-specific SKU alias, case pack and price agreement have been verified, record them as rules for that buyer. The next PO can start with that context. The review step remains: products, buyer formats and price lists change.

Where Tradefold fits

Tradefold imports incoming wholesale POs from PDFs, CSV files, Excel-compatible spreadsheets, text and inbound email. It helps teams match catalog products, review buyer aliases, confirm case quantities, compare source/catalog/agreed buyer prices and create a Shopify draft only after explicit approval.

It currently supports store currencies Shopify store currencies, with no exchange conversion. Eligible stores can try Tradefold for 14 days and up to 10 successfully created draft orders. Paid plans are $99 USD/month for 100 drafts and $199 USD/month for 300 drafts.

Install Tradefold from the Shopify App Store and use one existing buyer PO as the first review test.

Keep reading

Read our guide to the PDF-to-draft workflow, check pricing and the trial allowance, or get help with your first order.