Around ten months ago, creating product bundles in WooCommerce was made ridiculously simple with the Custom Product Boxes plugin. While before this plugin there were options to allow the admin to group products in WooCommerce from a website’s back end, we changed the norm with the Custom Product Boxes plugin. Here, we shifted the control to the end user thereby improving user experience DRASTICALLY.
If you have been using the Custom Product Boxes plugin for WooCommerce then the ‘Dynamic Price Calculation’ update is sure to make you happy. If you’re not then probably you should take note of it. (You might want to start using it on your WooCommerce website after this revision.)
Any who, before we get into the specifics of the update let’s take a look at what the plugin is all about. (If you’re already acquainted with the plugin then feel free to jump to the details of the update right away 😉 )
What’s Custom Product Boxes All About?
Custom Product Boxes is an extension for WooCommerce that takes creating bundled products to a completely new level. Here’s what your website will be equipped with once you install the plugin.
1. You can Create a WooCommerce Grouped Product Box
Just like you have ‘Simple Product’ listed in the ‘Product Type’ drop down, a new product type is created on installing the plugin. The new product type is called ‘Custom Product Box’. The product bundling feature will be made available to you on assigning this product type to a product. You can then set the number of items that can be added to the box.
A fixed price can then be assigned to each WooCommerce grouped product box as per your requirement. What do I mean by fixed price? Well, it means that if you create a custom box consisting a 9 items then a exact price will be assigned to the box irrespective of the items that are added to the box.
Ideal Use Case
This pricing type is ideal if the price of every product that will be added to the box is the same. For example, if an assorted box of chocolates is what you are offering to your customers then the fixed price option can be chosen if the price of every chocolate is the same.
2. You can Link Products with the Box
Products that have been added to WooCommerce can be linked to the Custom Product Box using the ‘Add-On Products’ field.
3. End Users can Choose the Products for the Custom Box
Once the grouped product has been set up at the back end and published users will now be able to choose the products they add to the grouped product box.
Of course the products that can be added to the box will only be the ones which you have assigned to the box.
4. Stocks Will be Managed
The stock of the add-on products is managed on the front end. So the user is able to view the availability of a particular product add-on right where he adds it to the custom product box.
What’s New?
Earlier in the article I mentioned about assigning a fixed price to a custom product box.
Version 1.1.0 of Custom Product Boxes is a major update in this respect and comes with the option to dynamically calculate the price of a WooCommerce grouped product. The following are the two variations available while selecting the dynamic calculation option for pricing type of product box.
1. Per Product Pricing with Base Price
Here, a base price will be set for the WooCommerce grouped product. Beyond that, price of an item that is added to the box will be appended to the base price thereby increasing the value of the final product.
Ideal Use Case
This pricing type is ideal if the base product is a special packaging box that comes along with items that have variable prices.
2. Per Product Pricing without Base Price
This option allows you to associate pricing for a box based on only the items that are added to the box. Which means that the customer starts out with a box which is priced at zero. Now every time an item is added to the box the price of that item will be appended to the final cost of the product that will be added to the cart
Ideal Use Case
This pricing type is ideal if the items that have been associated with the grouped product have variable prices.
So, that was me updating you on the dynamic price calculation feature for the Custom Product Boxes plugin.
It is our constant effort to keep improving the plugin and customer feedback forms an important part of this process. If you’re using the plugin and would like to see a feature feel free to let us know. That definitely does not mean you can’t give us your ideas if you’re not using the plugin.
Help us get started with the next version of Custom Product Boxes by giving us your inputs – you can either send us an email or simply use the comments section below.
Until the next time, Adios 🙂
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