Presta for B2B platform

[Franz_dvp]

Hi guys,

 

I'm building a site for a client who needs a B2B platform and I chose PrestaShop as e-commerce solution, but after spending two weeks on it, I still can't find the right settings.

 

We have three different kinds of clients (dealers, wholesalers and distributors) and we need to specify three different prices for each product, so that dealers see ONLY their prices, and so wholesalers and distributors.

So for example, adding a new product - like a laptop - I need to set € 700 for dealers, € 600 for wholesalers and € 500 for distributors. Every time a new client subscribes, we have to set what kind of client is, so that online he will find ONLY the correct price for each product (important: a dealer, who pays € 700 for a laptop, doesn't have to know that distributors pay € 500). I can't find how to set PrestaShop to act this way.

 

At the moment, I created three client groups (dealers, wholesalers and distributors) and set a different discount percentage per group. Every time a new client subscribes, I add him to the correct group, so that he sees the price resulting from the connected discount.

 

The problem is, percentage discounts are not the right move, we need three specific prices per product. I imagined I could have specified them using excel (three columns > three prices) and then the csv export, but I can't find the way.

 

 

I look forward to reading your suggestions. Thank you very much to everyone for your help!

 

Francesco

(PrestaShop 1.5.6.1 on Linux Hosting)

Edited January 16, 2014 by Franz_dvp (see edit history)

[ufctemple1]

@Franz_dvp - I'm a newbie here too, and need the functionality you describe (nice clear example by the way).

 

I am so disappointed that the "The best place in the world to ask questions about PrestaShop and get advice from our passionate community!" hasn't even replied one time to your question.

 

I want to love Presta and be a believer, but ... crickets chirping here is a sour sign to me.  

[waterworks2]

I also struggle internally to not feel a let down when I can't get a question answered. But then I remember that every expert on this forum as well as the entire community are probably doing all of this for free, answering questions, taking the time to explain things in detail, figuring out fixes to our problems because we simply aren't talented or knowledgeable enough to figure out the problem ourselves. 

 

Not to mention Presta Shop is completely free e-commerce solution. I think this makes it a solid solution when compared with many others.

 

That being said, I've worked with several other systems including xcart, magento, virtuemart and those suffer from the same support problems. Post a problem on the forums and you wait days and often never get an answer to your problem. I especially found this to be the case with Magento, which is a complicated beast of an e-commerce system and not user friendly at all. Not to mention it cost a whopping $15,000 (starting price) now that eBay has bought a majority share of the software. 

 

I think PrestaShop is a solid choice for a small storefront, but yah I do understand the feeling of being frustrated when nobody chimes in. Hopefully someone can chime in soon for you.

 

I have found in the past that quite often just paying money to hire a really good coder can solve a ton of headache really fast. I know it's not always feasible but if you're serious about business, sometimes it's the only way to go for complex customization to your store front.

[Franz_dvp]

@ufctemple1 @waterworks2

 

Thank you for your replies.

I know that Presta aims to be a B2C solution, and B2B platforms have different needs, so I don't expect to find all the options I need to set up, but I understand ufctemple1's point of view and I also think that the surplus value of an opensource platform is its community.

I work with WordPress and I'm really glad to be part of that community, where you can find a friendly support even better than a ticket-managed business one.

 

At the moment, I'm still working on Presta, but I confess that my team is not satisfied with the current results, and maybe we'll have to start over with a different platform.

 

Anyway, thank you very much for your help. I hope Presta will continue improving with time.

 

Francesco

[ufctemple1]

@waterworks2 - You make very good points, including that Magento is a "complicated beast" lol.  I spent $3,500 on developers - and six months of frustration - and Magento could not do what I did alone in half a day with PrestaShop.  Note:  that is not an exaggeration.

 

I am not unhappy with PS overall, just that they tout the community (who doesn't want to be a part of something great?!?) and then it doesn't seem to here.

 

As far as it being free is the reason that nobody here seems to be answering, I don't really accept that.  As Franz_dvp points out the WP community help is there - and it's free too.

 

So, instead of simply complaining and going away - I'm determined to jump in here as often as possible and help where I can.

 

@Franz_dvp - Francesco, have you any direct or tangential experience with PrestaShop paid support?  I have no problem at all paying $33 or $58 a month for good, fast, reliable help - but they apparently have monthly and annual hour limits in place.  From what I can tell, that in plain speaking means "$63 or $58 / per hour for support if you use up all of it (could be much much more if you don't need it all).

Also - I don't see any mention of paying monthly - it's a substantial annual charge with limited assistance.

Can you or @waterworks2 shed some more light on PrestaShop support practices?

Edited February 3, 2014 by ufctemple1 (see edit history)

[ufctemple1]

Well, this helps some.  I filled out enough to get to the official PrestaShop terms of service agreement for their basic support plan:
 

1. Six (6) hours of technical support for one year from date of contract
2. Up to two (2) hours of technical support per month not to exceed Six (6) hours per year.
3. Technical support hours are 1 pm to 5 pm EST, Monday thru Friday, excluding US Federal Holidays, the day after Thanksgiving, and the day before Christmas.
4. Installation support with new hosting account from PrestaShop hosting partner.
5. Support tickets will be assigned to a technical support engineer based on the ticket Priority assigned by technical support agent. All down sites, and sites unabled to process checkouts are given priority to their technical support ticket over non-emergency technical support tickets. Support tickets are assigned to a technical support agent during technical support hours in the order in which they are received.
6. Each Support request or ticket requires one hour minimum.
7. Support valid only for website: 
8. Each support request must be provided on the official PrestaShop Technical Support Platform.
9. There are no guarantee in ticket handling, processing, and response time.

 

 

There's definitely room for a third party technical expert / team / company to provide FAR SUPERIOR service than PrestaShop themselves - in my humble opinion.

[Franz_dvp]

@ufctemple1

 

I don't know about PrestaShop paid support, this is my first experience with this platform.

 

Thank you for your latest post, maybe I'll consider the service, but actually it all started as an experiment, to avoid using a proprietary software (like one which we already use) and simply managing all stuff by ourselves.

 

I need to go online soon, so for now I'll try to set up the most important options. In the coming months I'll continue searching for other solutions.

[benjamin utterback]

Hi guys,

 

I'm building a site for a client who needs a B2B platform and I chose PrestaShop as e-commerce solution, but after spending two weeks on it, I still can't find the right settings.

 

We have three different kinds of clients (dealers, wholesalers and distributors) and we need to specify three different prices for each product, so that dealers see ONLY their prices, and so wholesalers and distributors.

So for example, adding a new product - like a laptop - I need to set € 700 for dealers, € 600 for wholesalers and € 500 for distributors. Every time a new client subscribes, we have to set what kind of client is, so that online he will find ONLY the correct price for each product (important: a dealer, who pays € 700 for a laptop, doesn't have to know that distributors pay € 500). I can't find how to set PrestaShop to act this way.

 

At the moment, I created three client groups (dealers, wholesalers and distributors) and set a different discount percentage per group. Every time a new client subscribes, I add him to the correct group, so that he sees the price resulting from the connected discount.

 

The problem is, percentage discounts are not the right move, we need three specific prices per product. I imagined I could have specified them using excel (three columns > three prices) and then the csv export, but I can't find the way.

 

 

I look forward to reading your suggestions. Thank you very much to everyone for your help!

 

Francesco

(PrestaShop 1.5.6.1 on Linux Hosting)

 

You don't need to do Price discounts. When you make the specific price, uncheck the "Leave the base price" and edit the default price, that will change the default price on the group that you select, without doing a discount.

 

btw, sorry for the quick answer. I understand your points and I'm just trying to help out.

 

In a more formal message I would say Hello! welcome to the community etc... and it's true. For now, just try my suggestion out and let me know if it helps. 

 

Thanks!

[Franz_dvp]

You don't need to do Price discounts. When you make the specific price, uncheck the "Leave the base price" and edit the default price, that will change the default price on the group that you select, without doing a discount.

 

btw, sorry for the quick answer. I understand your points and I'm just trying to help out.

 

In a more formal message I would say Hello! welcome to the community etc... and it's true. For now, just try my suggestion out and let me know if it helps. 

 

Thanks!

 

Hi Benjamin,

 

thank you very much indeed for your help! This completely solves my problem! I just wish you had read my topic some time ago... but it's never too late to get some help :-)

 

Just one more question: is there a way to import these specific prices through a csv file? At the moment I should manually add two specific prices for each product, and it would be a really hard work.

 

Thank you again!

 

Francesco

[ufctemple1]

@Benjamin - Thanks for the prompt support, you don't know how welcome your message is!

 

@Franz - I haven't tried either of them yet, but Store Manager http://www.prestashopmanager.com/  and Store Commander http://www.storecommander.com/en/  look promising for bulk / mass edits and export import.  

 

I noticed that SM doesn't really post here on the forum, but SC definitely does - although mostly in French.  I think I'll give SC a look first solely based on that willingness to be involved in the PS community.

Edited February 3, 2014 by ufctemple1 (see edit history)

[benjamin utterback]

Store Manager does not post on here too much because they have a great support email when you own their products. I can vouch for them and it will save you a great amount of time doing the daily tasks. Yes, they can import the specific prices. 

 

As for the CSV, you would need to add the specific price for each group in order to import. 

[Franz_dvp]

@ufctemple1 @benjamin

 

Thank you for your interest and your kind replies. I will keep working on PrestaShop, maybe with the help of Store Manager.

 

Nice to meet you guys!

 

F

[ufctemple1]

@Benjamin - could you elaborate a bit on "As for the CSV, you would need to add the specific price for each group in order to import" please?

 

Also - thanks for speaking up about Store Manager, it is well received.

 

Do you have anything to share about Store Commander?

[benjamin utterback]

This should help you import specific price (not % or amount discount) for customer groups in PrestaShop 1.5x http://maiolab.net/adding-a-specific-price-for-all-products-prestashop/ (Contact store manager to see how they would do it)

 

 

 

I have no feedback on store commander, sorry!

[waterworks2]

@ ufctemple1, I can't really speak for the workings of support for Prestashop. I'm new here as well and trying out Presta in an attempt to figure out what e-commerce platform I'm going to use for my next business idea.

 

I'm not surprised at all at your Magento experience. It is truly a beast to handle. I had a friend who experienced the same exact thing. Spent months developing it and tossed about $5k at it only to figure out it was just too much to get going. What I found right off the bat is that you really have to have webhosting that is setup specifically for running Magento, perhaps much more so than other e-commerce solutions. That seems to be the first and foremost thing there. Second, if you want to accomplish any customization, you need to hire not just a web developer, but someone who specializes and is certified in Magento development. I had very experienced designers work on a project for me that was Magento based and even they were having difficulty with some things. I think Magento is a great solution for someone that has a web-dev team on staff already and they are ready to put forth a lot of money to develop a top-notch store that moves 1000's of products a day.

 

So far I like PrestaShop for a small business solution. I'd like to find some really big stores using Presta and browse them to see how well those sites work. Still doing lots of research and feeling out this PrestaShop stuff.

 

Regarding the comparison between free WP and free PS and their related communities, you have to remember that WP has a way larger community, probably due to the fact that way less people need e-commerce than who just need a regular website/blog platform. Therefor I think there is going to be a much smaller community for any e-commerce platform when compared to WP. Small community of course means less plugins, less forum discussion, etc. This was a big problem with Magento that I had. Support community seemed almost non-existent. So many questions went unanswered on the forums.