Shopify B2B Company Accounts: Setup, Roles & Permissions (2026)

Running a wholesale or B2B operation means managing dozens — sometimes hundreds — of business buyers, each with their own purchasing team, shipping addresses, payment terms, and approval chains. Generic e-commerce accounts were never designed for that complexity. Shopify B2B company accounts solve this by giving every wholesale buyer a structured, permission-governed account that mirrors how real businesses actually purchase. Instead of one login shared across a company, or a separate account per employee, a single company account houses every location, every buyer, and every workflow under one roof — all tied to custom pricing, net terms, and catalogs negotiated specifically for that account.

This guide explains exactly how shopify b2b company accounts work, who needs them, how to set them up, and what limitations to plan around — so you can decide whether they fit your wholesale operation or whether you need a different approach.

What Are Shopify B2B Company Accounts?

Shopify B2B company accounts are a native feature of Shopify Plus — see the official Shopify Plus B2B platform — that lets merchants create dedicated accounts for business buyers, structured around the way companies actually buy. Rather than treating every buyer as an individual consumer, Shopify models the relationship at the company level — capturing the org structure, locations, payment terms, and buyer roles in a single entity.

The feature became available as part of Shopify Plus's built-in B2B offering, replacing the need for third-party wholesale apps for most core scenarios. When a merchant enables B2B on Shopify Plus, a new section appears in the admin under Customers → Companies, where every wholesale account is created and managed independently from retail customers.

The fundamental data structure has three tiers:

• Company — the top-level entity representing the buying organization (e.g., "Acme Distributors LLC")
• Locations — individual branches, warehouses, or offices within that company, each with its own shipping address, billing address, payment terms, and optionally its own price list
• Customers (Buyers) — individual people attached to one or more locations, each with a specific permission role that controls what they can see and do

This three-tier model is what separates shopify plus company accounts from a standard Shopify customer account. A standard account is a flat record — one email, one address book, one purchase history. A company account is a hierarchy that can scale from a two-person operation to an enterprise buyer with 50 locations and dozens of purchasing staff.

Who Needs Shopify B2B Company Accounts?

Not every wholesale merchant needs the full structure that shopify b2b company accounts provide. But for certain buyer profiles, they are nearly indispensable:

• Distributors with regional branches — A distributor that orders from three warehouses, each with different billing entities and purchase approval chains, maps naturally onto the Company → Location → Buyer model.
• Multi-branch retail buyers — A retail chain that buys wholesale for 12 stores can have each store as a location, each store manager as a buyer, and head office finance as a location admin with full visibility across all branches.
• Franchise networks — Franchise groups where franchisees buy independently but a parent entity manages negotiated pricing benefit enormously from company-level catalogs and per-location ordering.
• Agencies and resellers — Agencies that purchase on behalf of multiple end clients can use separate company accounts per client, keeping purchase histories, terms, and catalogs cleanly separated.
• Manufacturers with OEM buyers — OEM customers often have dedicated purchasing managers, separate engineering teams that view specs, and a finance department that handles invoicing — all different roles within one buying company.

If your B2B buyers are predominantly small businesses with a single buyer and one ship-to address, simpler wholesale approaches may serve you better. But as soon as buyers have multiple stakeholders or locations, shopify b2b companies earn their complexity.

Setting Up Shopify B2B Company Accounts

The setup process is straightforward once B2B is enabled on your Shopify Plus store. Here is the sequence to follow:

1. Enable B2B on Shopify Plus

B2B is a Shopify Plus-only feature. In your Shopify admin, navigate to Settings → Markets → B2B. Enable the B2B sales channel. You can choose whether B2B buyers access a dedicated B2B storefront URL or whether they log in through your main store with their company credentials — the experience adjusts automatically based on their account type.

2. Create a Company

Go to Customers → Companies → Add company. At minimum, you need a company name. You can also add a company email, phone number, external ID (useful for syncing with an ERP or CRM), and notes. This is the parent record — all locations and buyers will sit beneath it. For shopify b2b company accounts, every piece of buyer-specific configuration ultimately traces back to this company record.

3. Add Locations

Within the company record, create one or more shopify company locations. Each location requires a name (e.g., "Chicago Warehouse" or "East Coast HQ") and a shipping address. You can also assign:

• A billing address (separate from shipping if needed)
• Payment terms (e.g., Net 30, Net 60, or payment on checkout)
• A price list / catalog specific to that location
• Tax exemption status
• A currency (if you operate a multi-currency store)

Multiple locations under one company can have different payment terms and price lists. A head-office location might have Net 60 terms while a field office location pays on checkout — all within the same parent company account.

4. Invite Buyers and Assign Roles

Add customers to a location by entering their email and assigning a permission role. Shopify sends them an account activation email. Once they activate their account, they log in and see only the company storefront experience — with pricing, catalogs, and payment options filtered to their location and role. You can assign a buyer to multiple locations if they are authorized to order for more than one branch.

5. Set Company-Specific Catalogs and Pricing

Assign a catalog (a curated product selection with a linked price list) at either the company level or the individual location level. This means buyer A, ordering from the Chicago location, can see a completely different product range and price sheet than buyer B at the New York location — even though both belong to the same parent company account. This flexibility is the operational heart of shopify plus company accounts.

Understanding Company Structure: Companies, Locations, Buyers

The hierarchy is the key concept to internalize before building out your B2B accounts. Here is how the three tiers relate:

A single buyer can belong to multiple locations. A location inherits settings from the company but can override them. This layered inheritance means you configure shared defaults at the company level and override only what needs to differ at the location level — saving significant admin work at scale.

When a buyer logs in, they see the store through the lens of their location assignment. If they belong to multiple locations, they are prompted to select which location they are ordering for — keeping purchase histories, addresses, and payment methods cleanly separated per branch.

B2B Buyer Permissions on Shopify

One of the most practically important aspects of shopify b2b company accounts is the permission system. B2B buyer permissions Shopify offers are role-based, assigned per location, and control what each buyer can see and do in the storefront and account portal.

Shopify currently offers three built-in roles:

The Location Admin role is designed for procurement managers or office managers who need full control — they can update addresses, manage buyer invitations for their location, and see all purchase activity. Ordering Only suits individual buyers who need to place orders but should not touch account settings. View Only is useful for stakeholders — a finance team member who needs to review product catalogs or track spending but is not authorized to commit to purchases.

Understanding b2b buyer permissions Shopify provides is essential when onboarding enterprise accounts, where role separation is often a procurement requirement, not just a convenience.

Company-Specific Features

Shopify B2B company accounts unlock a suite of features that are unavailable or severely limited in standard Shopify customer accounts:

• Net Payment Terms — Assign Net 15, Net 30, Net 60, or Net 90 terms to any location. Buyers check out without paying immediately; an invoice is generated and the merchant collects payment later. Shopify tracks outstanding balances and due dates natively.
• Custom Catalogs — Catalogs are curated product collections. Each company or location can be assigned a catalog that limits which products are visible and purchasable — so a buyer never sees products they are not supposed to order.
• Price Lists — Attached to catalogs, price lists define the specific prices a buyer sees. Prices can be set as fixed amounts per variant, or as percentage adjustments (e.g., 20% below retail). Multiple companies can share the same price list, or each can have their own.
• Tax Exemptions — Mark a company or location as tax-exempt. Shopify will not collect tax on orders placed by that buyer, and the exemption is recorded on the order for your accounting records.
• Purchase Order (PO) Numbers — B2B buyers can enter a PO number at checkout. This appears on the order, the invoice, and in your admin — critical for buyers whose finance teams match supplier invoices to internal POs.
• Payment on Invoice — In addition to net terms, you can configure locations to pay by bank transfer on invoice, with payment collected outside of Shopify's checkout payment flow.

Managing Multi-Location Companies

When a company has multiple shopify company locations, management complexity grows — but Shopify provides the tools to handle it cleanly.

Each location maintains its own order history, so a buyer at the Chicago location sees only Chicago's orders, while the Location Admin can see all orders across the locations they manage. This keeps large buyers' purchase data organized without requiring separate company accounts per branch.

Shipping and billing can be set independently per location. A company's accounts payable department might be based in New York even though goods ship to four different states — the billing address lives on the company or location record, separate from the ship-to address entered at checkout.

Approval workflows are not yet a native Shopify B2B feature — Shopify does not currently support draft order approval chains where a manager must approve before an order submits. This is a known gap, and merchants who need it typically address it through custom development or third-party B2B apps that layer approval workflows on top of Shopify's native accounts. See the Limitations section below for more on this.

For merchants managing dozens of multi-location shopify b2b companies, the Shopify API allows programmatic bulk creation and updating of companies, locations, and buyers — making it practical to sync account structures from an ERP or CRM rather than configuring each one manually in the admin.

Shopify B2B Company Accounts vs Traditional Customer Accounts

Understanding the difference between B2B company accounts and standard Shopify customer accounts helps you decide which is appropriate for your buyer segments:

For any merchant with serious B2B volume, the feature gap is significant. Standard accounts were designed for consumers. Shopify B2B company accounts were designed for procurement teams.

Common Questions About Shopify B2B Company Accounts

Can a buyer belong to multiple companies?

A buyer (customer record) can be associated with multiple locations, but each location belongs to one company. In practice, if an individual genuinely purchases on behalf of two unrelated companies, they would need two separate Shopify customer accounts.

Can I mix B2B and retail on the same Shopify Plus store?

Yes. B2B buyers log in with their company credentials and see B2B pricing and catalogs. Retail visitors see the standard storefront. Shopify handles the separation automatically based on whether the logged-in account is a company buyer or a standard customer.

Do B2B company accounts work with Shopify's checkout?

Yes — B2B buyers use Shopify's standard checkout, but it is pre-populated with their location's shipping address, payment terms, and pricing. The checkout experience is recognizable to the buyer while being fully customized behind the scenes.

Can I import existing customers as B2B companies?

Shopify does not provide a native bulk import UI for company accounts, but the Shopify Plus company accounts API supports programmatic creation. A developer can script an import from a CSV or CRM export using the Companies API endpoints.

Are B2B company accounts available on Shopify Basic or Advanced?

No. Shopify B2B company accounts are exclusively a Shopify Plus feature. Merchants on lower plans can access limited B2B functionality through apps, but native company accounts — with locations, roles, net terms, and catalogs — require Plus.

Can B2B buyers see retail prices?

Only if you allow it. When a catalog is assigned to a buyer's location, they see only the prices defined in that price list. Standard retail prices are hidden unless explicitly included in their catalog at the same price point.

Limitations and Workarounds

Despite being the most capable native B2B solution Shopify has offered, shopify b2b company accounts still have meaningful gaps that merchants should evaluate before committing:

• No native order approval workflows. Enterprise procurement teams often require that a buyer's draft order be reviewed and approved by a manager before it becomes a live order. Shopify does not support this natively. Workarounds include custom-built approval flows using draft orders and the Shopify API, or third-party B2B platforms (Handshake, Ordermentum, etc.) that layer approvals on top of Shopify.
• No native quick order / CSV order upload. High-volume B2B buyers typically want to paste a list of SKUs and quantities rather than browse and add items individually. Shopify's default storefront does not include a quick-order form. This is addressable via apps or custom theme development.
• Limited buyer role customization. The three built-in roles (Location Admin, Ordering Only, View Only) cover most scenarios, but granular permissions — such as allowing a buyer to order but not see invoices, or to see pricing without initiating checkout — are not configurable. Custom development can extend this via the Storefront API and metafields, but it adds complexity.
• No native quoting / RFQ workflow. Request-for-quote processes, where a buyer submits a cart for price negotiation before committing, are not built into Shopify B2B. Draft orders created by merchant staff can serve this purpose manually, but there is no buyer-facing quote submission UI. Apps such as Quotify or custom builds fill this gap.
• ERP and CRM sync requires development. Shopify b2b companies do not have out-of-the-box integrations with common ERP systems (SAP, NetSuite, Dynamics). Keeping company accounts, pricing, and inventory in sync requires either a middleware integration platform (like Celigo or Boomi) or a custom integration. This is common in enterprise B2B but should be budgeted for.
• Reporting is basic. Shopify's built-in analytics do not segment B2B sales by company or location in depth. Merchants who need detailed account-level reporting typically export data and analyze in a BI tool, or use Shopify's reporting API.

For most mid-market wholesale merchants, the native feature set covers 80–90% of operational requirements. The remaining gaps are addressable through apps available in the Shopify App Store or through custom development with a qualified Shopify Plus agency.

Conclusion

Shopify B2B company accounts represent a significant step forward for merchants running wholesale operations on Shopify Plus. The Company → Location → Buyer hierarchy mirrors how purchasing teams actually work. Native net terms, custom catalogs, per-location pricing, PO number support, and role-based access give merchants the tools to serve enterprise and mid-market buyers without bolting on a separate wholesale platform.

The feature is not without limits — approval workflows, quick ordering, and deep ERP integration still require custom development or third-party apps. But for merchants who have been stitching together wholesale functionality with discount codes, password-protected pages, and shared logins, migrating to proper shopify plus company accounts delivers a material improvement in both the merchant's operational workflow and the buyer's purchasing experience.

If you are evaluating whether shopify b2b company accounts fit your operation, or if you need help setting up companies, locations, custom catalogs, and pricing at scale, explore our Shopify B2B & Wholesale services and our broader B2B Shopify strategies — both built around the practical realities of running wholesale on Shopify Plus.