True product flexibility with cart transform functions for Shopify Plus

The Update

Your gift rewards just became infinitely more flexible. Any product in your catalog can now serve dual purposes - sold at full price for regular purchases, automatically free when given as a gift reward. No duplicate products. No inventory headaches. Just smart, automatic pricing in cart and at checkout.

What's New

Universal Product Gifting Every product in your catalog is now gift-eligible. The same "Moisturizer" that sells for $25 can automatically be added as a free gift when customers hit your thresholds. No need to create "Free Moisturizer Gift" variants. One product, two purposes.

Smart Pricing Protection Built-in safeguards keep your margins protected. If customers modify gift quantities at checkout (increasing beyond 1 or changing cart items that drop below thresholds), the gift automatically reverts to full price. The discount only applies when all conditions are met.

Market-Specific Control Configure different thresholds for different markets. Show gifts only in specific countries. Hide them in others. Multi-currency conversion happens automatically. Your global reward strategy executes flawlessly across all markets.

Impact on Your Store

This eliminates the biggest pain point of gift rewards - product duplication.

Before: You needed two versions of the same product:

• "Premium Face Moisturizer" at $25 (for sale)

• "FREE Premium Face Moisturizer Gift" at $0 (for rewards)

This meant double inventory management, confusing catalogs, and SKU proliferation.

Now: One product serves both purposes. The same "Premium Face Moisturizer" sells for $25 normally and becomes free automatically when customers qualify. Your catalog stays clean. Your operations stay simple.

Smart Exclusions Keep It Fair

The function knows what shouldn't count toward thresholds:

• Gift items don't contribute (prevents recursive rewards)

• Addon products count toward total but not item count

• Gift cards are fully excluded

• Custom tags let you exclude any product (use _elite_exclude_from_reward_calculation)

These exclusions ensure accurate threshold calculations without manual configuration.

Shopify Plus Exclusive

This feature leverages Shopify's cart transform functions, available only on Plus plans. The technology runs server-side including at checkout, modifying prices in real-time based on your configured rules.

Non-Plus stores can still use cart validation for threshold enforcement, but automatic pricing requires Plus.

Simple Setup

1. Navigate to Cart Designer → Rewards & free shipping → Settings & design tab

2. Scroll to Automatic gift application

3. Click Enable function

Your existing reward thresholds are automatically used. The function deploys to Shopify and starts working immediately.

Important: Discount Code Behavior

The cart transform function works with the non-discounted cart total. This means if customers apply manual discount codes at checkout (rather than in the cart), gifts may remain free even if the discounted total falls below your threshold.

Example: Customer has a $105 cart and qualifies for a gift. At checkout, they apply a 20% discount code, bringing the total to $84. The gift stays free because the function only sees the original $105. However, this really is an edge-case for most merchants. The function still protects from gross abuse (e.g. removing products to only get a gift would change the total and thereby would be detected correctly).

What works correctly:

• Automatic discounts (applied in cart)

• App-based discounts like "Buy 3 get 2" (applied in cart)

• EliteCart's discount box feature (applied in cart)

Recommendation: If customers frequently use large manual discount codes, enable EliteCart's discount box feature so discounts apply in the cart, where accurate pricing is available.

Why This Matters

Operational Efficiency One product, two purposes. Your team manages a single inventory. Updates propagate automatically. New products become gift-eligible instantly. The operational overhead of gift rewards drops to zero.

Protection at Scale As your gift program grows, security becomes critical. The cart transform function's built-in protections scale infinitely. Whether you're giving away one gift or one thousand, the rules enforce consistently.

How It Works Reliably

The system is built for dependability:

• Rules enforce on Shopify's servers (not browser-based)

• Your settings update instantly across your store

• Built-in safeguards prevent errors and edge cases

Because it uses Shopify's cart transform technology rather than discount codes, it works alongside your other promotions without conflicts.

Available Now for Shopify Plus

The cart transform gift function is live for all EliteCart Professional and Enterprise accounts on Shopify Plus.

Enable it in your Cart Designer settings to start using any product as both a purchasable item and a gift reward.