Doudlah Farms B2B Wholesaler Platform

Overview

Doudlah Farms is building a dedicated B2B WooCommerce site to streamline wholesale ordering for their network of regional grocery and co-op accounts. As of the October 2025 sync, the site build was essentially complete with account setup and pricing configuration underway. The platform needs to handle tiered pricing per wholesaler, multi-contact account management, order notifications, printable invoices, and payment tracking against net-30 terms.

This article captures the key decisions, open questions, and workflow requirements surfaced during the build-out process.

Platform Status (as of 2025-10-03)

Site pages fully built; minor image/copy tweaks remaining on 1–2 pages
Team actively creating individual wholesaler accounts with customer-specific pricing
Logo finalized: bottom-right option featuring truck graphic (chosen for readability and horizontal spread)
Wholesaler email list needs to be completed by Lucy before accounts can be fully activated

Account Structure

Each wholesaler gets a single account login rather than individual logins per contact. This simplifies management and preserves order history across staff changes.

Handling Staff Turnover

Several wholesalers (e.g., Basics in Janesville, Epic, Willy Street Co-op) have high contact turnover. Recommended approach:
- Use a shared ordering or invoicing email (e.g., ordering@wholesaler.com) where available
- If a personal email was used and staff changes, the email address can be updated on the backend in under a minute
- Order history remains intact on the account regardless of login credential changes

Multiple Contacts Per Company

Where a single company has separate buyers for different product categories (e.g., bulk vs. branded shelf items), Lucy will add separate rows in the wholesaler spreadsheet with a note clarifying each contact's role. The account itself remains unified.

Pricing Tiers

Not all wholesalers are on the same price list. Accounts requiring custom pricing as of this call:

Wholesaler	Price List
L&L	Blue list (new)
Piggly Wiggly	Blue list (new)
Marty (Down on the Farm)	Blue list (new)
All others	Standard list

Lucy will annotate the wholesaler spreadsheet with which price list applies to each account and resend the updated price list file to Karly for direct linking in the backend.

Order Notification & Fulfillment Workflow

Lucy raised several operational requirements that need to be configured or confirmed with the WooCommerce developer:

Order Notifications

Two options under consideration:
1. WooCommerce + ShipStation integration (mirrors the B2C site setup)
2. Automatic order confirmation email sent directly to Lucy whenever a new order is placed

Either approach is viable; decision deferred to developer consultation.

Printable Packing List & Invoice

Lucy's current fulfillment process requires:
1. A packing list (order details) printed and brought with the delivery
2. A separate invoice that the receiving party signs at delivery
3. One signed copy returned to Doudlah Farms as proof of delivery; one copy left with the customer

The B2B plugin may already support invoice generation — this needs to be confirmed. If not, a custom solution will be required.

Payment Tracking (Net-30)

Wholesalers pay via a mix of methods: ACH, check, QuickBooks-initiated transfer. Because payment happens outside the platform, Lucy will need to manually mark invoices as paid and record the payment method. Requirements:
- Ability to mark an order as paid with payment method noted
- Automated reminder email when a net-30 invoice goes unpaid (to be scoped with developer)
- Visibility into outstanding balances per account

Context: Lucy discovered a wholesaler (Wisconsin Food Hub) was 7 months in arrears after manually auditing invoices. Automated tracking is a priority to prevent recurrence.

Historical Order Data

Mark raised the value of importing historical order data from existing wholesalers (particularly Down on the Farm, managed via Excel by Marty's wife) into the B2B platform for forecasting purposes. This would enable year-over-year sales projections by account and region. Flagged for developer consultation — not yet scoped.

Open Action Items

[ ] Lucy — Add wholesaler emails to the B2B spreadsheet; annotate which accounts use the blue (new) price list; resend updated price list to Karly
[ ] Karly — Consult developer (Mark H.) on: order notification setup, net-30 payment tracking automation, printable invoice generation, and feasibility of importing historical order data
[ ] Lucy — Send Karly an example purchase order and signed invoice to illustrate the current fulfillment flow for developer reference
[ ] Karly — Update B2B site logo to finalized truck graphic (bottom-right option)

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