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Customizable bundles

Andrija Krstic Updated by Andrija Krstic

Bundles allow you to bundle multiple one-time products to create a unique build your box type of experience for your customers. There are different types of bundles - fixed (preset) and configurable (customizable). This article explains the usability and the setup of customizable bundles.

What are configurable (customizable) bundles?

Configurable bundles are letting the customer mix and match different products included in the pool into one big bundled product. This powerful feature will enable your customers to easily build their own box by picking from the selection of items pre-configured in the bundle builder.

Main difference between configurable and fixed bundles is the fact that customers get to choose what gets included in their box when it comes to configurable bundles. This calls for an ultimate curation experience!

Configurable bundles are available for customers using the Advanced plan. Find out more about bundles in general (fixed or customizable) on the dedicated page here.

Use cases

Meal Kit Bundle - Similar to Hello Fresh, build a checkout experience where customers will be able to pick and choose from the selection of meals and desserts. Let them choose plans for 2/4/6 people, with meals being delivered weekly/every other week..

Subscribe and Save model (Coffee subscription example) - Explore this pre-built coffee subscription example showcasing prime example of a subscribe & save model built using configurable bundles.

Build-a-box model - Explore this pre-built example showcasing standard build-a-box business model built using Subbly's configurable bundles.

Setup

To setup a bundle go here and click opt to create a bundle.

Give your bundle a name and a slug will be automatically populated based on it. To build the customizable bundle, please choose the Customizable bundle option inside the Bundle type selection.

Digital toggle should be enabled if your bundle is actually a bundle of digital items or membership products. Main characteristic of these is that they won't prompt the customer to provide the shipping address at the checkout (as there's no physical shipment of products involved) as well as no order will be created on the Subbly backend.
Settings tab

On the next window (Settings tab) you will be able to redefine the bundle name again and add additional description for the bundle which will be presented on the bundle page on the frontend of your Subbly website.

If you're not using Subbly's website builder, product/bundle description will not be shown anywhere on the checkout level. Description is irrelevant in that case.

If you want your bundle to have a proper product/bundle image, please make sure to use the Use a custom bundle image toggle and to upload the image for the bundle which will be presented on your site's bundle page, as well as on the checkouts.

Please refrain from pasting text from other text processors into the description field. Also, please don't use any emotes/emojis or special characters, only native text formatting included in the widget.

Make sure to save and proceed to the next tab (Products)

Products tab

Now you're on the Products tab. This is where you get to add the products to the pool of products so your customers can pick and choose from them when on the checkout. Go ahead and use the drop-down to add one-time products to be included in the bundle.

Please note that you're able to include only published one-time products in the bundle. If you haven't already, now is the time to go ahead and create each one of the products that are going to be included in the bundle as separate one-time products. If you're looking to include subscription product in the bundle - no problem. Just make sure to create the subscription product as a one-time product and you will set the bundle as available for recurring subscriptions as well.

Original price of each product is pulled from the backend, ie., this is the price of the one-time product previously created on the backend and included in the bundle pool.

Extra price column is where you can increase the individual price of each item included in the box. In our example above, collagen product was created as a free item, however, you can add extra price to it to increase the price of an item when it's included in the bundle.

Extra price can only increase the individual price of the product included in the bundle. If you're looking to add discounts (volume discounts for products, for example), you will be able to do it later during the setup.

Limits column is used to set a limit of items that can be included in the bundle. As an example, you can limit the customers to be able to include more then 2 items of each product, in which case you'll need to set the limit for the particular product to 2 as in the image below.

If you have different tiers configured for the bundle (this will be explained in the next section) you will be able to set quantity limits for products based on each separate bundle tier.
Example would be running a meal kit delivery offering Lite and Standard tier. If they get to choose up to 3 meals a day on Lite, whereas they get to choose up to 6 meals per day on the Standard tier, you might want to limit the possibility for customers to choose 3 of the most expensive meals if they were on either on the plans. Instead, you can limit the Lite users from being able to use only 1 of those meals if they were on Lite, ie., 2 of these meals (out of 6) if they were on Standard.

When you're done configuring this step and adding products to the pool of available products, proceed to the next (Appearance) tab.

Appearance tab

This is where you get to decide on the layout of the bundle selection steps on your checkout. Different layouts are applicable and more suitable for different business models, you might want to iterate different layout options for better conversions.

If you're looking for a completely custom layout, that's still something you will be able to achieve. Make sure to check our checkout/cart API/SDK documentation. Don't forget to let us know and showcase what you've built!

By default, 4 different appearance layouts are available for bundles.

On the same page - gets the product selection for the bundle as well as tier selection for the bundle included on the same page. Customers will get to choose both the tier as well as products and quantity of products included on a single page. This might be better for conversions as it removes additional step(s) from the checkout. Example can be found on the picture below.

2 separate pages - tier selection is here separated from the product selection widget. Calls for a bit cleaner layout at the checkout but increases the number of steps at the checkout. Example below.

Dynamic configuration - Doesn't include the tier selection step. Instead, it automatically adjusts the tier based on the number of products included in the bundle. Customers get to dynamically add/remove products and adjust quantities at the checkout. Bundle tier is adjusted automatically based on the bundle setup. Example can be found below.

Select after checkout - this is a very specific case where the product selection step can come only after the payment was actually processed by the customer. Customer can get to choose the tier selection with pre-defined bundle prices pre-checkout and get to customize the bundle only once the payment has been collected.

This appearance option is applicable only for product setup that has the future start date. It is impossible to use this appearance setup for bundles that are set to start immediately after the checkout has been completed.

Filtering by attributes option on the appearance step makes it possible for you to build filters for bundle items at the checkout. Attributes will need to be pre-configured on the separate section of the admin here.

Meal kit delivery business models are again good example here. Most of the times, merchant will offer a wide variety of items on the checkout. Scrolling through 50+ meals can get quite annoying for the customer if there's no any type of filter. This is where adding attributes to products and making it possible for the customer to filter by attribute at the checkout comes handy!
General appearance settings for the Cart Widget are natively inherited for the Bundles as well, so you might want to revise them here.

After choosing the appropriate layout and appearance for the bundle layout widget, let's proceed with setting up the pricing and tiers for your bundles. Please proceed to the Pricing tab.

Pricing tab

Now is the time to set billing/shipping frequencies for your bundle. Pay attention that you can offer a bundle both as a subscription or as a one-time product (or both, thus replicating the subscribe and save business model). Go ahead and specify whether you'd want your bundle to be a subscription product or a one time. Configure billing/shipping frequency if it's the subscription product or characteristics and price point of the one-time product bundle option.

Important considerations when setting up pricing options for the bundle:

  • you can add as many subscription plans to it as you want (think adding it as monthly, quarterly, annually...)
  • you can add only one one-time option to the bundle
  • you can specify quantity discounts (volume discounts) for the bundle
  • you can add volume discounts for subscription product as well as customers will be able to subscribe to multiple subscription items on the checkout at the same time
  • when creating the subscription plan for the bundle, you will be presented with the same widget you're being created with when creating a regular subscription product
Adding quantity discounts is very useful and will incentivize the customer to buy multiple items of the same product/bundle in order to be eligible for the discount. This functionality is not available with regular coupons, but can be easily achieved with bundles.

Let's say that you're offering a bundle which ultimately consist of only one product - one bottle of wine for example. If you want to incentivize people to get a discount if they buy multiple items of the same product (3 bottles of wine or more) you can set different price points for different volumes of items sold!

Looking into Advanced pricing options (picture below) lets you combine the bundle with some standard (or advanced) Subbly features such as:

  • setting up a setup fee (one-time payment charged immediately after the checkout) for the subscription plan of the bundle
  • setting up a pre-order end date (so the first payment gets prolonged)
  • adding a funnel to the bundle checkout (very powerful for increasing the AOV immediately on the checkout by adding some complementary product offerings)
Useful upsell tactic with our example of selling a bundle of wine items here would be setting up some complementary products as available for upsell on the checkout. For example, we can offer the customer to buy a set of wine glasses for a special price (50% off) on the checkout when subscribing/buying the bundle of curated wines. Note that you are able to upsell these things to the customers even post-purchase through their customer portals via the upsell addons feature.
  • configuring a different shipping information for the bundle (presented on the thank you page of the customer's checkout

Once you've configured everything, proceed to the next step (Appearance tab)

Have any questions? Make sure to reach out to support chat for answers!

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