How Upstate Elevator Automated Wholesale POs Without Forcing Retailers Onto Shopify Plus
Industry: Cannabis
Category: Consumer Packaged Goods
Company: Upstate Elevator
Segment: Mid-Market
The Challenge: Wholesale Customers don't follow their process
Upstate Elevator sells cannabis products to retailers and distributors across the state. They run on Shopify Plus, but many of their wholesale customers do not want to use it. Instead of placing orders through a storefront, retailers send purchase orders via email. That meant every order had to be manually interpreted before it could be entered into Shopify.
The complexity went beyond simple data entry. Retailers ordered in different units of measure: Individual units, Inners packs, full cases, samples. Pricing also varied depending on pack size.
If the order quantities were divisible by case pack size, Upstate Elevator would fulfill and track by the case and offered a 10 percent discount. If not, it had to be fulfilled and tracked in individual units.
This required judgment on every order. Without structured logic, the team had to manually:
Read the PO
Determine unit conversion
Check case pack quantities
Pull the right SKU information
Apply correct discounts
Enter the order into Shopify Plus
Ensure fulfillment matched packaging logic
As order volume increased, the risk of mistakes increased.
The Solution: Automate Unit Conversion and Discount Logic
Upstate Elevator implemented Buddy to handle order intake and standardize wholesale logic before data reached Shopify.
Instead of manually translating emails into Shopify, the workflow now looks like: Email PO → Buddy → Review → Shopify Plus
Buddy automatically:
Parses incoming email orders
Normalizes units, cases and inners
Converts quantities based on case pack logic
Determines whether quantities qualify as full cases
Structures the order before it is pushed into Shopify Plus
The team reviews the structured data inside Buddy before pushing it into Shopify.
The Result: Controlled Growth Without Operational Chaos
Before Buddy, wholesale email orders required interpretation and manual calculation before entering Shopify.
After Buddy:
Up to 30 POs per week are processed through a standardized workflow
Unit conversions are handled automatically
Case discounts are applied consistently
Orders are reviewed, not rebuilt
Shopify receives clean, structured data
Upstate Elevator did not force customers to adopt Shopify. They adapted to how retailers prefer to buy.
By automating unit conversion and packaging logic, they removed one of the most error-prone parts of wholesale operations.
The Bigger Lesson: Wholesale Flexibility Requires System Logic
Many mid-market wholesale brands face the same issue. Retailers order in different units. Discount structures vary by packaging. Customers resist using brand-owned portals. Without automation, teams compensate with manual labor.
Upstate Elevator replaced that with structured logic inside Buddy. Instead of forcing buyers to change behavior, they built a system flexible enough to handle real-world wholesale complexity. That's what allows them to scale without adding operational friction.
