Enabling Product-Level Delivery Control Without Compromising Store-Wide Logic

Background

For many merchants, delivery is not a one-size-fits-all operation. While most products can follow a default delivery setup, certain items demand more careful handling — whether due to freshness, preparation time, seasonality, or limited availability.

As Scrollengine expanded its customer base across food, bakery, and freshness-driven businesses, a recurring pattern began to emerge. Merchants were increasingly offering products that operated on delivery rules different from the rest of their catalogue. However, Scrollengine’s delivery logic was primarily designed around store-wide configuration, making it difficult to introduce exceptions without side effects.

This gap became especially visible as merchants began scaling their product offerings and experimenting with more specialised items.

The Challenge

Merchants needed flexibility at the product level, but existing delivery rules applied globally across the store.

In practice, this meant that even a small change — such as limiting delivery dates for a single product — required modifying store-wide settings. These changes often came with unintended consequences, including disrupted delivery flows for standard products, increased operational risk, and confusion during checkout.

For businesses managing time-sensitive or made-to-order items, this limitation was more than an inconvenience. It directly affected how confidently they could sell certain products online.

Scrollengine began hearing consistent feedback from merchants who wanted more control, without sacrificing the simplicity and reliability of their default setup.

Merchant Signals That Shaped the Solution

Two merchants, in particular, highlighted this challenge clearly.

Geelong Flower Farm operates in a domain where freshness and timing are critical. Certain flower arrangements were only available on specific harvest or delivery days, while others could follow a regular delivery schedule. Applying one delivery calendar across all products forced compromises — either limiting availability unnecessarily or risking unmet delivery expectations.

Similarly, Fantasy Bakery dealt with a mix of standard baked goods and custom orders. While everyday items could be delivered using default rules, custom cakes required advance preparation and fixed delivery slots. Managing both within a single global delivery configuration created operational friction and limited flexibility.

In both cases, merchants were not asking for more complexity — they were asking for precision.

Defining the Product Goal

The core challenge was clear:

How might Scrollengine enable merchants to define delivery behavior at a product level, without disrupting their existing store-wide rules?

Any solution needed to:

• Offer granular control only where required
• Preserve default delivery logic for the majority of products
• Avoid introducing complexity for customers at checkout

The focus was not just on configurability, but on maintaining clarity and operational safety.

The Solution: Product Specific Delivery Rules

Scrollengine introduced Product Specific Delivery Rules to address this need.

This feature allows merchants to apply custom delivery configurations to selected products, while keeping their global delivery setup intact. Instead of redefining delivery behavior across the entire store, merchants can now isolate exceptions and manage them independently.

With Product Specific Delivery Rules, delivery logic becomes modular — flexible at the edges, stable at the core.

How Merchants Use It

Merchants can now:

• Assign custom delivery calendars to individual products
• Define unique delivery dates or time slots for special items
• Keep standard products aligned with the default delivery setup
• Confidently sell seasonal, limited, or made-to-order products

This approach ensures that delivery rules reflect real-world operational needs, without forcing merchants into workarounds or compromises.

A Key Design Decision: Delivery Logic in the Cart

One of the most important design considerations was how product-specific delivery rules should behave when multiple products are added to the cart.

Scrollengine chose a single delivery outcome model.

When a cart includes a product with special delivery rules, that product determines the delivery date and time for the entire cart. All other items follow the same schedule, and customers are presented with one clear delivery option at checkout.

This decision prioritised clarity and simplicity — avoiding conflicting delivery selections and reducing the risk of customer confusion or fulfillment errors.

The Impact

For merchants, Product Specific Delivery Rules unlock a new level of control. They can expand their product range, experiment with specialised offerings, and manage delivery constraints confidently — without worrying about unintended effects on the rest of their store.

For customers, the experience remains simple and predictable. Despite the added complexity behind the scenes, checkout remains clean, with a single, unambiguous delivery choice.

The Outcome

By responding directly to real merchant needs, Scrollengine strengthened its delivery engine to support more nuanced business models — particularly in categories where timing, freshness, and preparation matter most.

Product Specific Delivery Rules now enable merchants to grow their offerings without growing their operational risk, reinforcing Scrollengine’s position as a flexible yet reliable delivery solution.

From everyday items to specialised products, Product Specific Delivery Rules give merchants the flexibility they need to deliver with confidence.

‍Install Scrollengine for your store →

‍