Shopify Plus developer for growing Australian brands: checkout, Functions, B2B and Markets

What does a Shopify Plus developer do that a regular Shopify developer does not?

A Shopify Plus developer works where the Plus plan removes limits: the information, shipping and payment steps of checkout, custom apps containing Shopify Functions, company-level wholesale catalogues and advanced automation. Theme work is the same on every plan; the difference is everything below the theme.

On a standard plan, most customisation happens in the theme and through public apps. That covers the storefront well. It stops at checkout, and it stops at business logic that no public app handles quite right, such as a discount that depends on the customer's trade tier and the product's supplier at the same time.

Shopify's documentation is specific about where the lines sit. Apps that customise the information, shipping and payment pages, and the Checkout Branding API, are listed as Plus features. Shopify also says that only stores on a Shopify Plus plan can use custom apps that contain Shopify Function APIs, while public apps with Functions work on any plan.

So the skills a Shopify Plus developer brings are closer to software development than theme editing: writing and deploying apps with the Shopify CLI, handling GraphQL Admin API data, testing checkout changes before they reach real buyers, and planning how B2B, markets and discounts interact. One of us does that build work on our team, with another of us on data and reporting and the third of us on testing and scheduling.

When does an Australian brand actually need Shopify Plus?

You need Plus when a business requirement cannot be met on a lower plan, not when revenue hits a particular figure. Growth makes those requirements more likely, but the trigger is the feature.

The common triggers we see from Australian brands fall into four groups. Checkout: you need custom fields, messages or logic on the shipping or payment steps, such as a delivery-date picker for regional customers or a trade account number field. Discount logic: your promotions depend on rules that public discount apps cannot express. Wholesale: you want catalogues assigned to individual stockists, deposits on large orders, or more B2B catalogues than lower plans allow. Scale and control: you need custom app automation in Flow or several team members with detailed permissions.

If none of those apply, stay on your current plan and spend the difference on better photography, content or ads. Many successful Australian stores never need Plus. Our guide to ecommerce running costs shows how the plan fits the wider budget.

• Choose Plus when checkout changes are a sales requirement, not a nice idea.
• Choose Plus when wholesale buyers need their own catalogues or payment arrangements.
• Stay on Advanced when a public app already handles your discount rules.
• Stay on Advanced when you sell in Australia only and checkout works as is.

Shopify Plus vs Advanced: which features need which plan?

Many features people associate with Plus are available on lower plans, while a handful genuinely are not. Knowing which is which stops you paying for Plus by default, or building a workaround that Plus would have made unnecessary.

Shopify's B2B features by plan page shows companies, company locations, quantity rules, quantity price breaks and net terms on all plans. Plus adds unlimited B2B market catalogues against three on other plans, catalogues assigned directly to a company or location, and payment options such as deposit requirements and partial payments. Contextual storefront and checkout customisation through Markets is listed for Advanced and Plus.

Shopify Flow itself is available on Basic, Grow, Advanced and Plus. Its Send HTTP Request action needs at least Grow, and tasks from custom partner apps are Plus-only. Public apps built on Functions run on every plan; custom apps with Functions need Plus.

Our rule for clients: list the exact features you need, check each one against Shopify's current plan pages, and only then decide. Plan details change, so we check the live documentation when we scope your project rather than relying on memory.

Checkout.liquid is retired: how a Shopify Plus developer migrates you

If your Plus store still relies on checkout.liquid, it is already running on borrowed time or has already lost those customisations. Shopify's checkout.liquid documentation states that it is now unsupported for the information, shipping and payment steps, and that checkout.liquid and additional scripts were sunset for the Thank you and Order status pages on 28 August 2025.

The replacement is Checkout Extensibility: checkout UI extensions that render inside set areas of checkout, the checkout and accounts editor for layout and branding, web pixels for tracking, and Shopify Functions for logic. Each piece is upgrade-safe, which is the point. Shopify can change checkout without breaking your store, and you no longer maintain a fork of the checkout template.

Migration starts with an inventory. We list every customisation in the old checkout.liquid, additional scripts box and script tags: tracking codes, custom messages, hidden fields, upsells, style tweaks, anything injected by apps. Each item then gets one of four outcomes: rebuild as a UI extension, move to branding settings, replace with a web pixel, or drop because nobody needs it any more. That last category is often larger than expected.

We build and test on a development store or a preview first, place test orders on every payment and shipping method, and compare analytics events before and after. The table further down maps the common old customisations to their new home.

What can a Shopify Plus developer change at checkout now?

Quite a lot, within set boundaries. Checkout UI extensions add content and inputs in defined places; they cannot rewrite the whole page. That trade-off keeps checkout fast and secure, and in practice covers most real requirements.

Examples that suit Australian brands: a field for an ABN or trade account number on B2B orders; a delivery instructions box for rural properties; a message about Christmas shipping cut-offs that appears only for certain postcodes; a gift note with a character limit; a consent checkbox for a loyalty program; a clear notice about dispatch times for pre-order items.

Branding settings control fonts, colours, corner radius and layout sections, so checkout looks like the rest of the store. Web pixels send checkout events to analytics and ad platforms through Shopify's sandboxed system instead of pasted scripts.

Shopify Scripts were switched off: rebuilding discount logic with Functions

Shopify Scripts no longer run. Shopify's help centre states that as of 30 June 2026 Scripts were deprecated, and any Scripts still published were deactivated. If your store lost tiered pricing, free gifts or shipping rules around that date, this is why.

Scripts were small Ruby programs that ran in checkout to change line item prices, shipping rates and payment methods. Shopify Functions replace them, and they are organised by job: discount functions, delivery customisation, payment customisation, cart transform, cart and checkout validation, and fulfilment constraints. A Shopify Plus developer rewrites each old script as the right kind of Function inside a custom app for your store, with settings your team can change from the admin.

The rewrite is also a chance to simplify. Old stores often have scripts layered over years, some contradicting each other. We document what each one was meant to do, confirm the rule with you in plain English, and build only the rules you still want.

Before anything goes live we test each rule against a list of real cart combinations: single items, mixed carts, discount codes stacked with automatic discounts, wholesale customers, and orders to every shipping zone.

Shopify Functions for Australian discount and shipping logic: examples

Functions are how you express rules specific to your business and your market. The examples below are the sort of requests a Shopify Plus developer gets from Australian brands, with the Function type each would use.

• Tiered spend discount excluding sale items (discount function): a percentage off full-price lines once the cart passes a threshold you set.
• Trade tier pricing on top of B2B catalogues (discount function): an extra discount for customers tagged as gold stockists.
• Hide express shipping for remote postcodes (delivery customisation): only offer options your carriers actually deliver in time to parts of WA, NT or far north Queensland.
• Rename or reorder delivery options (delivery customisation): show click and collect first for shoppers near your warehouse.
• Hide buy now, pay later for wholesale (payment customisation): trade orders see invoice terms instead.
• Limit quantities during a drop (cart validation): cap each customer at two units of a limited release.
• Bundle builder (cart transform): expand a bundle into its components so stock and fulfilment stay accurate.

Functions run on Shopify's infrastructure, so they add no server for you to host. Each one is part of a custom app installed only on your store, and the source code sits in a repository you own. Pricing is per project from US$900, depending on how many rules and edge cases are involved.

B2B on Shopify Plus: wholesale price lists for Australian stockists

B2B on Shopify lets trade customers log in and order at their own prices from the same store and stock as retail shoppers. For Australian brands selling to boutiques, cafés, salons or hardware stores, it usually replaces emailed order forms and manual invoices.

The building blocks are companies (each stockist), locations (each shop or delivery address), catalogues (which products and prices a company sees), quantity rules and payment terms. On Plus, catalogues can be assigned directly to a company or location, which is what lets a single store hold different price lists for a large chain and a small independent. Plus also adds deposits and partial payments for large or custom orders.

The work a Shopify Plus developer does here is mostly data and rules. We import companies and locations from your spreadsheet or accounting system, build catalogues with price lists, set minimums and case-pack increments, and configure payment terms. Then we check the storefront from a trade login: correct prices, no retail banners, a quick order list, and checkout extensions for PO numbers or delivery notes.

Tax settings for trade customers follow your accountant's instructions. Invoices and GST details flow to Xero through a connector or a custom sync, covered on our Xero integration page.

Shopify Markets for expanding into New Zealand and the US

Shopify Markets lets one store sell in several countries with local currencies, prices, domains or subfolders, languages and product availability. For most Australian brands, New Zealand is the first step, the US the second, and Markets handles both without cloning the store.

A Markets setup covers several decisions. Currency and pricing: automatic conversion, a percentage adjustment, or fixed prices per product for key items. Domains: a subfolder such as /en-nz/ on your main domain, or a separate domain; each has SEO consequences. Availability: which products sell in which market, useful when a product is not approved or not economical to ship. Duties and taxes: how prices display and whether duties are collected at checkout.

Tax registration and obligations in New Zealand or US states are a question for your accountant, not your developer. We configure the store to their instructions and make sure it can report what they need.

Shipping is the practical constraint. Sending bulky or heavy items across the Tasman or the Pacific changes margins, so we often set up a market with a smaller product range and clear delivery estimates before committing the whole catalogue.

Shopify Flow automations a Shopify Plus developer sets up

Shopify Flow automates store tasks using triggers, conditions and actions, so staff stop doing the same checks every day. On Plus, custom app tasks let Flow call logic built specifically for your business.

Useful workflows for Australian brands are rarely exotic. Tag and route high-risk orders for manual review. Alert the warehouse on Slack or email when a bestseller drops below a stock level. Tag first-time customers and send them to a welcome email sequence. Hold orders to remote postcodes for a freight quote. Tag B2B orders over a set value for account manager approval. Hide products automatically when they sell out and unhide them on restock.

We set these up with names and notes so your team knows what each does, and we test each against real past orders where possible. A workflow that tags every order by mistake is easy to create and annoying to undo.

When Flow is not enough, for example when you need AI to classify customer messages or draft replies, we build a separate automation, priced from US$600. Our AI automation page explains that work.

How much does a Shopify Plus developer cost for an Australian brand?

Shopify Plus development is usually priced per project, based on the number of features and how complex their rules are. With us, custom Plus work starts from US$900 and a full Plus store build from US$750; larger multi-part projects take six to twelve weeks.

Quotes from different providers vary widely, driven by location, team size and how much design and strategy is bundled in. A Plus agency in Sydney or Melbourne carries Australian salaries and often includes workshops and account management. A remote team builds on a lower cost base and focuses on the technical work.

What moves our quote up or down is concrete: the number of discount rules and the edge cases each has; how many B2B companies, locations and catalogues you need; how many markets and languages; whether an ERP, Xero or 3PL integration is involved; and how much old checkout code needs auditing first.

Your Shopify Plus subscription is billed by Shopify, and apps by their developers, directly to you. None of it passes through us. For wider context, compare this page with our app development cost guide if a mobile app is on the roadmap too.

Moving to Shopify Plus from WooCommerce, Magento or a standard plan

Moving up from a standard Shopify plan is mostly an account change followed by new development; moving from WooCommerce or Magento is a full migration. Both need a plan for data, redirects and testing.

An upgrade within Shopify keeps your theme, products, customers and orders. The work that follows is adding Plus features: checkout extensions, Functions, B2B catalogues. A migration from another platform involves moving products, variants, customers and order history, recreating customer accounts, rebuilding the theme and mapping every old URL to its new address.

Redirects matter more than most owners expect. Search rankings and backlinks point to your old product and category URLs, and a missed redirect turns a ranking page into a 404. We export every indexed URL, map it, and check the redirects in Google Search Console after launch. Our WooCommerce developer page covers staying on WooCommerce if that turns out to suit you better.

• Freeze product edits on the old store during the final data import.
• Run a trial import early to find data problems while there is time.
• Test customer account invitations before launch day.
• Launch early in the week, not before a sale weekend.

How to vet a Shopify Plus developer before giving store access

Vet a Shopify Plus developer on how they test and hand over, not just on what they have built. Plus changes touch checkout, where a mistake costs real sales within minutes.

Ask how they would test a new discount Function before it reaches customers. A good answer mentions a development store or preview, a list of cart scenarios, and a rollback plan. Ask where the code will live; it should be a repository you own. Ask what access they need; collaborator or staff accounts with limited permissions are normal, sharing the owner login is not.

Red flags: no mention of testing; code kept on their account; plans to paste scripts into checkout; vague answers about Functions or Checkout Extensibility, which suggests they have not worked with them; or pressure to upgrade to Plus before you have listed the features you need.

• Ask for a written list of every customisation they will build.
• Ask how rules will be edited by your team after handover.
• Confirm the custom app and repository are in your name.
• Agree what happens if a checkout change needs rolling back.

SEO, speed and AI search on a Shopify Plus store

Plus does not rank better by itself; the same technical SEO rules apply as on any Shopify plan. What changes is scale: more markets, more collections, and more ways to create duplicate URLs.

With Markets, each country version needs correct hreflang links so Google shows New Zealand shoppers the NZ prices and Australian shoppers the AU ones. Shopify generates these for subfolders and domains set up through Markets, and we check they are right in Search Console. Filtered collection URLs and B2B-only pages must stay out of the index.

Speed is the other big factor. Plus stores often carry years of app scripts. We audit which apps load code on every page, remove what is no longer used, and check Core Web Vitals on mid-range phones. For AI search tools and Google's AI answers, clear product facts, shipping and returns details in plain text, and accurate Product structured data help your store get described correctly. Nobody can promise rankings; ongoing work is covered on our ecommerce SEO page, and our SEO cost per month guide explains budgets.

Hiring a Shopify Plus developer in India: how it works from Australia

We are in India Standard Time, four and a half hours behind Sydney and Melbourne on standard time and five and a half during daylight saving, and two and a half hours behind Perth. Your early afternoon is our morning, which suits a short daily or twice-weekly check-in during a Plus project.

You invite us as collaborators or staff with only the permissions the job needs. Custom apps are created under your organisation, and the code sits in a repository in your name. We build on a development store or in preview, and you review on your phone before anything touches live checkout.

We quote in USD and you pay by milestone via Wise, bank wire or PayPal. Invoices come from India, and your accountant can tell you how to record them. Terms that apply once work starts are in your written quote and on our terms page.

Worked example: a hypothetical Brisbane outdoor gear brand going wholesale and trans-Tasman

This scenario is made up to show how the pieces fit, not a real client. Say a Brisbane brand selling camping and outdoor gear online wants three things: stockists ordering online, a New Zealand store, and its old free-gift promotion back after Scripts stopped working.

We start with an audit. The store has an old checkout.liquid tracking snippet that stopped working, a gift-with-purchase Script now deactivated, and forty stockists ordering by email. Plus is justified because stockists need individual catalogues and the brand wants a trade account field at checkout.

The build runs in stages. First, a discount Function recreates the free gift above a threshold, excluding clearance lines, and a web pixel replaces the dead tracking snippet. Second, B2B: forty companies imported with locations, three catalogues by stockist size, case-pack quantity rules and net terms, plus a checkout extension for PO numbers. Third, a New Zealand market in a subfolder with NZD pricing, a smaller range of lighter products, and a delivery customisation hiding bulky items from NZ shipping.

A Flow workflow tags wholesale orders over a set value for review. Custom work is priced from US$900, and maintenance is free for two months, then from US$120/mo.

Shopify Plus developer readiness checklist

Answer these before you brief any Shopify Plus developer. They turn a vague conversation into a quote you can compare.

• Which exact features need Plus, checked against Shopify's plan pages?
• What old checkout.liquid code, additional scripts or Scripts exist today?
• Every discount rule you run, written in plain English with examples.
• Number of B2B customers, locations and distinct price lists.
• Markets you plan to open in the next year, and the product range for each.
• Systems to connect: Xero, ERP, 3PL, CRM, email marketing.
• Who on your team approves checkout changes, and who can edit rules later.
• Any sale dates or launches the work must avoid.

Send your answers, even partial ones, through the contact page or WhatsApp. You get an itemised quote in about two working days.