Turn your product launches into events! Schedule exact dates and times for your products to go live, and let Big Cartel handle the rest while you focus on building hype with your customers.
Note: This feature is available in the new admin experience. Still using the legacy admin? Click the link in the orange bar at the top of your admin to check it out now!
What's New:
Set launch dates and times - Schedule products to automatically go Active at the perfect moment
Bulk scheduling - Launch entire collections simultaneously with one click
Automatic notifications - Get alerts 24 hours before and at launch time
Flexible management - Change or remove schedules anytime without stress
Why This Matters:
Build anticipation - Promote your drop date and let customers mark their calendars
Launch on your terms - Go live at optimal times, even while you sleep
Coordinate marketing - Align releases with social posts, emails, and campaigns
Reduce stress - No more manual product flipping at the exact right moment
Perfect for creators - Ideal for batch makers who create products in collections
How It Works:
Set a launch date and time when creating or editing any product. Your product stays Hidden or Coming Soon until the scheduled moment, then automatically switches to Active. You'll get notified before and after launch to keep you in the loop.
Pro tip: Scheduled Drops works beautifully with Product Passwords (also in the same section!) to create VIP early access. Schedule your main launch, then give email subscribers or Patreon supporters early access with a password. It's the perfect combo for building community and creating FOMO around your releases.
Available Now for Diamond Members: This premium feature is exclusively available on the Diamond plan, giving you the professional tools you need to run strategic releases and turn launches into events.
Not on Diamond yet? Now's the perfect time to upgrade and take control of your product launches.
The biggest selling time of the year is here! This toolkit’s packed with tips, tools, and festive flair to help you show up, sell out, and make it your best season yet.
What’s in the toolkit?
Setup guides: Quick checklists to get your shop holiday-ready
Great news for international sellers! We've massively expanded our currency support from 20 to 135 currencies, making it easier than ever to sell to customers around the world.
What's New:
Display prices in the currency your buyers actually use—from Argentine Peso to South African Rand and everything in between
Switch between currencies anytime from your shop settings
Get paid in your preferred currency while showing prices in another (based on your payment provider settings)
Why This Matters:
Reduce buyer confusion and cart abandonment
Build trust with local pricing
Expand your reach to new markets
Let customers see exactly what they'll pay
Important Notes:
Some currencies are only available with specific payment providers (Stripe or PayPal)
You'll see a notification if your selected currency isn't compatible with your current payment setup
Your payout currency is managed through your payment provider—this update is about what your customers see on your storefront
Ready to update your shop's currency? Head to your Settings to select from our full list of supported currencies.
We've just released a suite of template updates to give you more control over your shop's design and functionality. Here's what's new across all 12 templates:
Shop Sprinkles just got more festive
Shop Sprinkles was a hit last holiday season, and you asked for more control — so we've added new animation styles, sizing options, and even a "party mode" to help you create the perfect vibe for your shop. You’ll find these new settings in the Miscellaneous settings section in shop designer as soon as you upgrade your template to the latest version.
What's new:
Two new animation styles: Choose from “Orbit” (emojis spin in circles as they fall) or “Tumble” (emojis flip end over end), in addition to the original “Drift” style
Enhanced depth effect: All three animation styles now have a more polished, subtle 3D look
Size control: Make your emojis bigger or smaller to match your shop's aesthetic
Density options: Adjust how many emojis appear on screen, from subtle to full-on "party mode" — we automatically optimize the effect for desktop and mobile so it looks great everywhere
With all these combinations, you can fine-tune Shop Sprinkles to perfectly match your brand and style. Check out this video to see some of the possibilities:
Here’s another example showing how the effect can be fun and whimsical using the new orbit style with large emoji:
Password-protected product pricing (Diamond plan only)
In September, we added the ability for our Diamond plan sellers to add password protection to their products. A popular request was to add the option to hide prices for these types of products in the shop product grids as away to build exclusivity and keep details hidden until buyers unlock access. This joins our existing options to hide prices for sold out or coming soon products.
Fine-tune your shop’s text size
Want to adjust your text size without touching code? Now you can control typography across your entire shop with simple template settings. Scale all text at once, or customize specific sections like your header, footer, product grids, and product pages—perfect for dialing in the right look, especially with stylized fonts that run larger or smaller by default.
For example: one setting can scale your entire shop's text to 80% of its original size. Mix and match settings to get exactly the look you want, no CSS required.
Maintenance page images
Upload a custom image or logo for your maintenance page without writing any code. You can even hide your shop name if your image already includes it — perfect for keeping your branding consistent.
Scrolling announcement banners
Got a longer announcement or what to add a bit of flare? Set your banner message to scroll horizontally and loop continuously. You can even control the scrolling speed to get it just right.
Featured homepage text without products
Many sellers have requested the ability to still have featured homepage text without showing products or categories. It’s now possible so you can have a more minimal homepage, with a high impact feeling when it’s paired with a welcome/hero image.
Ready to use these updates? Head to your shop designer — many shops already have the latest template version waiting as a draft. Simply review your settings, make any adjustments you'd like, and hit Publish when you're ready. These features are available to all sellers on free and paid plans (except password-protected pricing, which requires our Diamond plan).
Take your shop to the next level with three new features that are only available in our completely redesigned shop admin.
What's waiting for you:
Password-protected products: create exclusive shopping experiences with password-protected products. Perfect for VIP drops, early access releases, or member-only items. Set a password in the Product access controls section of a product form. Available exclusively on Diamond plans.
SEO fields: take control of your search visibility with expanded SEO customization options for your products and shop. Help buyers find your products faster and make quicker purchase decisions. More visibility means more sales—it’s that simple. Navigate to the Advanced settings section in a product form to add new SEO fields. Available on all plans.
Social selling: Connect your shop to Instagram Shopping, Facebook Shops, and Google Shopping to sell where your customers already spend their time. Turn posts into purchases and expand your reach across multiple channels. Head over to the Marketing page to start connecting! Available exclusively on Platinum and Diamond plans.
Professional policies made simple! We've added a dedicated Shop Policies section to make creating essential legal pages effortless.
What's New:
New "Shop Policies" section in your shop settings
Four key policy types: Shipping & Delivery, Returns & Refunds, Privacy Policy, and Terms & Conditions
Available to all sellers immediately
Rich text formatting for professional-looking policies
How It Works: When you create a policy, we automatically generate a custom page and add it to your shop's footer. Your customers can easily find and review your policies without cluttering your main navigation.
Already Have Policy Pages? No problem! You can keep your existing custom policy pages or migrate the content to our new policies section and delete the old pages. The choice is yours – use what works best for your workflow.
Important Note: Make sure you're using an updated shop template for policy links to appear in your footer. Older templates won't display these links automatically.
Need Inspiration? We've included helpful guidance articles for each policy type with suggestions on what to include. No more staring at blank pages wondering where to start!
Full Control: Delete policies anytime – they'll be instantly removed from your site and footer links.
Ready to build trust with professional policies? Head to your shop settings and look for the new "Shop Policies" section!
We've made featured categories even better! Four more of our popular templates now support featured categories on your homepage, and all 8 templates can now display eye-catching collages instead of just single product images.
What's new:
Featured categories added to: Sidecar, Luna, Lunch Break, and Roadie templates
Collage display options for all 8 templates: Choose from single product, grid collage, strip collage, or featured collage
Optional product counts: Show or hide the number of products next to category names
These updates are live in our 8 most popular templates: Cosmos, Ranger, Trace, Foundry, Sidecar, Luna, Lunch Break, and Roadie.
Here’s an example so you can see some of the new display options:
Ready to showcase your categories? Head to your shop designer and make sure you're using the latest version of one of these templates. Many shops already have the update waiting as a draft! Open your homepage template settings, add your featured categories (if newly available), choose your display style, and publish when you're ready.
We've rolled out another large set of template changes and improvements across all Big Cartel templates. Every template—Cosmos, Ranger, Netizen, and beyond—now gives you more control over how your shop looks, works, and connects with buyers.
Design Details That Help You Sell
Homepage Heroes That Convert
Your homepage visuals just got smarter. Make every hero image and slideshow clickable to guide visitors exactly where you want them — featured products, new categories, or even link outside your Big Cartel shop to an external project. Just use simple relative paths (like /products) or full URLs to create instant pathways to purchase and exploration. Plus, choose between slide or fade effects for your slideshows to match your brand's vibe — because sometimes a subtle fade says more than a dramatic slide.
What's new:
Add links to hero images and slideshow slides (to shop pages or any URL)
Choose slideshow transitions: slide or fade
Product Grids That Sell Better
Your product grid is where browsing turns into buying, and now you have complete control over what shoppers see first. When you're selling products with multiple price points, you can choose exactly how those prices appear — show the full range to highlight value (”$10.00 - $20.00”), lead with your entry point to reduce sticker shock (”$10.00”), or showcase your premium variant pricing (”$20.00”).
You can also polish the look of your shop with whole-dollar price rounding, turning “$100.00” or “$99.99” into a clean, editorial “$100.” And to signal variety right away, turn on variant counts so shoppers know how many options each product offers—whether that’s “3 styles” or “7 colors,” with labels you can fully customize in our recently added “Text and Translations” feature.
Together, these details transform your product grid from a simple catalog into a strategic selling tool that guides shoppers exactly where you want them to go.
What’s new:
Flexible multi-variant price display: range, lowest, or highest
Whole-dollar price rounding for a cleaner look
Display variant counts
See below how the same product feels different with combinations of the new settings — subtle shifts that shape how shoppers perceive your prices and your brand. In this example, this postcard has multiple variants with pricing ranging from $2.00 to $15.00. You have options to control whether you show a price range, the lowest/highest price, and whether the prices are rounded or not.
Additionally, we now give you options to show whether your products have multiple variants/options which can encourage your shoppers to click-through to explore more:
Navigation Your Way
Take full control of your shop’s navigation: decide what appears in your header, footer, or nowhere at all. Perfect for keeping secondary pages—like newsletter sign-ups or care instructions—accessible without clutter. You can also match navigation text styling to your brand’s voice with quick casing options.
What's new:
Choose which page types appear in header vs. footer (all pages, custom pages only, contact, or none)
Control how many custom pages to display when shown
Style your nav text with casing options: UPPERCASE, lowercase, or default
Connect With Buyers Your Way
Your community is spread across the internet and we’ve added some small but important things that can help you make your Big Cartel shop a bigger part of where your audiences live.
Expanded social network support
Reach your audience wherever they are. We’ve added Reddit, Signal, Telegram, and Discord to your social link options, automatically placed in your shop’s footer.
Communication on your terms
Not every seller wants to juggle a contact form sending emails to your inbox. If you're already managing conversations through Instagram DMs, email, or some other app, you can now turn off your shop's contact form entirely and replace it with a custom message pointing buyers to how you want to connect. Want to remove the contact page completely? Just turn off the contact form and use the new navigation controls to remove it from your header and footer — your shop, your rules.
You can optionally take it further by using custom HTML in your contact page announcement setting to embed images, styled text, or anything else that makes your contact page uniquely yours — from a simple redirect message to a full visual experience.
What’s new:
Turn off the shop’s default contact form
Add custom text, links, or HTML to your contact page announcement
Remove the contact page entirely from navigation
Quick reminder: If you haven't tried Chatway yet, it's still one of the easiest ways to stay connected with shoppers — managing conversations from your website, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger all in one app on your phone. It’s an app integration with a generous free plan for all Big Cartel shops on a paid plan.
Ready to customize?
Head to Shop Designer and update to the latest template version. All these features are waiting for you.
Add a personal touch to your shop with our new Featured Text setting! Now you can easily add custom messages, announcements, or promotional text right on your homepage — perfect for welcoming visitors, highlighting sales, or sharing important updates.
What you can do with Featured Text:
Add a warm welcome message for your shoppers
Include links to specific categories or products using HTML
Easy positioning above or within your featured items section
Sellers on paid plans have even more control with our custom CSS feature with which you can create more complex styling and content
Ready to try it? Head to your shop designer, go to Settings → Homepage Settings, and look for the new Featured Message setting. This feature is available in all our latest themes for both free and paid shops. If you're using an older theme, simply upgrade to any of our latest themes to access this feature.
