Gift subscriptions provides an option for your customers to gift subscriptions to their friends and families. This guide covers how gift subscriptions work, configuring gift subscriptions for your store, customizing the customer experience, and limitations. 

Before you start

• The Gift subscriptions feature is separate from Rewards. 
• Stores with a custom customer portal can use the JavaScript SDK to set up a redemption flow for Gift subscriptions. Refer to JavaScript SDK Gifts for more information. 
• Previously Bundles only worked with Affinity Gift Subs, but now it works with Landing pages as well (for both dynamic and fixed price bundles).
• You can use dynamic and fixed-price bundles as your gift product option.
• There are a few things to consider before enabling this feature. See Limitations to ensure that Gift subscriptions are compatible with your current store configuration.
• If this is your first time using Gift subscriptions, start by taking Recharge's course Creating gift subscriptions for a complete introduction.

Gift Subscriptions overview

With Gift subscriptions, a customer can choose to gift a specific product or store credit to the recipient of their choosing, and they can select when an email will notify the gift recipient. Prepaid and ongoing subscriptions are supported. Multi-currency is also compatible with gift subscriptions. 

When purchasing a gift product or credit, the customer can fill in the recipient's email and name with an optional message and sender name. Once the recipient receives an email, they can follow the link to redeem their gift in the customer portal. The gift recipient can then fill out their information, choose the quantity and frequency of the order, then select their order date to redeem the gift product or credit.

Check out the video walkthrough below for an overview of Gift subscriptions. 

Merchant portal settings

You may need to adjust your store settings in your Recharge merchant portal before providing customers the ability to purchase gifted subscriptions. By default, gifting permissions are enabled for all users that already have access to Products.

Update your user and account permissions

Update your user and account permissions to ensure all users have access to the Gift Products section of the merchant portal: 

1. Click Settings in the Recharge merchant portal. 
2. Select Accounts and click on the user account that needs updating. 
3. Check the checkbox beside Gifting listed under the General section of the Permission Settings.
4. Click Save changes to update the user's permissions. 

Update your customer portal settings

Depending on your preferences, you can provide gift recipients additional permissions in the customer portal when redeeming their gifted subscriptions. Update your customer portal settings to allow customers to select more than one quantity of a product, or to choose a one-time product when redeeming a gift:  

1. Click on Storefront and select Customer portal from the merchant portal. 
2. Gifting Subscription settings are available in the customer portal controls section under Gifting. You can enable either setting by clicking the toggle. 
   

Gift order fulfillment 

The initial order purchased by a gift sender is typically not a physical product sent to the gift recipient. Update your fulfillment settings in Recharge to automatically mark the initial gift order as fulfilled in Shopify to streamline the gifting process.

Enable the gift order fulfillment setting to have Recharge automatically set the order to fulfilled in Shopify when a gift recipient redeems their gift:

1. Click Settings in the Recharge merchant portal and select Order processing.
2. Navigate to the Gift order fulfillment setting under Gifting. There are two settings available:
   • Do nothing. The sender’s initial gift order remains unfulfilled: Keep orders marked as unfilled to prevent unnecessary orders from being sent to third-party fulfillment integrations.
   • Fulfill the gift sender’s initial order when the recipient redeems their gift: Have Recharge automatically mark the order as fulfilled to close it out in Shopify.
3. The Do nothing setting is selected by default. Select Fulfill the gift sender’s initial order when the recipient redeems their gift to automatically mark all orders as fulfilled in Shopify.
4. Click Save to confirm your changes. 

Step 1 - Create the gift product

Follow the instructions below to create and manage your gift options directly in Recharge:

1. Click Products and select Gifts in your Recharge merchant portal. 
2. On the gifting page, click Add a gift product. 
   
3. Select your gift option, then click Save and continue.
   • There are three gifting options to select from:
     • Single product: This gifting option allows you to choose a specific product as a gift product, and the recipient sets the order frequency. 
     • Any product within a Recharge collection: This gifting option requires you to build a Recharge collection with a list of products that gift recipients can choose from.
     • Any product: This gifting option represents a gift card, and allows the gift recipient to select from any product in your store. 
       
4. Search and select the specific product/collection you wish to offer as a gift. Save your preferences.
5. On the next page, set the gift name, description and add gift options. Click Save and continue.
   • Gift options reflect how much the gift costs, and the products the recipient will receive. Ensure that the gift product is priced to reflect the number of orders being gifted and any shipping and taxes costs that should be included. 
   • For example, if one subscription box product costs $20, and shipping and taxes come to $5, and you want to offer the gift recipient the ability to receive multiple boxes, add two subscription boxes for $50, or three subscription boxes for $75.
     
6. Review the gift summary to ensure all information is correct.
7. In the Store level settings section, you can choose how email notifications are sent and choose how you customize the redemption experience. See Customize the recipient experience and Notifications for further details.
   
8. Click Save gift product to confirm changes. 

After configuring the gift product in Recharge, you must enable or build the gifting widget on your Shopify storefront. See Step 2 - Add gift widget to your Shopify theme for more information.  

Step 2 - Add gift widget to theme

After creating the gift product, you have the choice of either creating a custom gifting widget or using the App Block provided within the Shopify theme.

Add the Gifting Widget using the app block

1. Navigate to your theme editor in Shopify. 
2. Create a new product template and name it gifting product. 
3. Click Add block in the theme editor on your recharge-gift-products template and add the Gifting Widget. You can drag and drop this widget wherever you’d like on the product page. 
4. Save your changes and preview the page to ensure everything looks as intended. 
5. Important - Go to your gift product in Shopify and update the template to the gifting-product template rather than the default template.
   

Create a custom Gifting Widget

Create the input fields on the gift product page to add the correct line item properties, allowing us to import the gift details into Recharge. The line item properties we would need are: 

As long as we receive the required information, Recharge will create the customer accounts necessary using the recipient email address input by the sender and the sender’s email they input on checkout.

Add a Send as gift button to the product page

When adding the Gifting Widget to your theme, you can also add a Send as gift button to product pages. This button will direct customers to the gift product page when clicked allowing you to promote gift products. 

To add a Send as gift button to your product page:

1. Navigate to your theme editor in Shopify. 
2. Go to the default product page of the product you want to add a button to. Make sure that you are not attempting this on the gift product page.
   
3. Click Add block  and add the Gifting Buy Button. You can drag and drop this widget wherever you’d like on the product page. 
   

Customize the recipient experience

Gift recipients are sent to a landing page to redeem their gift. You can choose to use the Site Builder to customize the landing page to fit your store's branding and voice or Affinity's built-in redemption experience. There are two options to access these settings. 

Option 1

Edit the redemption experience from the Gift Products page:

1. Click Products in your Recharge merchant portal and select Gifts. 
2. Click the Edit gift settings dropdown and select Edit redemption experience.
   
3. Choose how you'd like to customize the redemption experience. If you select the Site Builder, click Customize experience to customize the landing page. 
   

Option 2

Choose the redemption experience after adding your gift product: 

1. Follow the steps outlined in Create the gift product. 
2. After you've set up the gift product, click the pencil icon next to Customize the recipient's redemption experience.
   
3. Choose how you'd like to customize the redemption experience. If you select the Site Builder, click Customize experience to customize the landing page. 

Using the Site Builder

Use the Edit global styles, colors, and layout section to make visual changes to your page. The Site Builder contains different page blocks to let you update the page to your preferences. Use the HTML custom block to add custom content such as video or unique messages. The Gift Redemption Landing block allows you to customize the gift recipients redemption page. 

Additionally, customize different pages in the gift redemption experience:

1. Click the dropdown arrow next to Landing Page.
   
2. Select a page to customize. The example below uses Gift start date.
   

Notifications

Gift senders choose if they wish to notify the gift recipient of their gift when they purchase their gift. When the notification is sent, the recipient receives an email with a redemption link to redeem their gift. 

You can send gifting-related notifications through Recharge or Klaviyo and email notifications related to gifting are sent in batches every 15 minutes. 

Recharge

Enable the Gift Purchased notification in Recharge to notify gift recipients of their gifts:

1. Click Settings in the Recharge merchant portal and select Notifications. 
2. Select the Gift Purchased notification under the Customer notifications section.
   
3. On this page, you can toggle the status to Enabled and customize the email template to fit your brand. 

Klaviyo

You can create custom notifications in Klaviyo using Klaviyo Flows. Recharge sends metrics to Klaviyo based on certain events, which you can use as your trigger when creating notifications in Klaviyo.

These metrics include specific event properties you can use to completely personalize your email notifications. See Sending gifting notifications with Klaviyo to notify gift senders and recipients, as well as access source code and video tutorials to get started building email flows.

Analytics

Access data specific to gift subscriptions directly in the Gift Products section in the Recharge merchant portal. 

You can review analytics for: 

• Gift orders processed in the last 30 days

• Gift orders processed count in the last 30 days

• Gifts unredeemed in the last 30 days

• Gifts redeemed in the last 30 days

Translations

Adjust language translations and customize text elements for your gift subscriptions. Stores using the Affinity customer portal theme can make translations in the merchant portal. If your store is using Novum, Prima, or Theme Engine, translations can be made directly in the Site Builder. 

Affinity

To access the translation settings:

1. In the merchant portal, click Storefront and select Copy & translations.
2. Click Customer Portal - Affinity. 
   
3. Scroll to the Gifting section and expand the field to see your translation options for gifting. 
   
4. Click Save once you've finished making updates. 

Novum, Prima, or Theme Engine

1. Select Products in your Recharge merchant portal and click Gifts. 
2. Click the Edit gift settings dropdown and select Edit redemption experience to edit your landing page. 
3. Select the desired block to update the text. For example, the Gift Redemption Landing block allows you to edit the page translations. 
   
4. Click Done once you've finished making updates. 

Gift order details

Stores using gift subscriptions display a Gift orders tab where you can review gift information such as gift sender, recipient, product, value, and status. You can filter this information by gift recipient id or gift sender id. 

To access the gift orders tab:

1. Click Customers in your Recharge merchant portal and select Orders.
2. Click the Gift orders tab.
   

Review gift balance

Review a customer’s credit balance on the customer details page:

1. Click Customers in your Recharge merchant portal and select Customers from the dropdown.
2. Select a specific customer to access the customer details page. 
3. In the gifts section, you can review the customer's gift balance.
   

Pricing your gift product variants

When offering gift subscriptions, shipping and taxes should be included in the gift subscription price. 

For example: 

• If the product is $10.00, with $3.00 flat rate shipping, and estimated taxes will not go over $2.00 dollars - the gift product price should be set to $15.00. 
• When offering multiple gift orders, the pricing would be set to $30.00 for two gift orders, and $45.00 for three gift orders. 

If calculating the exact numbers is difficult, you can add information in the product description defining how many gift orders the purchase is for (ie. "Up to two orders") and communicate that shipping and taxes are included in the gift price. 

FAQs

How do I test my gifting flow before making it live?

You cannot set a gift flow to test mode before going live. You may want to configure your gift product in a staging store first, if you have access to one, to test the user experience.

If you do not have access to a staging environment, ensure that your "All Products" page on the storefront does not include the gifted product, and test the gift product before making it available on the "All Products" page. This ensures that only people with a direct link to the product can access the product while you are testing it.

How are refunds handled for gifted subscriptions?

You can refund the original order to the gift sender in Shopify, however this will not automatically cancel the gift credits.

To cancel the gift credits:

1. Click Customers in the Recharge merchant portal and select Customers from the dropdown.
2. Select a specific customer.
3. In the Unredeemed gifts section, click Actions and select Cancel gift.
   

If the gift product has already been redeemed, you cannot claim the cost back if you refund the original order. Be careful to only refund unredeemed orders.

Gift credit refunds must be processed through Recharge, as Shopify does not support refunds for these credits. Refunding through Shopify will fail, returning an error message, and the credit is not applied back to the account. To process the refund in Recharge: 

1. Log in to the Recharge merchant portal, click on the Customers tab, and locate the customer who will receive the refund.
2. Open the customer's Customer Details page and click on See Details.
3. Select the order, enter the amount to refund, and click Refund Payment.

Why did I receive an email from Recharge indicating that some of my gift orders failed?

Gift orders can fail due to invalid store configuration. See Recharge failed to create a gift order for steps to fix the issue, plus instructions on manually importing gift orders into Recharge.

Can I remove credits from a customer's account?

Yes, you can remove credits from a customer's account in the Recharge merchant portal:

1. Select Customers in the Recharge merchant portal and click Customers.
2. Search for and select the customer's name.
3. Click Revoke Credits under Gifts.
4. Enter the amount to remove and select Revoke.

It's important to confirm the amount to remove before you revoke the credits, as you cannot add credits back to a customer's account after removing them unless you have Rewards enabled. 

Can gift credits be used to purchase add-on products?

Yes. Add-on products can be processed using gift credits. 

What happens if the gift buyer enters the wrong recipient email? 

The recipient's email cannot be updated if the buyer enters the email address incorrectly. 

How can I provide access to the gift portal if the gift recipient lost the redemption link email?

You can reshare the redemption link with gift recipients if needed: 

1. Click Customers in your Recharge merchant portal and select Customers from the dropdown.
2. Search for the gift recipient's email address. 
3. There is a section for unredeemed gifts on the gift recipient's customer account. This is where the redemption link is located.
4. Click Actions and then click copy the redemption link. 

What if my gift recipient has leftover credit?

If your store is on Shopify Plus, you can utilize Recharge's checkout extension and allow the leftover credits to be added next time the customer checks out. Refer to Credits on Checkout for more information. 

If your store is not on Shopify Plus, leftover credits can be used in the customer portal. If the customer goes through checkout and adds a payment method, they would then be able to purchase something on their customer portal with a combination of both leftover credits and their payment method.

How can my gift recipient subscribe once their credit runs out?

Once gift credits run out, the customer will need to go through checkout in order to add a payment method. They would then be able to purchase a product in the customer portal.

If the customer has already gone through checkout before the gift credits and has a payment method on file, they do not need to go through checkout again and can purchase a product directly in the customer portal.

If your store meets the requirements, you may also add a payment method directly in the customer portal. See Updating payment methods directly in the customer portal for more information on eligibility.

How are gift orders reported in Shopify? 

There is not a streamlined reporting process for gifting in Shopify due to the complexities in calculating revenue. When calculating revenue for a gift order, the money received for those orders is initially considered unearned revenue, since the gift recipient has not received your product. Revenue is considered earned when gift recipients redeem their gifts.

You can use the Gift Redemption Shopify tag to understand gift revenue or use filters in your Shopify reports based on the line item in gift orders to calculate the total earned revenue. 

Recharge cannot provide legal advice on interpreting analytics or financial reporting, only guidance. See Gifting Analytics in Recharge for more information. 

How do third-party applications work with gift subscriptions?

Third-party applications that add gifts to the cart may cause a confusing customer experience. Be sure to thoroughly test your configuration. Consider the option to conditionally restrict your third-party application setup when using Gift Subscriptions.

Can I send gift recipients a direct link to the landing page to redeem their gift?

Gift recipients might overlook or accidentally delete the email containing the link to the gift redemption page. You can send the gift recipient a direct link to the landing page so they can easily redeem their gift:

1. Locate the customer in your Recharge merchant portal.
2. Under Unredeemed gifts select Actions and click Landing page link.
3. Copy the unique landing page link URL to share with the gift recipient. 

Considerations

Consider the following when configuring Gift subscriptions: