Cart and Checkout
Discover how buyers add items to their carts, complete a fully on-brand checkout experience
Storefront checkout on ArtInStack uses one cart and checkout experience for your buyers—whether they add to cart over several pages or use buy now from a photo or product detail page. Payment runs on your site (your subdomain or custom domain), styled with your theme, then orders land in your dashboard for fulfillment. This is separate from dashboard tools such as plan upgrades or catalog test buttons that open a different Stripe flow.
After payment, buyers see a confirmation; digital goods get download access; print-on-demand and shipped items follow your fulfillment paths—see Manage orders and fulfillment.
Prerequisites
Stripe connected: Connect payments with Stripe
You test on: your live public site (preview mode works for owner testing)
You review orders in: Dashboard → Products (orders)
How buyers start checkout
| Path | Typical use |
|---|---|
| Add to cart | Shop across pages—prints, digitals, multiple lines—then open the cart and proceed to checkout |
| Buy now | Single item from a photo print picker or product page—skips browsing but uses the same checkout screens |
Both paths share one basket per visitor on your studio site. ArtInStack keeps line details (size, paper, linked photo, price at add time) so checkout stays consistent even if you later edit catalog prices.
Where checkout happens (buyer view)
- Cart review — line items, quantities, subtotal (path on your site: /cart-checkout).
- Details — email for every order; shipping address and method when the cart includes physical or print-on-demand items; optional promo code, gift message, and order notes where enabled.
- Payment — card entry on /cart-checkout/payment (secure Stripe on your branded checkout—buyers are not sent to a generic off-site cart for storefront sales).
- Confirmation — thank-you state and email receipt; digital delivery links when applicable.
What ArtInStack handles for you
One print lab per order. Print-on-demand items are fulfilled through a single partner lab per checkout—Prodigi or Gelato, depending on your product setup. Buyers cannot mix labs in one cart; they finish or clear the cart, then shop the other lab. Multiple sizes or variants from the same lab in one order are supported (for example several print sizes from the same photo).
Prices checked before payment. If a catalog price changed after an item was added, checkout may ask the buyer to refresh the cart—especially for physical lines—so you are not caught selling at an outdated amount.
Shipping choices on the form. For eligible print orders, ArtInStack requests live shipping quotes from the print partner when possible (country and postal code drive the options). If a live quote is unavailable, curated fallback rates still let buyers pick a method. The option they select is included in the total charged at payment. You do not manually paste shipping into Stripe for each storefront order.
Digital and donation rules.
- Digital downloads: buyers need a valid email; no shipping block.
- One-time donations: can share a cart with other one-time items per your product rules—see Donations and fundraising campaigns.
- Monthly recurring gifts: checkout alone—no prints, digitals, or other products in the same cart; no promo or shipping on that flow.
Test checkout as the seller
Use the same URLs your clients use, not only dashboard shortcuts.
- Open your public site (or Preview site with owner preview access).
- Add to cart from a shop page, or buy now from a photo or product detail page.
- Complete /cart-checkout with a Stripe test card in test mode, or a small live charge you plan to refund.
- Enter a real-looking shipping address for POD or physical tests so shipping methods appear.
- Pay on /cart-checkout/payment and confirm the confirmation screen and receipt email.
- For digital products, open the buyer download link from the confirmation or email.
- In the dashboard, open Products → orders and confirm line items, totals, and shipping match what you tested.
- Refund live test charges in Stripe when finished.
Dashboard “test checkout” on a catalog row uses a different hosted Stripe session for quick product smoke tests—it does not replace walking through /cart-checkout on your live site.
Buyer troubleshooting
- Ad or privacy blockers can block payment scripts—ask buyers to allow scripts on your domain if payment never loads.
- Currency on products should match your connected Stripe settlement currency.
- Mixed print labs shows a clear message to complete or clear the cart—expected behavior, not a bug.
After payment (your workflow)
Orders and fulfillment status live under Products; POD production tracking also ties to Settings → E-commerce → Print orders (see Manage orders and fulfillment and FAQ: Print fulfillment and shipping).
Related guides
- Commerce overview — how product types fit together
- Digital vs print products
- Print on Demand overview
- Add a product
Verifying your setup
- You completed add to cart and (if you sell prints) buy now through /cart-checkout on your public site.
- Payment succeeded on /cart-checkout/payment and confirmation email arrived.
- The order appears in Products with correct lines, shipping (if applicable), and product type handling.