Promotions
Overview
Promotions within Spree are used to provide discounts to orders, offer free shipping or to add potential additional items at no extra cost (eg. samples).
Promotions are one of the most complex areas within Spree, as there are a large number of moving parts to consider. Although this guide will explain Promotions from a developer’s perspective, if you are new to this area you can learn a lot from the Admin > Promotions tab where you can set up new Promotions, edit rules & actions, etc.
Promotions can be activated in three different ways:
- When a user adds a product to their cart (automatic promotions, eg. free shipping with a threshold)
- When a user enters a coupon code during the checkout process
Promotions for these individual ways are activated through their corresponding PromotionHandler class, once they’ve been checked for eligibility.
Promotions relate to two other main components: actions and rules. When a promotion is activated, the actions for the promotion are performed, passing in the payload from the fire_event call that triggered the activator becoming active. Rules are used to determine if a promotion meets certain criteria in order to be applicable.
Here is a table showcasing the attributes of the Spree::Promotion model along with a description for each attribute and example values:
| Attribute | Description | Example Value |
|---|---|---|
name | The name of the promotion | Summer Sale |
description | A brief description of the promotion | Discounts for summer |
expires_at | The expiration date and time of the promotion | 2025-09-01 23:59:59 |
starts_at | The start date and time of the promotion | 2025-06-01 00:00:00 |
code | A code that users can enter to apply the promotion | SUMMER2023 |
usage_limit | The total number of times the promotion can be used | 500 |
match_policy | The policy for how promotion rules are matched | all |
code_prefix | A prefix for generated coupon codes | SUMMER |
number_of_codes | The number of unique codes to be generated for the promotion | 1000 |
kind | The type of promotion (coupon_code or automatic) | coupon_code |
multi_codes | Indicates if the promotion uses multiple coupon codes | false |
Actions
There are four actions that come with Spree:
Rules
Here’s a list of all the rules that come with Spree:
Rules are used by Spree to determine if a promotion is applicable to an order and can be matched in one of two ways: all of the rules must match, or one rule must match. This is determined by the match_policy attribute on the Promotion object. As you will see in the Admin, you can set the match_policy to be “any” or “all” of the rules associated with the Promotion. When set to “any” the Promotion will be considered eligible if any one of the rules applies, when set to “all” it will be eligible only if all the rules apply.
Coupon Codes
Coupon codes are a way to track the usage of a promotion. They are associated with a promotion and can be used to apply the promotion to an order.
Coupon codes are generated when a promotion is created. The number of codes to be generated is set in the number_of_codes attribute on the Promotion object.
Here is a list of attributes for the CouponCode model:
| Attribute | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
code | Auto-generated unique 16-character code for the promotion. | 22A0F62A230BD919 |
promotion_id | ID of the associated promotion. | 12345 |
order_id | ID of the order to which the coupon code is applied. | 67890 |
state | Sate of the promotion code | unused, used |
If code_prefix is set in the Promotion object (eg. PRM), the code will be generated with that prefix, eg. PRM22A0F62A230BD919.
Extending Promotions
Please follow our extending Promotions guide to learn how to create custom promotion rules and actions.
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