Preorder

The customer knows it is not here. That is the whole difference from a backorder, where they usually do not.

How to run one

• Turn on inventory policy for that variant, so it sells past zero
• Put the ship date on the product page, in words, not in a badge
• Say it again at checkout and in the confirmation email
• Keep the preorder count where somebody looks at it weekly

Shopify has no preorder feature in the core admin, so the date lives in your copy and the discipline lives in your team.

The promise is the product

A preorder is a date. Hit it and you have a customer who trusts you with money before you have goods, which is the cheapest working capital there is.

Miss it silently and you have a refund and a review.

Where it goes wrong

The date is set from the supplier’s quoted lead time rather than from the longest one you have actually seen. Suppliers quote the good week.

The other one is preorders and normal stock selling from the same variant. The first delivery lands, gets sold to whoever browses that afternoon, and the people who paid six weeks ago are still waiting. Hold the preorder quantity back before the shelf goes live.