The goal
Prospective trade customers had to register before they could see enough product detail to know whether Tatum Gems was right for them. The owner wanted products, images and filters open to everyone, while wholesale pricing and ordering stayed restricted to approved trade accounts. She told us she had wanted this for years and had not found anyone who could build it on her platform.
What we did
- Mapped three levels of access: public visitor, registered member, and approved trade account.
- Built a public catalogue with full product details, images and five filters: gemstone type, colour, shape, origin and cut.
- Kept pricing private. Prices, stock and checkout appear only after an approved trade buyer signs in.
- Wrote custom code to keep both in step. The public catalogue syncs with the store automatically, including a nightly check, so the owner updates products once.
- Trained the owner on bulk product uploads, so she is not dependent on us for day to day changes.
The result
The catalogue was delivered in October 2026. New buyers can now browse the full range before registering, search engines can see every product, and the owner uses the site as a live catalogue at trade fairs in place of printed ones. Her review praised the back-end work and custom functionality.
What we would do differently
The build took longer than first planned, and the client said so in her review. The access rules were more layered than they looked. We now map every access level and permission before quoting a timeline.