🌐 Language: 🇻🇳 Tiếng Việt · 🇬🇧 English (current)

S-Cart Multi-Store — One admin, many sales websites

Introduction

Multi-Store is a plugin that lets a business run multiple sales websites from a single admin system. This document is for business owners and operations managers (no technical background needed): after reading it you will understand what Multi-Store is for, the value it brings, how it differs from Multi-Vendor, and how the Free edition differs from Pro so you can pick the right fit.

1. What Multi-Store is and the problem it solves

When a business wants several different stores/websites — for example one domain per brand, one language/currency per market, or separate wholesale and retail sites — the usual approach is to build several standalone websites. The result: scattered data, many logins to manage, higher maintenance cost, and no single overview.

Multi-Store brings everything into one place:

• Many stores, one admin. Each store has its own domain, its own interface (template), its own language and currency — yet you manage them all from a single admin panel.
• Shared platform. Products, orders, and customers live in one system; no need to rebuild from scratch for each website.
• Lower cost and effort. Install once, operate in one place, update in one place — instead of maintaining several separate websites.
• Grow gradually. Start with one store and add new ones when needed, without rebuilding the system.

👉 Try it live on the demo site: https://demo.s-cart.org

2. How Multi-Store differs from Multi-Vendor

These are two different business models, and they cannot be installed together on the same website (the system blocks it to prevent data conflicts). Pick the right model:

In short: Multi-Store = many stores that are all yours; Multi-Vendor = one marketplace for many sellers. If you need a marketplace model, look at the Multi-Vendor plugin instead of Multi-Store.

3. Free vs Pro

Multi-Store comes as a Free edition (free, enough to get started) and a Pro edition (unlocks every feature for large-scale operations).

• Choose Free when: you are starting out, need up to 3 stores, and manage everything yourself.
• Upgrade to Pro when: you need more than 3 stores, want to hand each store to its own administrator, or need consolidated system-wide reports.

🔗 Learn more & upgrade to Pro: gp247.net/en/product/multi-store-pro.html · Tiếng Việt

3. Two everyday workflows

🛍️ Getting a product into a store — two ways

• Way 1 — Post it directly in the store: the store's administrator (store-admin) logs in on the store domain and creates the product there. It belongs to that store. (In the root admin, the platform owner can also create a product and pick the store it belongs to — available since the Free edition.)
• Way 2 — Publish from the root site: the platform owner opens the "Sync products to stores" screen, picks a root product + target store + category, then clicks Publish. Each store gets an independent copy that keeps a link back to the source product, so it can be re-synced when the source content changes.
  • Applies to single products only (bundles/groups are not supported yet).
  • The published copy defaults to draft status (not for sale) and price 0 — set the price and enable selling before it goes live, to avoid selling at 0. Each store's own price and stock are always preserved on re-sync.

👤 Granting a user store-admin rights

Open the "Store administrators" screen (administrators only):

1. Pick the User to grant (not administrator / view-all).
2. Pick the Store to grant (the root ROOT store cannot be chosen).
3. Pick a Role (store-scoped) — optional. Two presets ship ready to use: Store Admin (the store's full business scope, including configuration & reports) and Store Member (day-to-day operations: products, orders, customers, content). You can still create or pick other roles.
4. Click Assign store admin.

Once assigned, the user becomes a store administrator: they log in on the store's domain, see only that store's scope, and cannot reach the root admin (a security separation — see Conditions). Importantly, whatever roles or permissions they are granted, store administrators are always blocked from platform-wide actions (installing/removing plugins, global configuration, users/roles, store management…) and from any data outside their store — this boundary is enforced by the system, independent of how you assign permissions. Remove the grant with Revoke. One account cannot be both root staff and a store administrator — use two separate accounts if a person needs both roles.

Conditions & Rules (know before you use it)

• Cannot be installed alongside Multi-Vendor — Multi-Store and multi-vendor are different models that share store data in conflicting ways. The system blocks installation if a multi-vendor plugin is present; remove the other plugin first, then install.
• The Free edition is limited to 3 stores (including the root store) — enough to get started; to add more, upgrade to Pro. This is the line between the two editions, not an error.
• The root (ROOT) store cannot be locked — the root store is the foundation of the whole system; locking it would take everything down, so this action is always blocked (locking is a Pro feature).
• Platform requirements: requires gp247/shop and runs on GP247 core 3.0 or later. This is an S-Cart/GP247 plugin, not a standalone product.

Q&A

Q1: Do I need to build a separate website for each store?

→ No. You install one system; each store is a domain pointing to that same system, all managed together in one admin panel.

Q2: Can each store have its own interface, language, and currency?

→ Yes. Each store configures its own template, language, currency, and settings — even though they share one platform.

Q3: Should I choose Multi-Store or Multi-Vendor?

→ Choose Multi-Store if all the stores are yours. Choose Multi-Vendor if you want different sellers on a marketplace and you collect commission.

Q4: How many stores can the Free edition run?

→ Up to 3 stores, including the root store. If you need more, upgrade to Pro (unlimited).

Q5: What is the most valuable thing Pro adds?

→ Per-store administrators, syncing products to many stores, a unified dashboard, system-wide revenue reports, and store locking — built for running many stores for real.

Q6: If I'm on Free and later upgrade to Pro, do I lose data?

→ No. Pro extends Free on the same platform; upgrading unlocks more features while your existing store data stays intact.

Q7: Where can I try it before deciding?

→ The public demo site: https://demo.s-cart.org

Q8: Why can't I install it together with a multi-vendor plugin?

→ The two models share store data differently, and running them together would corrupt data. The system blocks it to protect you; pick just one model that fits.

Q9: Where do I find detailed installation and configuration?

→ See the official product page: gp247.net/en/product/multi-store-pro.html (a Vietnamese version is available too).

_{📅 Last updated: 2026-09-02 · ✍️ Author: GP247}