Run a flash sale on Shopify

Flash sales work because they are short, which means both edges matter. A sale that starts late loses the email traffic; one that ends late gives away margin to people who arrived after the deadline.

Both edges are just times on a task.

The shape of a flash sale task

• Filter the products — usually a tag applied in advance.
• Compare-at price → set the same as the price, so the discount displays.
• Price → decrease by percentage, round to your usual ending.
• Tags → add a marker the theme or an app can use to badge the products.
• Scheduler → start and revert times a few hours apart.

Deciding what goes in

• By tag, applied during the week as a separate bulk task.
• By collection, when the sale is a whole category.
• By inventory, so nothing promoted is already out of stock.
• By price band, when the offer is “everything under 50”.
• Excluding a “no-discount” tag for protected products.

A worked example: six hours, one collection

1. Filter: collection is “Flash”, inventory more than 0.
2. Editors: compare-at from price, price −30% rounded to .99, add tag “flash-live”.
3. Scheduler: start 12:00, revert 18:00.
4. Send the email for 12:05, when the storefront already shows the new prices.
5. At 18:00 prices, compare-at and the tag all return to their previous state.

Check the storefront, not the admin

The admin will show the new price the moment the task finishes; the storefront may need a cache cycle or a theme that reads compare-at price properly. Look at a product page before the email goes out.

For a repeated weekly flash, promote the task to a recurring schedule so it happens on its own.

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