Subscriptions for consumables: what to sell, how often and how to charge

Some customers buy the same thing at regular intervals: coffee, dog food, their usual cream, pool filters. Every time they have to remember to come back to your store is a chance for them to buy it somewhere else or simply forget. A subscription turns that repeat purchase into an order that arrives on its own.

But a poorly designed subscription creates more work than revenue: cancellations after a few weeks, failed payments, orders shipped to customers who had already cancelled. This article is about deciding what to sell this way and how to set it up so it works.

Which products work as subscriptions

The key question is not “do they buy a lot of it?” but “do they buy it at a predictable pace?”. Good fits are:

• Consumables with a steady rate of use: coffee, tea, pet food, cat litter, supplements, everyday cosmetics, cleaning products.
• Replacement parts with a known lifespan: filters, brush heads, cartridges, blades. Customers know how often they replace them, even if they don't remember to.
• Products that run out at an awkward moment: things nobody wants to be left without (nappies, special pet food, basic office supplies).
• Discovery boxes: a different selection every month. Here the value lies in the surprise, and the cancellation rate tends to be higher.

Poor fits are impulse or seasonal purchases, products bought once every few years and those the customer needs to see before each purchase (fashion, most gifts). If in doubt, look at your order history: find customers who have bought the same product three or more times and work out the average interval between orders. If the intervals are similar across customers, a subscription is possible.

Frequency: let them choose, but sensibly

A frequency that does not match actual consumption is the most common reason for cancelling. If customers build up stock because it arrives before they have finished it, they cancel. If they run out before the next delivery, they buy elsewhere and end up cancelling too.

• Offer a few sensible options: every two weeks, every month, every two months. More than four or five options is confusing.
• Suggest a frequency based on the pack size. A 3 kg bag of pet food and a 15 kg one do not last the same time; say so on the product page.
• Let them change it later from their customer account. It is far better for someone to switch from monthly to every two months than to see them cancel.

The price of each period, without fake discounts

The usual incentive is a discount on the one-off purchase price. It works, but it has two pitfalls:

• If the discount is too high, customers subscribe, receive the cheap first order and cancel. You have sold once at a reduced margin and paid for the admin.
• If you inflate the one-off price so that the subscription price looks like a bargain, you are advertising a saving that does not exist. As well as being dishonest, it conflicts with the rules on prices and discounts.

It is often clearer to set what each period costs directly (“€15 a month, €150 a year”) than to build it around a percentage. And decide from the outset what happens to renewals if you raise prices: keep the agreed price, apply the catalogue price or set a new one from the second period. Whatever you choose, tell the customer before they pay.

How to charge for renewals

The first order is easy: the customer pays as usual. The problem is the following ones, when they are not there. There are three common routes:

1. Card stored with the payment gateway. The customer authorises the first payment with strong customer authentication and the gateway stores a reference for subsequent charges. This is the most convenient option for consumers. The weak spot is expired cards or cards without funds.
2. SEPA direct debit. The customer signs a mandate with their IBAN and you submit the debit in a batch. Very common with businesses and fixed fees. It does not depend on a card expiring, but payments can be returned and that has to be managed.
3. An order paid manually each time. The store creates the order and the customer pays it via a link. This is the simplest technically and the one that causes the most cancellations, because every payment is a decision.

Whatever the method, you need to know which payments are scheduled and when, and react quickly when one fails: notify the customer, give them a simple way to update their payment method and do not ship goods that have not been paid for.

Pause, change and cancel: design that retains customers

It seems counterintuitive, but making it easy to cancel reduces cancellations. Customers who know they can cancel in two clicks subscribe with less hesitation. And those who want to leave will leave anyway; if you make it difficult, they leave annoyed and file a chargeback with their bank as well.

• Offer a pause before cancellation. Holidays, a month with too much product, a temporary change: pausing saves a lot of subscriptions.
• Let customers change quantity and frequency from their account.
• No minimum terms the customer does not expect. If there are any, make them clearly visible before signing up.
• Send an email for every change: sign-up, renewal, pause, cancellation.

And in internal operations, a detail that prevents headaches: the warehouse team should be able to see whether the subscription behind an order is still active. If someone cancels when an order has already been created but not shipped, it should not go out.

What to measure

• Monthly cancellation rate and, above all, at which renewal customers leave. If most cancel after the first delivery, the problem is the introductory discount or the frequency.
• Failed payments and how many are recovered.
• Forecast recurring revenue for the coming months: it helps you plan purchasing and stock.
• Reasons for cancelling, if you ask when customers cancel. One optional question is enough.

One last technical note: subscriptions depend on scheduled tasks that create the orders and on the integration with the payment gateway. A store with PrestaShop, PHP and modules kept up to date avoids the silent failures that appear when a gateway changes its API or an old version stops receiving fixes.

How to do it in PrestaShop

RKR Suscripciones lets customers choose on the product page between a one-off purchase and a subscription, with the frequency and the price of each period, which can be a discount or a fixed price per frequency. The store creates each period's order via cron a few days before delivery; customers pause, resume, cancel or change quantity and frequency from their account, and receive an email for every change. You can see the payment forecast, the scheduled orders and the subscription status in the order list, with a warning if a pending order belongs to a cancelled subscription. You also decide whether renewals follow the agreed price or the catalogue price. With RKR Domiciliación SEPA, each renewal can be collected by direct debit under a mandate, and if the customer revokes the mandate, the renewal is not created.