Most operators I talk to think about consignment in binary terms. Either a vendor sells you wholesale — flagship products, established trust, net-30 terms — or you move that vendor to consignment, and now you're telling them the relationship is changing. That framing is doing a lot of damage.
When you tell a vendor "we want to move you to consignment," they hear "we're going to stop buying your flagship outright." Their head goes immediately to revenue protection, not to opportunity. They get defensive, ask for terms that protect their downside, and the conversation either stalls or ends with you on stricter wholesale terms than you started with. Nobody wins.
There's a better conversation. Don't ask the vendor to convert. Ask them to add. The wholesale relationship stays exactly where it is. The flagship keeps moving on the terms you've already negotiated. What changes is that you've opened a second track on the same vendor record — a track where SKUs that need different economics can live on consignment without disturbing the wholesale rhythm.
Ask to Convert
"We want to move you to consignment." Vendor hears: we're cutting your wholesale revenue. Defensive. Slow. Often blocks. Trust takes a hit even if the deal goes through.
Ask to Add
"Wholesale stays the same. We want to add consignment for [specific SKUs]." Vendor hears: more shelf space, more sell-through data, more relationship. Additive. Fast. Both sides win.
The platform makes this real
Mixed-mode isn't a hack or a workaround. It's a first-class feature on every vendor record in ShelfSpace. When you open the vendor's Settings tab, you'll see two panels stacked on one screen — Wholesale Settings and Consignment Settings. Either one can sit empty when you only run one mode. Both can be configured when you run both.
At the dock, each delivery picks its Order Type. The vendor brings two invoices and two Metrc manifests on the same trip — one Wholesale, one Consignment. You create two deliveries in the platform. From that point forward, the wholesale delivery feeds the AP queue on the vendor's payment terms; the consignment delivery feeds the weekly settlement engine for that vendor. Two tracks, one vendor relationship.
The full operational walkthrough lives in our docs. The same-vendor-two-modes thesis lives in our explainer post. This piece is about the conversation that gets you there — and the three scenarios where the mixed-mode ask works.
Three scenarios where mixed-mode beats binary
Flagship on wholesale, experimental line on consignment
A vendor you've been buying wholesale for a year is launching a new infused-pre-roll line. You like the brand, but you're not sure whether the new line will pull the same way as their flagship flower. Asking them to wholesale the experimental line means you eat the loss if it sits. Asking them to convert the whole relationship to consignment threatens revenue they're counting on from the flagship.
Instead: wholesale stays as-is on the flagship. The new infused-pre-roll line ships on consignment, with a split anchored to the vendor's margin expectations. You give the experimental line a real chance to prove itself on your shelf without taking the inventory risk yourself. The vendor gets shelf space they wouldn't have gotten if you'd only said yes to wholesale.
High-volume vendor with slow-moving long-tail SKUs
Some vendors have a few SKUs that move every week and a long tail of SKUs that take 30 to 60 days to sell through. Buying the whole catalog wholesale traps your capital on the long tail. Asking the vendor to give you better wholesale terms across the board is a hard conversation because their economics depend on the volume of the fast movers. Asking them to convert the whole vendor to consignment makes them defensive about the volume SKUs.
The mixed-mode ask: keep the fast movers on wholesale at the terms you already have. Move just the long-tail SKUs to consignment, with shrinkage and aging-discount terms in the consignment settings. You stop tying up capital on product that may not move. The vendor stops sending you product you weren't going to sell through fast enough anyway. Both sides save on dead inventory friction.
Reciprocal buying inside a vertically integrated group
Vertically integrated cannabis companies face a unique version of this problem. Your production entity ships product to your retail entity. Internally, the buy is a transfer — but the accounting still has to clear, and intercompany cash should reflect actual sell-through, not a theoretical wholesale invoice. Forcing the buy to be wholesale ties up cash inside the group when it could be working elsewhere.
Mixed-mode lets your production entity wholesale its tested SKUs (the ones with proven sell-through on the retail side) and consign its newer launches or one-off drops. The retail entity settles weekly on consignment SKUs based on actual POS data, not a forecast. Cash that would have been frozen as intercompany payable freed up for whichever entity needs it. See reciprocal buying on consignment for the deeper version.
The conversation, in one paragraph
When you sit down with a vendor — call, email, trade show, doesn't matter — the structure is the same. Lead with what stays the same. Name the specific SKUs you want to add on consignment. Be explicit that the wholesale relationship and the flagship terms aren't changing. Propose a starting split that's anchored to the vendor's margin economics, not a generic 50/50. Offer to revisit in 60 to 90 days when there's real sell-through data on the consignment SKUs.
"Your wholesale stays exactly where it is. We want to add consignment for [specific SKUs]." That sentence does more work than any other in this conversation.
Setting splits without renegotiating the relationship
Splits are where this conversation usually gets stuck if you don't think about them ahead of time. The mistake is anchoring on a generic 50/50 default. That number signals nothing about the actual economics of the SKUs going on consignment, and it gives the vendor no reason to engage with the proposal as a real business deal.
A better anchor: the vendor's wholesale margin on the same product. If the vendor sells you the SKU wholesale at $10 with a $4 margin on their side, the consignment split should leave them at or near that $4 per unit — adjusted for the fact that on consignment they're carrying the inventory risk until it sells. That usually means a vendor-favorable split: 55/45 or 60/40, depending on how risky the SKU is for them. The platform supports per-category splits, so you can negotiate one number for flower-on-consignment and a different number for edibles-on-consignment from the same vendor.
Discount-cap settings are the other place this conversation lands. The aging-discount tiers tell the vendor what happens to their share if their product sits too long without moving — they get marked down per the tier schedule, and the vendor's settlement share reflects that. This is a feature for both sides: it incentivizes the vendor to send product that actually sells through, and it gives you a structured way to clear slow movers without eating the loss yourself.
What changes operationally — and what doesn't
Operationally, almost nothing changes for your team. The receive flow at the dock is identical whether the delivery is Wholesale or Consignment — same three steps, same signed-invoice-and-Metrc-manifest upload, same line-item disposition picker. The full SOP walks the click-by-click. The only meaningful new step is picking Order Type at delivery creation, which is one button click before you click Create Delivery.
What does change is how each delivery resolves downstream. Wholesale deliveries land in the AP queue and pay on whatever payment terms you set. Consignment deliveries feed the weekly settlement engine and pay based on actual POS sell-through. Two tracks, one vendor relationship, zero spreadsheet reconciliation.
When the conversation doesn't work
Not every vendor will say yes, and that's fine. Vendors with very thin wholesale margins may not have room to take on consignment risk on top. Vendors whose products move so fast that consignment doesn't free up meaningful capital — your top three vendors moving weekly volume, for example — those relationships stay on wholesale because that's where the economics actually work. The mixed-mode ask is the right move for vendors where it solves a real problem: slow movers, experimental SKUs, new launches, intercompany transfers, brands you want to give a fair test without taking inventory risk.
The binary frame ("convert or don't") makes you eat decisions you don't have to eat. The mixed-mode frame ("add when it fits") gives both sides a path that protects what's working.
Ready to run mixed-mode with your vendors? Reach out and I'll walk through how the first 60 days look for your specific vendor list.