# Drops and restocks

Chapter 11 of the Ribbon user guide.

Boutiques live on the weekly drop. Ribbon gives a drop its own moment on the home page, keeps the pieces visible but not buyable until it opens, and marks what's back and what's nearly gone:

* The **Next drop** section: a band with your kicker ("Next drop"), heading ("The ballerina edit"), text and the moment written out ("Friday 31 October, 6 pm AEDT"), a **countdown** (days, hours, minutes and seconds in large serif figures), a **Notify me** form and two teaser photos. Under them, the drop's products as **Coming soon** cards: a Coming soon badge and an "Opens Fri 31 Oct, 6 pm" pill where quick add would be.
* **When the moment comes**, the countdown and form give way to "The drop is live" and a **Shop the drop** button, the cards become buyable in place, and screen readers hear "The ballerina edit is live". A page opened after the moment shows the live drop straight away.
* **A product with a drop date** (`custom.drop_at`, chapter 7) is Coming soon everywhere until then, with or without the section: its product page and quick view show the Coming soon badge and the "Opens Fri 31 Oct, 6 pm" pill instead of the add button, and its cards show the badge and the pill instead of quick add.
* **Back in stock**: a badge on cards, quick view and the product page for available products tagged `restocked` (chapter 7).
* **"2 left"**: a small pill on the sizes that are nearly gone, wherever size pills show (the product page, quick view, the card's quick add, Shop the look and Wear it with).

## Next drop settings

| Setting | Default | What it does |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kicker, Heading, Text | "Next drop", "The ballerina edit", "Tulle, satin ribbon and the softest pink. Twelve pieces." | Your copy |
| Date | Empty | The day the drop opens, as YYYY-MM-DD, such as 2026-10-31 |
| Time | 18:00 | 24-hour time, such as 18:00 |
| Time zone | Store time zone | Or a UTC offset. Store time zone follows your store's daylight saving. With an offset, the moment under the text and the cards' "Opens" pills are both in that offset and name it, such as "Opens Fri 31 Oct, 6 pm UTC+11:00". |
| Show the date and time under the text | On | The moment written out, such as "Friday 31 October, 6 pm AEDT" |
| Collection | Empty | The drop's products |
| Products to show | 4 (2 to 8) | |
| Teaser photo 1, Teaser photo 2 | Empty | Two tall photos beside the countdown, the second set a little lower |
| Show the Notify me form | On | Signs the shopper up as a customer tagged `newsletter` and `drop-[collection handle]` |
| Form label, Button label, Note | "Get an email when it opens", "Notify me", "One email when the drop opens. Nothing else." | The form's words |
| Show the products as Coming soon until the drop opens | On | The Coming soon badge and pill on the grid's cards until the moment. Off shows them as normal cards. |
| When the drop opens | Show the live drop | Or **Hide the section** |
| Live heading, Live button label | "The drop is live", "Shop the drop" | The live state. The button opens the collection. |
| Background | Surface | Surface, Page or Panel |

**Without a valid date** the section shows nothing on your storefront; in the theme editor it shows a sample countdown seven days ahead, tagged **Sample**, so you can design it first. Without a collection there is no grid (the editor shows four placeholder cards marked Coming soon). After the moment, with **When the drop opens** set to Hide the section, it shows nothing. The presets ship the section with no date and every product as the collection, so on a fresh install it shows only in the theme editor, as the sample, and your storefront doesn't show it until you set a date. Set your own date, time and collection to put it live.

The countdown is always to one real moment, the same for every shopper, and works even on a page that was loaded hours earlier. It ticks once a second (once a minute for visitors who prefer reduced motion), has a pause button, and screen readers hear the moment written out rather than the ticking figures.

> **Gating is presentation only.** Coming soon hides the buttons on your Online Store, but a product that is published can still be added to the cart with a direct link, and stays for sale on any other sales channel it's published to. To keep a drop truly private until it opens, leave its products unpublished and publish them at the drop time. Unpublished products don't show in the grid either, so for a private drop let the heading, the teaser photos and the countdown do the talking.

## Notify me

The form signs the shopper up as a customer in **Customers**, with the tags `newsletter` and `drop-` plus the collection's handle (for the collection "The ballerina edit", `drop-the-ballerina-edit`; with no collection, the heading's handle). The shopper sees "You're on the list. We'll email you once, when the drop opens." The theme doesn't send that email: when the drop opens, send it yourself, for example with Shopify Email to customers with that tag. The note under the form promises one email, so keep to it.

## Drop dates on products

Give a product a **Drop at** date and time (`custom.drop_at`, chapter 7) to keep it Coming soon everywhere until then: on its product page, in quick view and on every card, in any collection or search. The Next drop section gates its own grid by its own date; when a product has both, the later one wins. Once the moment passes, the product sells as normal, with nothing to undo.

## Back in stock and low stock

* **Back in stock** badge: products with the tag set in **Theme settings › Product cards › Back in stock tag** (`restocked`) that can be bought. Remove the tag when the restock is no longer news.
* **"2 left"** pills: on a size whose stock Shopify tracks, set to stop selling at zero, with 1 to **Theme settings › Sizing and fit › Low stock at or under** (3) left. Screen readers hear "L, only 2 left". A product with one variant shows an "Only 2 left" badge on its card instead, and a product page without a size option shows the **Inventory** block's line (chapter 6). The numbers are always real stock; nothing is invented.
* **Notify me when it's back**: a sold-out size on the product page shows the **Back-in-stock request** block (chapter 6).