Buying on the marketplace.

Overview

The {{COMPANY_SHORT_NAME}} marketplace lives at shop.peptideclients.com. It's a directory of independent vendors selling research peptides and adjacent compounds; you browse vendor storefronts, add items to a cart, place an order, and the vendor reaches out to arrange payment and ship. {{COMPANY_SHORT_NAME}} the platform never custodies funds — we're the connective tissue, not the merchant of record.

You don't need an account to browse. You do need an account (free, takes 30 seconds) to add items to a cart, place an order, message a vendor, or follow a storefront.

What working correctly looks like

If everything is wired up, you should see all of these. If any one is missing, jump to Troubleshooting.

• The marketplace home at shop.peptideclients.com/ loads without a sign-in wall and shows featured vendors + a browse grid.
• Each vendor's profile page (e.g. /@vendor-slug) renders their logo, bio, payment methods, and product grid.
• Adding a product to the cart updates the cart icon badge with the running line count.
• The cart icon shows only your own carts — if you're also a vendor team member, inbound buyer carts are not counted.
• Checkout step 3 displays the research-use-only attestation the first time you check out with a given vendor.
• The submitted order lands in Orders with the vendor's reference number; the vendor receives an email and contacts you to arrange payment.

Setup — sign up or browse anonymously

The browsable surface is open. Discovery routes (/, /shops, /browse, /@<vendor>, /@<vendor>/<product>) work without a session. Action routes (/cart, /checkout, /inbox, /orders, follow, message) require an account.

1. Visit shop.peptideclients.com.
2. Browse without signing in. Click Sign in in the top nav when you're ready to act (add to cart, message, follow).
3. If you don't have an account yet, click Sign up. We support email + password and OAuth.
4. After sign-in you're returned to the page you came from (the sign-in form honors a ?next= param).

You can also check out as a guest in some vendor flows — vendors who allow guest checkout will let you skip account creation; you'll just need to give an email so the vendor can reach you.

Browsing

Three discovery paths:

• By vendor — the Shops tab (/shops) lists every active marketplace vendor. Click into a vendor profile (/@vendor-slug) for their full catalog, bio, COA links, and contact info.
• By category — the Browse tab (/browse) is the full catalog filtered by form (vial lyophilized, vial solution, tablet, capsule, etc.), product type (peptide, hormone, ancillary, SARM, etc.), and other facets.
• Search — the type-ahead search input filters live as you type, matching across product name, slug, and SKU. Vendor profile pages also have a per-vendor search input above the product grid.

Each product detail page shows the vendor, form, dose, concentration (where applicable), pack size, price, listing-quality signals, RUO classification, and links to the COA when the vendor has uploaded one. Vials marked vial_lyophilized render a reconstitution calculator below the gallery.

Cart mechanics

The cart model is per-vendor. You can have an open cart with vendor A and a separate open cart with vendor B at the same time, but you can't check out from both vendors in one order — each vendor invoices and ships separately, so each gets its own PO.

• Cart hub (/cart) lists one card per vendor with open lines. Empty carts are hidden.
• Per-vendor cart (/cart/<vendor-slug>) shows the line items for that one vendor with a qty stepper and remove control.
• Snapshot pricing — the line's unit price is snapshotted at add-time. If the vendor later changes the published price, your cart line stays at the price you saw when you added it.
• One open cart per (buyer, vendor) pair — if you add the same product twice, we increment the existing line instead of duplicating.

Checkout

Checkout is a 3-step flow at /checkout/<vendor-slug>:

1. Step 1 — Review. Lists every line in your cart for this vendor with subtotal. You can adjust quantities or remove items here; the cart stays mutable until you submit.
2. Step 2 — Ship to. Lists every address from your address book (/addresses) with a radio selector. Click Add a new address for an inline form that saves to your address book and selects the new row. The default address is the most-recently-used one.
3. Step 3 — Confirm. Shows the RUO attestation if it's your first checkout with this vendor (or if the cart contains a product flagged for re-attestation). Tick the box and click Submit order.

Submitting materializes a purchase order in status='submitted' with a per-vendor PO code (e.g. PO-0042). The cart flips to status='submitted' and stops appearing in your cart hub.

Research-use-only attestation

Peptides on the marketplace are sold for research use only. Before you can complete checkout with a vendor for the first time, you must affirmatively click “I am purchasing for research purposes only.”

The attestation row is stored per (buyer, vendor, attestation_version) with timestamp and a one-way hash of your IP. After you've attested once with a vendor, future checkouts skip the step — unless:

• The vendor revises the attestation text (bumps the version). Then everyone re-attests once.
• The cart contains a product flagged requires_research_use_reattestation (a vendor can flip this on for higher-sensitivity SKUs).

Payment

{{COMPANY_SHORT_NAME}} the platform does not collect payment. There is no card form on checkout, no Stripe redirect, no funds escrowed. After you submit, the confirmation banner reads “Vendor will contact you to arrange payment”; the vendor reaches out within the SLA they advertise on their storefront (usually under 24 hours).

Vendors typically settle out-of-band via the payment methods listed on their profile page. Common methods you'll see:

• Crypto — USDT (TRC-20, ERC-20, BEP-20), BTC, ETH, XMR. Vendors post the address; you send.
• Wallets — PayPal, Alipay, WeChat Pay, Zelle, CashApp, Venmo, Revolut, Wise.
• Bank transfer — usually for larger orders.

Order confirmation

Once your order is submitted:

• You receive a confirmation email with the PO code and the vendor's contact info.
• The vendor receives a po_submitted email in their inbox. They typically respond with payment instructions within 24 hours.
• The order shows up in your Orders tab (/orders) with status submitted. You can message the vendor from the order detail page if you have questions.

Tracking

Once your order ships, the vendor attaches a tracking number from their carrier (USPS, FedEx, UPS, DHL, Royal Mail, etc.). The number renders on your order detail page as a clickable link to the carrier's tracking site, alongside a carrier name and ship-mode badge (e.g. “USPS Priority”).

Carrier status updates (in transit / out for delivery / delivered) flow into your order page via the carrier's tracking API. When the carrier reports delivered, you get an order_delivered email and the order's status flips to delivered. The full shipping flow lives in the Shipping guide.

Returns & refunds

Each vendor sets their own returns policy (accepted or not, return window in days). The vendor's policy renders on their storefront and again on the order detail page.

• If the vendor accepts returns and your shipment is marked delivered, you'll see a Request a return CTA on the order detail page.
• Click it to open the RMA flow: pick the line items + quantities, supply a reason, and submit.
• The vendor reviews and either approves (with return-shipping instructions) or rejects (with a reason).
• After the vendor receives the return, they record the refund amount + method on the RMA. Because the platform doesn't custody funds, the refund itself happens vendor-to-buyer out-of-band on the same payment rail.

If the vendor doesn't accept returns or the window has passed, the CTA is hidden. Contact the vendor directly from the order detail page if you need to escalate.

Privacy & data

Account data, addresses, cart, order history, and attestation records are stored under the {{COMPANY_SHORT_NAME}} workspace tied to your email. Vendors see only what they need to fulfill your order — your shipping address, the line items, and your contact info. They do not see your other vendors' orders, your addresses with other vendors, or your platform-wide activity.

To export or delete your data, see the privacy policy and the data deletion page.

Settings & permissions

• Account — Account → Settings on shop.peptideclients.com.
• Address book — Account → Addresses (/addresses). Edit, archive, mark default.
• Following — Account → Following (/following). Notifications fire when followed vendors post new products or run sales.
• Inbox — Account → Inbox (/inbox). One thread per vendor per conversation.
• Orders — Account → Orders (/orders). PO and order history with status and tracking.

Troubleshooting

The full symptom-to-fix table lives at Troubleshooting. Quick links:

• “Vendor is not yet approved to accept orders” — the vendor's storefront is still in draft / pending_claim / suspended state. Wait, or pick a different vendor.
• Cart icon shows a count for a cart that isn't yours — not possible anymore (fix shipped 2026-05-20). If you see one, contact {{CONTACT_EMAIL}}.
• Checkout step 3 won't let me submit — the RUO attestation checkbox is unticked. Tick it.
• Order placed but vendor never reached out — check spam folder, then message the vendor from the order detail page.
• Tracking link is blank — the vendor hasn't attached one yet. The order status will stay submitted or processing until they do.

Related

• Vendor storefront — the seller-side counterpart (how vendors run the storefronts you're buying from).
• Shipping — the full carrier / tracking flow.
• Orders — how the order lifecycle works across the platform.
• Research use only — the full RUO disclosure.
• Privacy policy and data deletion.