The strikethrough price remains the single most powerful promotional lever in e-commerce: a well-executed strikethrough can double conversion on a product page. But since the EU Omnibus directive (enforced in France since May 2022), the rules have tightened. A wrongly computed strikethrough exposes you to heavy fines — and, more importantly, to lasting trust damage.
This guide covers the rules as they stand in 2026, the most common mistakes, and the method to keep a compliant catalog without spending weeks on it — on Shopify and PrestaShop alike.
What the law says in 2026
Three texts govern strikethrough pricing in the EU:
- Omnibus Directive (EU 2019/2161) — enforced since May 28, 2022. The reference price must be the lowest price applied over the 30 days before the promo announcement.
- French decree of March 11, 2015 — requires the reference price (the strikethrough) to be displayed next to the promotional price.
- French Consumer Code, article L121-2 — penalizes deceptive commercial practices, including fake strikethroughs, with fines up to 300,000 EUR per company.
The 3 most common strikethrough mistakes
Using MSRP instead of actual price
Forgetting to remove the strikethrough after the promo
Flash promo without refreshing the Google Shopping feed
How to build a compliant strikethrough, step by step
- Identify the 30-day low. Price history is available in Shopify (since 2023) and via PrestaShop export. Seegea keeps 365 days of per-product price history.
- Decide the new promo price. Minimum margin, target volume, range strategy. The discount must be real: a 3% strikethrough has no conversion impact and weakens brand perception.
- Set compare_at_price (Shopify) or specific price (PrestaShop). Manually: 15 to 30 seconds per listing. On 500 listings, that's 2 to 4 hours of typing.
- Define start and end dates. Shopify has no native end date — you need a third-party app or manual action. PrestaShop supports dates.
- Refresh outbound feeds (Google Shopping, Meta, marketplaces) to prevent site-vs-feed price mismatches.
- Schedule the return to full price. Without automation, forgets are common — especially after a Black Friday with 300 active promos.
Seegea handles compare_at_price on these CMS
What Seegea changes about strikethrough pricing
Seegea is a catalog editing layer that connects to Shopify via OAuth or to PrestaShop via API key. No data migration, no duplicates: your CMS stays the source of truth, Seegea adds a tabular interface built for speed.
Inline tabular editing
One-click AI descriptions
Full rollback
Comparison: native Shopify vs Seegea for strikethrough pricing
| Criterion | Native Shopify | Seegea |
|---|---|---|
| Editing 500 compare_at_price | 2 to 4 hours | 3 minutes |
| Price history | 90 days (since 2023) | 365 days |
| Promo end date | Not native | Yes, auto-revert at D+1 |
| Rollback after mistake | Manual, listing by listing | Ctrl+Z, full bulk edit |
| Omnibus compliance | Up to you to check | Alert on suspicious prices |
| AI promo description | No | One click per listing |
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Strikethrough and strategy: do not fall into the fake-deal trap
A massive strikethrough (—70%) pulls attention, but damages brand quality perception. DNVB brands that held best through 2024-2025 are the ones that reduced the number of promotions while increasing their quality: real discounts (—20% to —40%), short windows, targeted products, clear communication.
Conversely, brands keeping permanent strikethroughs on 100% of their catalog lose twice: average conversion because the strikethrough becomes wallpaper, and margin wasted. Strikethroughs are a tactical tool, not window dressing.
Automating strikethroughs without losing control
Automation is rightly feared: a misconfigured bulk edit can break 2,000 prices at once. That's where Seegea's rollback matters: each bulk operation is versioned, visible in history, and reversible in one click. A marketing team can move fast, knowing a rollback remains available for days after.
Case study: Black Friday on 3,500 SKUs
A Seegea customer in cosmetics prepared Black Friday 2025 on 3,500 SKUs in 4 steps:
- Export of the last 30 days of prices (one click)
- Apply a —25% discount on the selection (30 seconds)
- Schedule the revert to full price on December 2 at 00:00
- Refresh the Google Shopping feed hourly
Total prep time: 45 minutes. Previously (via the Shopify backoffice), this took 2 full days with two people. And the revert happened automatically — zero risk of forgetting.
Strikethroughs on variants: the tricky case
Variants (size, color) complicate editing. In Shopify, every variant has its own compare_at_price — you either edit variant by variant or export CSVs. Seegea supports parent-to-variant propagation: edit the parent, all variants inherit, with configurable exceptions.
Conclusion: the law is simple, compliance on 2,000 SKUs is not
Rules are clear. The difficulty is not legal — it is operational. Maintaining 2,000 compliant compare_at_price values, evolving them for each promo, cancelling them on time, refreshing feeds — that's the repetitive work that weighs on a marketing team. Seegea was built for that exact job: made in France between Annecy and Chantilly, by and for merchants who wanted to stop spending nights on these topics.