Merch has always been part of how campaigns raise money and build supporter identity. A hat, a tote, a t-shirt; every purchase is a signal that someone believes in what you’re doing. But until now, that money lived somewhere ActBlue customers couldn’t see it: in a separate processor, disconnected from your donor record, invisible to your compliance reporting.
Today, that changes.
We’re excited to announce BigCommerce Checkout, a new integration that embeds ActBlue’s payment processing directly into BigCommerce-powered merch stores. Every merch sale now flows into your ActBlue Dashboard as a tracked contribution, with full donor data, automatic compliance reporting, and none of the manual reconciliation.
The problem with merch (until now)
If you’ve sold merch before, you know the drill: one platform for donations, a completely different one for merch payments, and hours spent trying to stitch the two together for compliance reporting. Every merch buyer is a supporter, but your systems couldn’t tell you that.
One platform, one picture
With BigCommerce Checkout, that gap closes. Donors see ActBlue’s payment form at checkout, receive an ActBlue contribution receipt, and show up in your Dashboard exactly like any other contributor. Same compliance infrastructure — employer collection, contribution limits, reporting — that you already rely on. No new system to learn, no new processor to manage.
ActBlue does not sell contact information to anyone. Ever.
Built by an expert partner
Setting up a merch store isn’t something you have to figure out alone. We’ve partnered with Bright Blue Ink (BBI), the merch vendor behind the majority of the democratic merch market, to handle store design, production, and fulfillment from end to end. BBI runs the onboarding (typically a 10 to 60 minute session) and ActBlue handles the payment. You get a full-service merch operation without adding another vendor to vet or another platform to learn.
Battle-tested at the presidential level
$40 million. That’s what flowed through a predecessor version of this integration in 2024. Since February 2026, BigCommerce Checkout has been live in beta, generating real transaction volume with zero support escalations to ActBlue engineering along the way.
How it works
- Partner with BBI. If you’re not already a BBI client, we’ll connect you. BBI designs, produces, and hosts your store on BigCommerce.
- Complete onboarding. BBI walks you through connecting your ActBlue Dashboard to your BigCommerce store; you’ll need your Dashboard’s Integrations role enabled and your BigCommerce store hash.
- Go live. Once installed, the ActBlue payment form appears at checkout. Merch purchases start flowing into your Dashboard as tracked contributions immediately.
Get started
Whether you already run a store through BBI or you’re exploring merch for the first time, BigCommerce Checkout means your merch revenue finally lives where your donation data does: in one Dashboard, with one complete picture of your fundraising.
Get started with Bright Blue Ink.
Have questions? Reach out to BBI’s support team — they’re ready to help you get your store live.
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