Options, Attributes and Sub-SKUs

Overview

• Although differentshopping cartsystems use different terms for Order Options, OrderAttributes, Variants, etc., generally we refer to them as Options or Product Options.
• Most shopping cart systems let you have “options” or “attributes” such as color, size, style, etc. for your products. Those options usually appear to your customers as drop-down lists from which they canselectthe options that they want. The shopping cart then reports what item was sold, and which options or attributes were selected.
• If you are using SEOM to track your inventory, and you sell clothing, it doesn’t help you to know that you sold a shirt unless you also know what size and color your customer ordered. Similarly, when it comes time to re-order your inventory, you need to know exactly which colors, sizes, etc. you have in stock and which need to be ordered.
• Some shopping carts allow you to create unique SKUs for products which have multiple attributes and can track inventory accurately at the attribute level. In this case, the SKU at the cart is the same SKU used in the Order Manager and there is no need to build sub-SKUs.
• However, if your shopping cart does not support this concept, you can have SEOM create unique SKUs when the product is imported through a web order or product import (if your cart supports this feature). We call the original SKU the parent SKU and the item-specific SKUs, sub-SKUs. For example, if your customer orders SKU 001 in green and medium, the sub-SKU might be “001-green-medium”. Or the options can be coded to result in shorter sub-SKUs, resulting in something like “001-gr-m”. The sub-SKU is reflected in the Stone Edge order and is very useful if your shopping cart supports real-time inventory synchronization with the Order Manager.
• Review the system parameters in the Order Options group.

How product options work and affect the creation of sub-SKUs

There are several parts to the ProductOptionpuzzle. It is important to understand these concepts, although some of them may not apply to your shopping cart.

Terminology and examples

Parent SKU: The main SKU or product that your customer sees in your Web store.

SKU Delimiter: Also known as “Web Delimiter”. When SEOM builds sub-SKUs, it can either use the entire option or a selected part of the option. (With some shopping carts, including Miva Merchant, AbleCommerce, and Americart, you can also use a separate code for each option to build your sub-SKUs.) If you just want to use the beginning part of the option in the sub-SKU, the SKU Delimiter is the text that separates the portion to be used in the sub-SKU from the rest of the option.

Example with option name and colon ( : ) for SKU delimiter: “Size=XL:Extra Large”. Only the letters “XL” is added to the parent SKU.

Example without option name and with “dash” for SKU delimiter: “CB005-Cotton Blend”. Only the “CB005” is added to the parent SKU.

Name Delimiter: For shopping carts that return the name of each option along with the selected option, the Name Delimiter is the text which appears between the name and the selected option. (“:” or “=” in the examples)

Examples:”Color:Blue” or “Size=Medium”

Option Delimiter: For Americart, and other shopping carts that combine the item name with its order options in a single field, this is the text that appears between the item name and the first option, and again between each additional option.

Example: if the shopping cart returns “ABC001 option:green option:small” the Option Delimiter would be “option:”.

Price Delimiter: If your order options include an amount that the options add to or subtract from the base price of the product, this is the text that separates the rest of the option from the price.

Examples: price delimiter is a dollar sign: “Size=XL:Extra Large; $5.00” or “Chrome Finish; $35.00”.

Sub SKU Delimiter: Also known as “Local Delimiter”. This is the text that the program inserts between the Parent SKU and the SKU portion of each Order Option.

Example: “ABC001-XL-BLK” (the sub SKU Delimiter is a “-“)

Option Lists and Option Values

Product attributes are categorized in Option Lists, and each Option List contains the specific Option Values. For example, you may define an Option List called Color, which contains the Option Values of Red, Blue and Green.

There are several ways to create Option Lists and Option Values in SEOM:

Manually, by individual product record through the Attributes and Options tab of the Inventory screen

1. 1. 1. During an order or product import when the cart provides option information in theirXML

Creating sub-SKUs

There are several ways to create sub-SKUs SEOM:

1. 1. 1. Manually, by selecting Build Sub-SKUs for Item from the accordion when viewing a product at the Attributes and Options tab of the Inventory screen

         1. This method requires either UseModStopInventoryTrk or UseVikingCodersInventoryMgr = TRUE
         2. This method does not check system parameter HonorUseForBuildOnOrderImportt
      2. In batch mode, through Main Menu>Settings>Inventory Functions>Build SubSKUs
      3. During an order or product import when the cart provides option information in their XML and system parameter BuildSubSKUs=TRUE
         1. If the imported XML does not contain web delimiter information (WebOptionCodeDelimiter with or without AddToSubSKUIfNoCodeDelilmiter), the program the sets the UseForBuild field in the OptionLists table to TRUE
         2. If system parameter HonorUseForBuildOnOrderImport = FALSE, all option lists are used to create unique subSKUs
         3. If system parameter HonorUseForBuildOnOrderImport  = TRUE, only those options which have UseForBuild set to TRUE are used to create sub-SKUs

The Sequence of Attributes when Sub-SKUs are Built by SEOM

The sequence of attributes when building sub-SKUs is dependent on the “Local Sort Order” of the Option Lists (Attributes) in SEOM’s product inventory record.

 

Many of the shopping carts we support do not maintain or provide sort order of the product attributes. Therefore, we adhere to the following rule set when building sub-SKUs:

 

1. The import system looks for the Parent SKU in the Inventory. If it is found AND it has a list of attributes, the system attempts to match the attributes by name. Should all attributes have a match, the build is then sorted based on the Order field in the OptionLists table (local sort order).
2. The import system looks for the Parent SKU in the Inventory. If it is found AND it has a list of attributes, the system attempts to match the attributes by name. Should any of the attributes NOT have a match, the build is then sorted alphabetically by attribute name.
3. The import system looks for the Parent SKU in the Inventory. If it is found AND it does NOT have a list of attributes, the build is then sorted alphabetically by attribute name.
4. The import system looks for the Parent SKU in the Inventory. If the parent SKU is NOT found then the order in which the attributes are provided in the incoming data is honored.