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Catalog
Catalog

Central point to manage vendors, costs, warehouse lead times, listings, bundles, components, forecast settings, alerts, and more.

Monica avatar
Written by Monica
Updated over a year ago

The Catalog is the part of Inventory Planner that holds information about vendors, variants, bundles, assemblies, listings and warehouses. You can use the catalog to view and update that data.

The catalog is split into the following sections:

  • Vendors

  • Variants

    • Forecast Settings

    • Vendor Attributes

    • Listings

    • Warehouses

    • Bundles

    • Assemblies

Learn more about each section below.

Vendors

Vendors are third parties from whom you source your products. When ordering new stock, you will create purchase orders which you send to your vendors to fulfill.

Keeping your vendor records up to date is a key step for generating purchase orders in Inventory Planner, generating reports and accurate replenishment recommendations.

Where possible, Inventory Planner downloads vendor information from your connected system. For a full list of integrations and details that are pulled from every system, see our Integrations page.

You can use the vendors section in the catalog to create new vendors and edit details related to existing vendors.

Learn more about vendors here.

Vendor attributes

Vendor attributes are information associated with a variant that relate to a specific vendor - for example, the cost price of that variant if bought from the vendor.

You can use the catalog to manage and maintain your vendor attributes for each product.

Learn more about vendor attributes here.

Importing vendor data

You can use the import functionality to update vendor settings in bulk. View instructions in the Importing data into Inventory Planner article, or use the following articles to view step-by-step instructions based on what you want to update specifically:

Listings

Listings are instances where your variants are sold on different platforms. They can be viewed in the listings section of the catalog, where you can also adjust listing-level details such as sizes/volumes (CBM) and weights.

You may encounter a situation where one variant in Inventory Planner has multiple listings:

  • Same variant across multiple platforms: If you are connecting multiple stores to Inventory Planner, you can use the combined warehouses feature to aggregate the sales and stock information from multiple locations into one view for forecasting purposes. The same listing from each store must be linked together to display as one variant in the combined warehouse view.

  • Multiple versions of the same variant: If you sell the same variant in two different ways, you may need to link these listings together to display as a single variant. For example, if you sell using Amazon FBA you may have one listing for Amazon Prime members and a separate listing for regular Amazon customers. Both listings are related to the same variant.

Note: If you have multiple variants in Inventory Planner whose sales and stock history needs to be combined, use the "combine sales/stock" functionality instead. Such variants may include transitional items (where a new variant is replacing an old variant) and brand new items that otherwise have no sales history to reference for forecasting.

Inventory Planner attempts to link listings automatically based on matching product information (e.g. matching by barcode, ASIN, or SKU). If linked listings weren't automatically detected, please contact the Inventory Planner support team with details of a straightforward rule that can be applied to link them together.

If there is no straightforward rule to link listings together (or if you prefer to track listings manually), you can enable "Manual" mode to add additional listings.

Note: Enabling manual linking for a variant disables the automatic detection of linked listings going forwards. You can switch back to "auto" any time.

Visit the Listings article for detailed instructions related to configuring manual listings.

Importing listings data

You can use the import functionality to update listings data in bulk. View instructions in the Importing data into Inventory Planner article, or use the following articles to view step-by-step instructions based on what you want to update specifically:

Warehouses

Connections and warehouses should be configured in your settings under Account > Settings > Connections and Warehouses. Visit our setup and configuration guide for instructions related to connecting to your platform, configuring warehouses, account and forecast settings, billing, users, and purchase orders.

Within the catalog, the warehouses page is designed to configure warehouse-related information for variants, bundles and assemblies such as replenishment planning settings (e.g. lead times, days of stock), min/max stock, and alerts.

Importing warehouse data

You can use the import functionality to update warehouse data in bulk. View instructions in the Importing data into Inventory Planner article, or use the following article to view step-by-step instructions based on what you want to update specifically:

Forecast settings

The forecast settings section within the catalog allows you to configure and manage forecast methods and settings for individual variants.

Inventory Planner pulls product, sales, and stock information from other eCommerce and inventory management systems to provide forecasted needs and replenishment recommendations at the variant (SKU) level. Forecast settings can be customized by variant, or the same settings can be used for all variants using the default settings.

Default forecast settings can be configured in your settings by going to Account > Settings > Forecast.

To customize forecast settings for a specific variant, go to Catalog > Forecast settings and check the "custom forecast settings" checkbox next to any items.

These settings can also be adjusted throughout Inventory Planner by clicking the details icon next to any item then going to the Forecast settings tab, or in bulk by going to Replenishment, selecting multiple products, then clicking Bulk actions > Set forecast settings.

Importing forecast data

You can use the import functionality to update forecast data in bulk. View instructions in the Importing data into Inventory Planner article, or use the following article to view step-by-step instructions based on what you want to update specifically:

Bundles

A bundle is a product made up of other products (components) - for example, a first-aid kit. The stock of a bundle is directly related to the stock of its components. Goods are grouped together after a sale is made.

Forecasting for a bundle therefore requires ensuring enough components are ordered to meet the needs of the components' individual sales (if applicable) as well as the sales of its associated bundles.

The catalog is used to view and manage your bundles and their component products, as well as convert existing variants to bundles.

Learn more about bundles here.

Importing bundle data

You can use the import functionality to update bundle data in bulk. View instructions in the Importing data into Inventory Planner article, or use the following article to view step-by-step instructions based on what you want to update specifically:

Assemblies

Like bundles, assemblies are products made up of other products (components). However, assemblies are produced before being sold. Therefore the stock of an assembly is independent of the stock of its components.

Forecasting for an assembly requires enough components are ordered to meet the demand of the assembly's sales.

The catalog is used to view and manage your assemblies, as well as convert existing variants into assemblies.

Learn more about assemblies here.

Importing assembly data

You can use the import functionality to update assembly data in bulk. View instructions in the Importing data into Inventory Planner article, or use the following article to view step-by-step instructions based on what you want to update specifically:

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