Managing products in the Shopify Collective app

After you connect with a supplier, you can import supplier products to your store.

If you want to automate your product import and product details synchronization, then consider using Shopify Collective product policies. For example, you might want to sync more product details continuously, such as get the latest product images from the supplier.

You can also manually import supplier products, edit product details, and publish products to your online store. You can also view supplier product pricing details and shipping costs.

Some suppliers might create public price lists, from which you can instantly import products to your store, without having to connect with or be approved by the supplier.

Considerations for importing and managing products in Shopify Collective

Before you import or manage products in Shopify Collective, review the following considerations.

Imported product details and discounts

• Collections, tags, metafields, and discount codes aren't imported from a supplier's store to your store.
• You have the option to apply discount codes, such as a 20% welcome offer, to products that you import from your suppliers. This affects your profit margins, but the amount paid to the supplier remains unchanged. To prevent Collective products from being included in discount codes, you can use third-party discounting apps that offer exclusion features.

Variants, inventory, and SKUs

• You can have up to 100 product variants. If a product exceeds this variant limit, then product inventory and pricing information might not be synchronized.
• Inventory quantities for imported Collective products are managed by the supplier and are read-only in your store admin.
• You can't edit product variants and you can't choose which product variants to publish.
• POS inventory levels aren't synced from a supplier's store to your store. Only online inventory levels display in your store as available quantity to sell.
• A Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) is required for all products that are sold through Shopify Collective. You can edit a product's SKU at any time. The following scenarios can apply:
  • If a supplier's product already has a SKU, then the supplier's SKU is added to your store when you import the product.
  • If a supplier's product doesn't have a SKU, then a SKU is automatically created on your store with a number generated by Shopify Collective.

Product duplication, pricing, and taxes

• You can't duplicate imported Shopify Collective products. If you duplicate a product, then you break the product connection with your supplier.
• Product prices that display in your Shopify Collective app will include tax if the supplier set up their store to include tax in product prices, or product prices will exclude tax if the supplier doesn't include tax. Learn more about sales tax that a supplier might collect from you.

Uninstalling Shopify Collective

• If you uninstall the Shopify Collective app, then all your supplier connections are removed, and any products that you imported with Collective have their inventory set to 0 and they're disconnected from Collective. The products remain in your store, but if you reinstall the Shopify Collective app at a later date, then you need to import the products again with Collective.

Product pricing details

Review the following table to learn more about product pricing details in Shopify Collective.

Your customers can use discount codes for products that are imported using Shopify Collective, but the cost price that you pay to suppliers for each sale of a product doesn't change.

For example, you import a product from a supplier with a retail price of $100 USD and a cost price of $70 USD. If your customer uses a discount code of $20 USD, then you still need to pay your supplier $70 USD and your profit is only $10 USD, instead of $30 USD without the customer discount.

Import products to your store

You can import supplier products to your store.

If you want to automate Shopify Collective product imports, then consider using product policies.

After you import products to your store, they're moved from the Available tab to the Imported tab in your supplier product lists.

Steps:

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Apps > Collective.

2. Click Suppliers.

3. Click a supplier that you want to import products from.

4. From the Available tab, click the individual products that you want to import to your store, or select all the supplier's available products.

5. Click Import products.

Edit product details

You can change the following product details:

• Product price
• Product title
• Description
• Media

For product pricing, you can increase or decrease a supplier's retail price when you sell products on your own store.

Retail price syncing is turned off by default, meaning that you can adjust a supplier's product retail price on your own store. You can choose to activate automatic retail price syncing with product policies so that you always have the supplier's product retail price on your store. If you have syncing turned on and you change a product's retail price in your store, then the price isn't reverted to the supplier's retail price and updates only when the supplier updates it themselves.

If a supplier's product retail price doesn't fit your product pricing strategy, and you want to increase or decrease the retail price, then consider contacting the supplier first to discuss product pricing. You should ensure retail price syncing is off before you edit the retail price.

There are some details that you shouldn't edit on products that you import and sell using Shopify Collective. Any changes that you make to the following product details are overridden when the supplier updates their original product:

• Inventory tracked
• Shipping – ensure that the Physical product setting is activated
• Variants – you can't change, reorder, or add to the variant options

Steps:

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Products.

2. Click the name of the product that you want to change.

3. Edit the product price, product title, description, or media.

4. Click Save.

Making products available in your store

To ensure that your imported products can be purchased by your customers, you need to confirm the following details:

• The product is set to Active status
• The product is published to your sales channels

You can edit a default product policy or custom product policy and set all supplier products for that policy to be imported automatically as Active.

Review the publishing status of imported products

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Apps > Collective.

2. Click Suppliers.

3. Click the name of the supplier that you want to review products for.

4. In the Products section of the supplier details page, click Imported.

5. In the Status column, review the product status.

6. In the Channels column, view the following details:

   • If a number greater than 0 is displayed, click the number to view the sales channels that the product is published to.
   • If 0 is displayed, then the product is in Draft status, and you need to set it to Active so that the product can be purchased.
   • If Unpublished is displayed, click the arrow, and then click View unpublished products. If you want to make the product available for your customers to buy, then publish the product to your sales channels.

Set an imported product's status to Active

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Products.

2. Click the product that you want to set to Active status.

3. In the Status section, click the drop-down menu, and then select Active.

4. Click Save.

Publish an imported product to your sales channels

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Products.

2. Click the product that you want to publish to your sales channels.

3. In the Publishing section, click the icon.

4. Activate the sales channels that you want to publish the product to, or click Publish to all.

5. Click Done.

6. Click Save.

Delete products from your store

You can delete supplier products from your store. After you delete products from your store, they're moved from the Imported tab to the Available tab.

Steps:

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Apps > Collective.

2. Click Suppliers.

3. Click a supplier that you want to delete products from.

4. Go to the Imported tab, and then select the products that you want to delete from your store.

5. Click Delete products, and then click Delete.

Troubleshooting inventory sync issues

If product inventory isn't syncing correctly between you and your supplier, then review the following troubleshooting steps.