You can choose "Inventory Pools" as the inventory mode when enabling the Inventory Management functionality on Cloud. Once enabled, first set up the initial inventory of pool-tracked items, then add more products as pool-tracked to the inventory.
You can also set up the initial inventory of pool-tracked items in the Inventory Asset Management (IAM) mode.
If you want to know more about the Inventory Pools and IAM mode, check out this article.
Inventory Pools mode
In the Inventory Pools mode, you can set up the initial inventory of pool-tracked items by specifying the items you want to be pool-tracked in a CSV file downloaded with all the products in your catalog.
Here are a few things to know about the process to specify pool-tracked items:
If you are only specifying the pool-tracked items for products already in the catalog, you need to specify a value in the "Quantity on Hand" column.
If you are adding new products to the catalog and specifying them as pool-tracked items, add new rows with the brand, model, and a value in the "Quantity on Hand" column. If the brand doesn't exist, you can create one during the upload or map the products to an existing brand.
To set up the initial inventory of pool-tracked items:
1/ Go to "Inventory" in the left navigation menu.
2/ Click "Import" in the top-right corner of the inventory items table.
3/ In the modal, read the "Import File Guidelines" that specify:
The maximum number of rows supported for import in a single CSV file: 5000
Mandatory column to fill in the CSV file: Quantity on Hand
Recommended columns to fill in the CSV file: Minimum Stock Level, Reorder Level, and UPC, EAN, or ITF
4/ Click "Download my products to a CSV file" to download all products in the catalog to a CSV file named "Products.csv."
5/ In the downloaded Products.csv file, specify the initial on-hand quantity for the products you want to be pool-tracked in the “Quantity on Hand” column.
If you have more than 5000 products, split the file into multiple CSV files, each containing no more than 5000 products.
You don't have to specify the on-hand quantity for all products. You can leave the Quantity on Hand column blank if you don't want the product to be treated as a pool-tracked item.
6/ Once the Products.csv file is ready, import the file from the box in the left in the modal.
7/ Click "Next" multiple times, and you will see the following tabs:
Map Headers
If you have not changed the columns in the CSV file, you don't need to do anything.
If you are specifying items as pool-tracked for a single brand, you can select or add a new brand.
If you are adding new products for a brand where the products and the brand don't exist in the catalog, you can create a brand or map to an existing brand from the "Select brand for file" dropdown.
Map Brands
If you want to map brands in the CSV file to the brands in the Cloud catalog, you can do so here.
If you adding new products and you have not mapped or created a brand in the Map Headers tab, you can accept Cloud suggestions to map it to a brand in the catalog.
Map Categories
If you want to map the categories in the CSV file to the categories in the Cloud catalog, you can do so here.
8/ In the "Review" tab in the modal, you can review the details you want to update via the CSV file. You can see products by the following criteria from the "View by" dropdown.
All products: The number of data rows in the CSV file.
New products: The number of products in the CSV file that don't exist in the catalog, if the model of the product in the CSV file don't match with any product in the catalog, or if the category of the product is not defined in the CSV file.
Matched products: The number of products in the CSV file that are an exact match with those in the catalog.
Suggested products: The number of the products in the CSV file that Cloud suggested as match to the ones in the catalog.
Invalid products: The number of products/pool-tracked items that the Upload process cannot successfully update due to data errors such as missing brand,
9/ Once you have fixed the errors for invalid products, click "Import X of X rows."
The products for which you have specified the on-hand quantity appear on the Inventory page.
To add more pool-tracked items in the future, initiate the "Import" workflow again and import the "Products.csv" file with the on-hand quantities specified for products that are not yet pool-tracked under inventory.
Another way to set up the initial inventory of pool-tracked items and add more pool-tracked items in the Inventory Pools mode, is to mark the items as inventory-tracked in the catalog.
Check out this article for more details.
Inventory Asset Management (IAM) mode
If you enabled the IAM mode when enabling Inventory Management or switched the mode to IAM, you do the following:
#1 Mark products in the catalog as "inventory-tracked" and select "Pool tracking" as the mode
You can set up the initial inventory of pool-tracked items and even add new pool-tracked items.
#2 Switch the mode of asset-tracked items to Inventory Pools
You can switch the mode of items that come don't come with serial numbers and don't require asset-level tracking to Inventory Pools. For example, remotes, TV wall mounts, and speaker stands.
The new products have been added to the inventory of pool-tracked items, and the ones whose mode was switched to Inventory Pools appear on the Inventory page with a "Pools Tracked" label next to them.
