Variants

Master and variants: who holds what

In cocoPIM, a product with variants is organized on two levels:

• the master product holds everything they have in common: the description, the brand, the material, the lifestyle photos… as well as the categorization per channel (variants always take the master’s categories, with no override possible);
• each variant holds what sets it apart: its size, its color, its own SKU, its own barcode, possibly its own specific photo.

Variants are built on 1 or 2 axes at most. An axis = a select attribute that varies: size alone (1 axis), or size × color (2 axes). Two axes cover the vast majority of a small business’s needs; beyond that, your catalog would lose readability.

Inheritance: fix once, propagate everywhere

The great benefit of the system: variants inherit the master’s values. Fix the description on the master, and all 12 variants get it. A variant can however override an inherited value when it needs to be different (a specific photo for the red color, for example): the variant’s own value then takes precedence.

In practice: creating variants of a product

1. 1

   Prepare the axes

   Check that your family contains the select attributes that will serve as axes (e.g. “Size”, “Colour”) with their option lists.

2. 2

   Create the master product

   Create the product as in the previous module, choosing the “With variants” type: the creation then asks for its axes (1 or 2). Choose them carefully, they can no longer be changed once the product is created.

3. 3

   Generate the variants

   Select the combinations to create (S/M/L × Red/Blue…): cocoPIM generates the variants and suggests their SKUs automatically, based on the master’s.

4. 4

   Adjust in the matrix

   The variant matrix shows all the combinations in a table: ideal for checking at a glance what exists and for completing the values specific to each variant.

Completeness: the master reflects its variants

The completeness of a product with variants is not calculated like that of a standard product:

• each variant has its own completeness, calculated on its effective values (those inherited from the master as well as those it overrides), exactly like any other product;
• the master product has no completeness of its own: the percentage shown (in the product list as well as in the banner of its page, overall, per channel and per language) is the average of its variants’ completeness. A master with three variants completed at 100%, 80% and 60% therefore shows 80%.

In practice: to raise a master’s completeness, you complete its variants. A master with no generated variant yet shows no percentage (a dash in place of the value).