Product SKU codes

Stock Keeping Units (SKUs) are reference codes/numbers that uniquely identify each Product and Variant.

Businesses usually implement their own internal SKU referencing system to efficiently identify and track product inventory. But, they don't have to be for internal use only. Many store owners, particularly those selling business-to-business, publish SKUs publicly to aid communication with customers. 

Because Evance automatically assigns a sequential Quickfind code, SKUs are optional in Evance. However, we still recommend implementing your own SKU referencing system.

SKU format

You're free to use any format, but we recommend limiting SKUs to uppercase letters (A-Z), numbers ( 0-9), with dashes (-) as separators for legibility. We hope the following guidelines help you implement an effective and efficient SKU system:

• Use uppercase letters.
• Avoid mixing numbers with letters where the number looks similar to a letter. For example, in some fonts 0 and 1look similar to O and I. Instead, using a dash to separate letter and number sequences reduces confusion.
• Avoid special characters, slashes and spaces. These can cause problems when searching for Products by SKU in Evance, or in other applications (e.g. spreadsheets). 
• Keep SKUs as short as possible, whilst implementing a pattern that's simple, easy to remember and understandable. 
• Number-only SKUs (e.g. 123) may conflict with Evance's Quickfind code system resulting in search mismatches. However, numerically separated codes (e.g. 40-200-01) will not.

Example SKU formats

The formatting of your SKUs may depend on the products you sell and your business model. Here are some common format strategies:

• [manufacturer]-[range]-[model]-[variant]
  Let's assume you can represent all manufacturers as a three-letter code (e.g. SAM representing Samsung), 
  with a three-letter product range (e.g. GAL representing Galaxy), followed by a model (e.g. S21) and a variant (e.g. 128PV representing the 128GB in the Phantom Violet colour). Resulting in a SKU of SAM-GAL-S21-128PV.
• [range]-[season]-[type]-[colour]-[size]
  Where an SKU of ONY-2022Q2-TSH-BLCK-32R may indicate a Range called Onyx, a season of Summer 2022 in Black with a size of 32 Regular.
• An apparel store could break their products down by an internal brand reference number, department where M, W, K, U represents Men, Women, Kids and Unisex respectively a model code and a size variant. For example, 40-M-432-XS.

Try experimenting with your own Products to hone in on a pattern that suits your business.

Uniqueness

SKU codes should be unique across all products and variants in your store. Evance will validate your SKUs for uniqueness when adding new products and variants.

Should you use supplier SKUs?

Using your supplier's product codes may suit some businesses initially. As your list of suppliers grows you will find that your SKUs lack consistency causing confusion in the long-term. Hence, we recommend implementing your own SKU system to iron out short-comings in your referencing sooner than later.

SKU in search

By default, Evance's search engine supports Product lookup by both Quickfind and SKU. Simply type an SKU into your site search to return the relevant Product.