I feel really dumb right now and would love some inspiration. I'm trying to come up with an SKU scheme for my business. Honestly, I'm drawing a complete blank beyond what they are (soap, lotion, bath bombs, etc), their scent (which I may only use once) and... whatever the heck else do I add? Should I add? What's useful to know? It's not like I have warehouses or several locations or anything.
all the online "how to create skus" articles say to pick 3-4 specific attributes that apply to your items. Which is easy if you have clothing or something for example (S for sweater, B for black, M for medium and then a location number) but it's not so easy for soap when things change all the time.
For example... this month, my lavender and chamomile soap is white, purple, and pink with an in the pot swirl. That doesn't mean my next bath will be designed the same way or with the same colors. I also did one with the same fragrance that was plain purple with lavender buds on top. And other designs.
And I may even stop using lavender chamomile entirely since it doesn't seem to be selling nearly as well as it used to. And the online things say never to use the same thing twice... so if I use lavender chamomile this time but what if I change it to vanilla lavender? Or what if I have both lavender chamomile and vanilla lavender at the same time? They are both lavender, but they need to have distinct identifiers because they are different.
And what if I use a different recipe? Like my oatmeal, milk, and honey soaps are a different recipe from my standard soaps because the oatmeal, milk and honey. So are my mechanics soaps. So how do I define the difference? Do I just add letters or numbers signifying the newly added items? But the oatmeal, milk and honey is an entirely different recipe because I use cocoa butter instead of shea in it also.
And that's just to start. How do I narrow down what applies? Should I signify a letter for each oil used in each recipe? That sounds confusing. Should I bother with expiration dates? Soap doesn't really expire, though it may so there's no guaranteeing that either.
I wouldn't bother but in order to sync my website and square, they need to have matching sku's because that's how the plugin works and I can't find another plugin that would sync it the way i need it to. If I can get sku's set up, that means my facebook store, my instagram, my website, and square can all be synced so that the inventory is correct.
all the online "how to create skus" articles say to pick 3-4 specific attributes that apply to your items. Which is easy if you have clothing or something for example (S for sweater, B for black, M for medium and then a location number) but it's not so easy for soap when things change all the time.
For example... this month, my lavender and chamomile soap is white, purple, and pink with an in the pot swirl. That doesn't mean my next bath will be designed the same way or with the same colors. I also did one with the same fragrance that was plain purple with lavender buds on top. And other designs.
And I may even stop using lavender chamomile entirely since it doesn't seem to be selling nearly as well as it used to. And the online things say never to use the same thing twice... so if I use lavender chamomile this time but what if I change it to vanilla lavender? Or what if I have both lavender chamomile and vanilla lavender at the same time? They are both lavender, but they need to have distinct identifiers because they are different.
And what if I use a different recipe? Like my oatmeal, milk, and honey soaps are a different recipe from my standard soaps because the oatmeal, milk and honey. So are my mechanics soaps. So how do I define the difference? Do I just add letters or numbers signifying the newly added items? But the oatmeal, milk and honey is an entirely different recipe because I use cocoa butter instead of shea in it also.
And that's just to start. How do I narrow down what applies? Should I signify a letter for each oil used in each recipe? That sounds confusing. Should I bother with expiration dates? Soap doesn't really expire, though it may so there's no guaranteeing that either.
I wouldn't bother but in order to sync my website and square, they need to have matching sku's because that's how the plugin works and I can't find another plugin that would sync it the way i need it to. If I can get sku's set up, that means my facebook store, my instagram, my website, and square can all be synced so that the inventory is correct.
