Product types are now Product categories in Retail POS. As part of this change, we’ve also added sub-categories. You can now create multi-level sub-categories to organize and track your product catalog at a more granular level.

With product categories, you can create and assign multi-level categories to your products. Use product categories to organize and track your product catalog at a granular level.

Creating categories through the Product categories page

1. Navigate to Catalog > Product categories.
   
2. Select Add category.
   
3. On the Add product category page, enter the name of the Level 1 category (the highest level of the category).
   
4. If you wish to add Level 2 categories, select + Level 2 and enter the name for the Level 2 category. You can continue to create additional Level 2 categories by selecting + Level 2 as required. Each Level 2 category will represent an individual two-leveled category, for example, Pet Food / Dog.
   
5. If you wish to add a Level 3 category to a Level 2 category, select + Level 3 and enter the name for the Level 3 category. You can continue to create additional Level 3 categories for each Level 2 category by selecting + Level 3 as required. Each Level 3 category will represent an individual three-leveled category, for example, Pet Food / Dog / Dry.
   
6. Once all Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3 categories have been created as required, select Save.
   

You can now apply the product categories to your products. Refer to the Applying product categories to your products section of this article for more information.

Creating categories through a new product

1. Navigate to Catalog > Products.
   
2. Locate the product you wish to create categories for, using the filters if necessary. Select the edit pencil to the right of the product or select the product to expand and select Edit.
   
   

   If you're adding a new product, select Add product from the Products page. Enter the product information as per the steps outlined in Adding products and inventory and continue to step 3 below.

3. On the Add/Edit product page, scroll to the Product categories section and select the drop-down menu.
   
4. From the drop-down menu, type the name of the category you wish to create into the search field. If the category has not yet been created, select Add "X" as a new category.
   
5. Confirm your new category name and select Add category.
   
6. Once the category has been created, select Save to apply it to the product.
   

Creating categories via the Add/edit products page only supports the creation of Level 1 categories. To create categories with sub-categories, or to apply sub-categories to an already created category, see the Creating categories on the Product categories page section of this article.

Editing product categories

To edit product categories, navigate to Catalog > Product categories. From here, locate the category you wish to edit and select the edit pencil to the right.

Editing categories individually

Edit the text in the relevant Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3 text fields.

Editing categories in bulk

If you wish to create additional Level 2 or Level 3 categories, select + Level 2 or + Level 3 and enter the name for the Level 2 or Level 3 category.

You can continue to create additional Level 2 or Level 3 categories by selecting + Level 2 or + Level 3 as required.

Each Level 2 category will represent an individual two-leveled category, for example, Pet Food / Dog. Each Level 3 category will represent an individual three-leveled category, for example, Pet Food / Dog / Dry.

Deleting categories

Select the trashcan icon next to the Level 2 or Level 3 category and then select Delete category.

After a category is deleted, all products assigned to it will be assigned to the next available category on the same level. For example, a product assigned to Pet Food / Dog / Dry will be reassigned to Pet Food / Dog / Wet.

If there are no remaining categories on the same level, the product will be assigned to the next highest level within the categories. For example, a product assigned to Pet Food / Dog / Dry will be reassigned to Pet Food / Dog.

Applying product categories to existing products

To apply categories to products individually:

1. Navigate to Catalog > Products.
   
2. Locate the product you wish to apply categories to, using the filters if necessary. Select the edit pencil to the right of the product or select the product to expand and select Edit.
   
3. On the Edit product page, scroll to the Product categories section and select the drop-down menu.
   
4. From the drop-down menu, select the category you wish to apply. If the category selected has sub-categories, select each level of sub-category as required.
   
5. Once the categories have been selected, select Save.
   

Applying categories in bulk

You can apply categories to your products in bulk using a spreadsheet (CSV, XLSX, or XLS) to format product data. When applying product categories in bulk, the categories must have already been created in Retail POS. Any categories that have not yet been created will be ignored when imported. Refer to the Creating categories on the Product categories page section of this article for more information about creating categories before importing a spreadsheet.

When adding multiple category levels to products with a spreadsheet, enter the level 1, 2, and 3 categories to the product_category column. Each level must be separated by a space and a forward slash (e.g. Pantry / Coffee / Ground).

Product categories must start with the level 1 main category. If a product is missing a level 1 category but has level 2 or 3 sub-category, the import will fail.

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