Materials
A material is what a product is made of: a blank T-shirt, fabric, paint, a mug for printing. Materials live under Products → “Materials”.
Each material has:
- a name — for example, “Black T-shirt S”;
- an SKU — optional;
- a photo — optional; you can paste a screenshot (Ctrl+V);
- stock and a unit — pcs, g, kg, ml, l, m;
- cost per unit — the dashboard uses it to calculate product costs.
How a material is linked to a product
On the product card, in the “Materials” section, choose a material and its usage — how many units go into one product. For a product with variants, materials are set for each variant separately (an expandable sub-row in the variants table). There can be several materials: for example, a T-shirt + paint.
After that:
- product stock is calculated from the materials — as many as the scarcest material allows can be sold;
- a sale reduces the material, and a cancelled order returns it;
- the product's cost is calculated from the material prices and usage; you can adjust the amount.
A material overrides the product's own stock, including “∞”. So linking a material to an existing product is enough — tracking starts right away. But then you restock the material: you can't type a number on such a product.
An example for print on demand: the material “Black T-shirt S” → the “S / Black” variant uses 1 pc. A size sold — the blank went down. Blanks ran out — the product list shows an amber “Out: “Black T-shirt S”” badge, and clicking it opens exactly that material.
Linking materials to many sizes at once
After Instagram import, sizes are created without a material and without tracking. The “N sizes not tracked” badge on the product card leads to the “Link materials” page: all such sizes in one list.
- For each size choose a material and the usage per unit.
- The dashboard suggests a material by name similarity, but saves nothing by itself — check the suggestions and click “Save”.
Restocking
Change the material's stock in Materials — and every product using it is available again right away. If anyone was waiting for the product, the bot notifies them too (see “Notify me when it's back”).
Packaging
Products → “Packaging” — your boxes and bags:
- a name — for you, for example “Box S (24×17×9)”;
- dimensions — length, width, height in centimetres;
- the parcel weight — the weight category printed on Nova Poshta boxes: 0.5, 1, 2;
- quantity tracking — optional: then you enter the current stock, otherwise it's “Unlimited”.
Why
Dimensions and weight from packaging are filled into the Nova Poshta waybill automatically, and the delivery price depends on them. So made-up sizes give a wrong price.
You can choose a default box on the product card (“Packaging and shipping”) or change it when creating a waybill. You can also enter custom dimensions there and immediately “Add this packaging to stock”.
Boxes leaving stock
A box is taken off stock when you create a waybill and returned when the waybill is deleted. If you're short of boxes, the waybill is still created: the shipment is already registered with the carrier, and cancelling it over a box would be wrong.
If your plan goes down
Nothing disappears: linked materials and boxes keep working, and tracking continues. You just can't add new materials, boxes or material links until you're back on Plus.