Do I need to clear inventory before updating products via CSV upload?

[Timberparts]

Hi,

I am brand new to shopify, I am taking over our store from someone who has left the company and need help getting products updated.

When our store was first step up there were at least 8 CSV files uploaded to our store, this is almost 2 years ago now. As anyone can imagine pricing has changed over the last two years and certain products are no longer available so we need to have this rectified. I have reached out to our supplier and got the necessary documents and have the CSV files created and ready for upload.

Do I need to remove all our inventory prior to uploading as there some products that have price changes, some new products, and some products that are no longer available? What are my next steps?

[productsync]

Hi

To update your existing products you will need the handle for each one so you are best to run an export of your existing products from Shopify: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/products/import-export/export-products

Once you have this you can modify the file with new details of existing products such as price etc. In the status column you can mark the products that are no longer available as archived which will then update them in Shopify to not available for sale.

For new products you can import them using the same file format and the handle can be set to what you like as long as it is unique. Note the handle is also your product URL so use something relevant: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/products/import-export/using-csv

For updating your inventory levels you need to import it as a separate file as you can no longer do it through product csv import: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/products/inventory/inventory-csv

Regards

Tom

[Timberparts]

Hey Tom,

Thank you for getting back to me, I replied back below.

To update your existing products you will need the handle for each one so you are best to run an export of your existing products from Shopify: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/products/import-export/export-products -  we have handles in our csv files 

Once you have this you can modify the file with new details of existing products such as price etc. In the status column you can mark the products that are no longer available as archived which will then update them in Shopify to not available for sale. - issue here is that 90% of these lines need to be updated in pricing or marked not available which creates a monster of a task. we will also be looking to do this either once a quarter or twice a year to ensure our pricing is current. 

For new products you can import them using the same file format and the handle can be set to what you like as long as it is unique. Note the handle is also your product URL so use something relevant: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/products/import-export/using-csv  - we are not sure what lines have been added and which lines are preexisting due to the amount of products in these csv files. 

For updating your inventory levels you need to import it as a separate file as you can no longer do it through product csv import: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/products/inventory/inventory-csv - we are not updating levels so we are good here. 

Regards

Tom

[productsync]

Hey

If the items you no longer stock are marked as out of stock then that should get you by for now.

In terms of pricing you should be able to just import handle and price columns. If you import other columns and leave them blank it will overwrite your existing data so always do a csv export as backup. If you have a cost price column from supplier you could automate a calculation of that then round to a common value like .99cents. Take baby steps and do a couple of imports with just 1 or 2 rows to see how your data updates before expanding out to larger lists.

We could help you set your products up in our platform and have them syncing into your store. What we specialise in is connecting suppliers data and mapping it correctly for our users so they can then either push up new products automatically or update existing products. Not sure if you need to go this way as csv files are probably sufficient but depends on how much automation you would like. 

Regards

Tom