Combination products. Single sold, but two or more SKU on packing / inventory management.

[LostPer]

I have multiple products that in reality is a combination of two or more unique items. I need to show one product to a customer, but generate two unique rows / articles when purchased on the packaging list and inventory management. 

How is this solved?

Example:

Product A - White and Black lamp (customer view)

Item A - white lamp foot
Item B - Black lamp shade

Product B - White lamnp (customer view)

Item A - white lamp foot

Item C - White lamp foot

Analytics - 2 products sold for X$
Inventory - 4 items picked at a cost of Y$

I DON'T want to have item A, B and C available as purchasable products in the store front. 

We just moved into a 3PL and they are not happy as they don't get unique rows on their packaging lists and don't know what to pick. 

[nmalinow]

Try OTW Shipping . They use ShipEdge which is a super powerful software for customers to manage their orders and inventory. They should be able to group your items together in the way you describe. Give em a look!

[sillycube]

You have to separate the customer view from fulfillment view:

Since you have to track the inventory of product A, B and item A, B, C, you have to make 2 products for products A & B (for display to customers) and 2 products, lamp foot, and lamp shade with color variant (for inventory tracking, not shown to customer). The inventory tracking products are not shown in your online store.

When there is a new order made, it should generate an additional fulfillment sheet for the 3PL company to collect the actual items. The order sheet made by the customer is for customer viewing only. 

After the order is marked as fulfilled, the variants of items A, B, C will be deducted from the inventory.

The amount of customer-viewing products will be updated too.