I need variants that won't effect overall quantity

Shopify Discussion

Topic summary

Seller wants product variants (optional Power Adapter, Stand) that change price but do not manage inventory independently. Current workaround splits stock across variants, risking oversells when only one physical unit remains. A feature request is raised for variants to inherit a single top-level inventory count.

Proposed solutions:

  • Fusion Inventory app: manage “raw materials” with a bill of materials (BOM) per variant; app syncs product availability to material stock (e.g., main unit + Stand). Intended to keep inventory aligned across shared components.
  • Easify Product Options app: create adapters/stands as separate, hidden products used as add-on options; exclude from collections and hide via seo.hidden metafield. Add-ons won’t affect the main product’s quantity and can’t be purchased standalone.

Latest development: Seller expresses privacy concerns about Easify’s request for access to all customer data and asks why such data is necessary for add-on options.

Outcome/status: No native Shopify setting identified; third-party apps suggested. The thread remains open pending clarification on data access needs and the seller’s choice of approach.

Summarized with AI on December 21. AI used: gpt-5.
1

In my store, I have an electronic product I’m selling and I have options defined as variants that effect the price. These are optional Power Adapters and Stands.

In this case, the variant quantity is not important for inventory tracking; those items I always have on hand and are just physically bundled into the main product during shipping. These items can even be shared among other products. I looked at the Bundling App, but that’s for when you have 2 or more products you want to combine. In this case, the Power Adapters and Stands are not really products that I want to list on their own and I don’t want the mechanics of a “bundle”. Variants suit me better.

For now I’m having to split the inventory numbers up for the main product between the variants and keep tabs on whether or not there is an imbalance so I can adjust it. But when it gets down to 1 physical unit remaining in stock (like it did this weekend), I don’t know which options the last purchaser will want, so I have to keep each variant in stock with 1 unit. That runs the risk of 2 or more people buying when I only have 1 unit left.

What’s the best approach?

Can I put in a feature request that the variant stock inherits the count from a top level product value?

2

Hi @JoeKing ,

We recently released an inventory management app that work for this use case: Fusion Inventory

It works by allowing you to configure an inventory of raw materials and then link those raw materials to your products using a bill of materials. So for example in your case you would have the following materials:

Material name Quantity
ABC 10
XYZ 12
Power Adapter 3
Stand 1

and each product variant to be managed by the app will have a bill of materials. Product Variant “XYZ - Stand” may have the following bill of materials:

Material Quantity
XYZ 1
Stand 1

All you have to do is add the materials and bill of materials to the app and then activate inventory sync. After that, the app will take care of keeping your product inventory in sync with your material inventory.

Feel free to reach out if you have any questions.

3

Hi @JoeKing ,

The Easify Product Options app could be the solution you’re searching for :hugs: .

Here’s how it works:

  1. Rather than creating Power Adapters and Stands as variants of your main products, you’ll create them as separate products.

  2. With the Easify app, you can then designate Power Adapters and Stands as add-on products (custom options) for your main product.

  3. You can hide the Power Adapters and Stands products from your storefront by excluding them from all collections. Additionally, you can use the seo.hidden metafield to prevent them from appearing in search results.

As a result, your customers will only be able to select Power Adapters and Stands alongside your main products. These add-ons won’t affect your main product quantity, and customers won’t be able to purchase Power Adapters and Stands separately or view them on the storefront. It’s exactly what you’re looking for.

Let me know your specific requirements, and I can assist you with the setup. Alternatively, feel free to reach out to the Easify team via the in-app live chat for further assistance :raising_hands: .

4

This looks interesting and I want to try it, but can you tell me why the app needs to collect all of my customer data? I’m very cautious about installing apps that expose customer data to a third party. Why would add-on purchase options require sharing that data?