I have a listing that has been out of stock for a while and I would like to change the SKU if possible. The listing edit page says if you want to change the SKU you should delete the old SKU and then create a new one. This leaves me with tons of questions.
If I delete the SKU will the ASIN still remain OK (I’m assuming so)?
If I am successful at changing it will the FNSKU stay the same or will a new one be created?
Has anyone done this before with an FBA item? Again, there is none in the warehouse now, but I have some ready to ship. I wanted to put this under a different SKU because (reasons). If you need to know, I’ll have to have this moved to the private area.
Looking for any of the FBA veterans to chime in @VTR@ASV_Vites . Thanks guys.
SKUs are known in ‘Amazonese’ as “MSKU,” an acronym for “Merchant Stock Keeping Unit;” they are dependent upon the specific Offer-Listing created, at any given time, by any given 3P or 1P Seller upon one of Amazon’s Global Catalog Listing ASINs, and as such may be created ad infinitum as circumstances change (hence the common practice of managing expiration-dated inventory in the AFN [‘Amazonese’ for “Amazon Fulfillment Network,” aka FBA] merely by judicious use of the capability to create a new SKU [MSKU] for any given FBA Inbound Shipment).
All else being equal, an Amazon Global Catalog ASIN is designed to be immune to changes in SKUs by any given Offer-Listing provider.
Amazon’s published policy (references available upon request) states that a new FNSKU will be generated by its automated mechanism(s) for each and everynewly-created MSKU that a 3P/1P Seller uses to make a new Offer-Listing upon the Global Catalog Listing ASIN in question.
The next time I hear tell of Amazon varying from that entirely-sensible policy (‘entirely-sensible’ from a logistics standpoint) will be the first.
May I ask if the reason you’ve posed this question is due to the stock which you’d like to now ship FBA having the previously-used FNSKU “embedded” into its packaging/inserts, in an irremovable fashion?
The answer is no as far as packaging goes. The reason is basically I am repurposing this ASIN by changing it to a similar product (different type of the same soap) and I wanted to be able to identity the new stock more easily. That’s the TL;DR, but there are some other details. I can use the existing SKU just fine, but I have a system we use for MSKUs that I was hoping to follow.
You bring up an interesting point though about product that expire. Our products do not specifically expire, but I did have a review some time ago where the product had been in the warehouse for over 6 months and the review picture was horrible, so going forward I was just going to either recall or have any inventory over 6 months old destroyed. Creating separate MSKUs would be a solution to this problem I think, now that you mentioned it. I could then identify the inventory more easily.
I am really not sure if I can just create a new MSKU and NOT delete the old one, or even how to do that. The merchant SKU field is locked on my edit page, and there is that message that says I need to delete the SKU if I want to change it. Any idea how I go about creating a new MSKU? I haven’t messed with flat file uploads yet, but certainly want to learn. Not sure if now is a great time to do it though, as I just want to get this inventory in to the FC.
Thanks for all your help here, sorry I didn’t tag you in the OP. Forgot about your expertise in this area!
To help with the learning of Excel file uploads, you might want to review this thread as we went through the basics of downloading the file to the uploading it back up. After reviewing and downloading the category specific excel file that you need, just come back and ask your questions and we or another SAS member with knowledge of the files will help walk you through it. If you are familiar with Excel, it isn’t really hard. If you are not familiar with Excel, don’t worry as the learning curve isn’t hard either.
@Dogtamer pretty much answered this. My head hit the pillow 9 hours ago.
SKU’s are seller specific, the ASIN will remain OK.
A new one will be created if you use a new SKU name. If you use the exact same SKU name for that ASIN, you will get the old FNSKU back. Many sellers have to delete and relist for various reasons and as long as the SKU name remains the same, the FNSKU will too, and when I say exact, I mean exact, down to spaces, dashes, caps etc.
3 Yup many times. We have had to delete and relist when an employee accidentally made a variation of the wrong product, another time we had a bad actor ruin a listing. Many reasons, mostly self inflicted.
Many FBA sellers use numerous SKU’s for the same ASIN for things like expiration dates, shipment batches from different warehouses, etc. We use the “add another condition” button.
Concerns about inventory getting received properly and basically to save time not having to input all the data again for a very similar product. I am not going to restock the original SKU, but this one is almost the same thing. Thanks for asking.
What does it mean when you add another condition? I thought condition was “new” or “used.” Do you need a condition that is different from what is already listed or can everything be the same?
It all depends on what you put. It could be new packaging for the same product, new/used, different expiration date, whatever reason you need a separate SKU for the same ASIN for.
That’s good to know. I am changing equipment, and the colors are coming out slightly different. I don’t want them to mix the old condition with the new condition.
Okay, being that I’m in Handmade, I don’t see an area to put in the condition. Is there a “condition” field?
ETA: I’m googling and I see videos that show a condition field above the price. I do not have that, so I assume that making a new condition is not going to go well for me. When I click on the add a new condition button, the warning at the top of the page says
A lot of people order multiples of that product, so I’d hate for them to get upset that the colors are off when they are side-by-side. What should I do? Just let it sell out before adding new stock? I really don’t like doing that for FBA.
