Another spreadsheet template in the inbox
A new independent retail group wants to list forty of your lines. Their buyer sends a spreadsheet with sixty columns: EAN, case barcode, dimensions, weights, country of origin, a marketing description under a set character limit, three images at a set size, and a link to a data sheet. An online reseller wants something similar in a CSV with different column names. A garden centre chain wants it through their supplier portal.
Your marketing person, or whoever drew the short straw, spends days copying data from manufacturers' PDFs, the stock system and a folder of images called 'NEW NEW final'. Half the dimensions are missing. Some images are the old packaging.
The data exists, but not in one place
Your stock system holds codes, prices and maybe a barcode. Everything else a retailer needs sits across manufacturers' spec sheets, supplier price files, image folders and people's inboxes. There is no master record, so every request is a small research project, and the same work is repeated for each customer.
| Field retailers ask for | Where it usually lives |
|---|---|
| Unit and case barcodes | Stock system, sometimes only one of them |
| Dimensions and weights | Manufacturer PDF, or measured by hand |
| Descriptions and features | Supplier website, copied and edited |
| Images | Shared drive folders with unclear names |
| Safety or allergen sheets | Emails from the manufacturer |
What the copying costs
New listings go live weeks later than they could, and in that time the retailer might list a competitor's version. Mistakes in barcodes or case sizes cause receiving problems at the retailer's warehouse, which come back to you as charges or complaints. And the knowledge of where everything is lives with one or two people.
It also limits growth. Every new online reseller or retail group means another round of data work, so you take on fewer of them than you could.
The product data hub we build
- A central product record for each line, linked to your stock system by product code, with the fields your customers ask for.
- Manufacturer price and data files are imported as they arrive, and fields are mapped once per supplier. An AI extraction step reads spec sheets in PDF form and proposes values for a person to confirm.
- Images are stored against the product with their type (pack shot, lifestyle, case) and resized on export.
- Missing data is listed per product and per customer request, so you can see exactly what is needed to complete a listing.
- Customer templates are set up once. After that, each retailer's file or feed is generated from the hub in their format, including character limits and image sizes.
- Where customers accept a feed, it updates automatically when your data changes.
- One place to correct a barcode or a description.
- The same data used for your own trade website and catalogue.
- A record of which customer received which version.
After it is in place
When a retail buyer sends a template, you map it once and export it. The team's time goes into filling genuine gaps, chasing manufacturers for the few missing fields, not copying known ones. Your own website and printed catalogue use the same data, so they stop drifting apart. And adding an online reseller becomes a sensible commercial decision rather than a data chore.
Is this your team's week?
- Retailers send you product data templates regularly.
- Barcodes and case sizes are checked by hand for each request.
- Images live in folders that only one person understands.
- Your website and catalogue disagree about product details.
- You turn down listing opportunities because the data work is too much.