ChannelEngine: multi-location stock [beta]

About this article

This article describes ChannelEngine's multi-location feature, how to enable it, and how to configure it.

Table of contents

Introduction

Enable the multi-location feature

Configure the multi-location feature

Select a stock location

Update different stock locations via the API

Introduction

If you have stock locations spread across different countries or even different parts of the same country (e.g.: different states in the United States), you can benefit from ChannelEngine's multi-location feature. With it you can configure multiple locations, allocate your stock accordingly, and define the default behavior for when the stock in one of your locations is depleted.

Enable the multi-location feature

As the feature is currently in beta, it can only be enabled by a ChannelEngine employee. Please contact your Onboarding or Customer Success specialist so they can enable it for you.

Note that this feature only only works in combination with feeds and/or an API connection, and not with merchant plugins (e.g.: Magento, PrestaShop, etc.).

Configure the multi-location feature

Once the multi-location feature is enabled, you can configure it by going to Products > Stock locations. If you do not see that option, log out and then back into ChannelEngine.

You are then presented with an overview of your existing stock locations, showing their names, the country where they are based, whether they are the default or they fall back to the default, and a couple of associated actions.

To add a new stock location, click on the Add button at the bottom of the overview.

In the pop-up that appears, enter a name for the stock location. You can set it as the default by ticking the Default stock location box, or set it to fall back to the default once the stock allocated to it is depleted by ticking the Fall back to default box.

Although you do not have to provide the full address of the stock location, you do need to select a country.

When you are done, click on Add to save the stock location.

Select a stock location

You can then select your preferred stock locations per channel. To do so, go to a channel's Setup section and click on Advanced settings to expand it. Scroll down to Stock location and choose an option (e.g.: Warehouse Germany). Click on Save at the bottom of the screen.

Map a stock location

To map different stock quantities to each stock location configured, go to Settings, Product feeds, click on the pencil icon by a feed, and scroll to the bottom of the page to Stock locations. Each of the stock locations configured can be mapped to a different stock attribute, according to the allocation available in your feed.

Once you map your stock locations to your stock attributes, the stock quantity per location becomes visible. Note that if you go to the products overview, the stock shown per product is the Overall stock (i.e.: aggregated) – not the stock for a specific stock location. To see a breakdown of the stock per product per location, select a product.

NB: to keep the overview as clear as possible – and avoid mistakes –, make sure to name the different stock attributes in your feed according to each location. E.g.: Stock, Stock DE, Stock FR, Stock ES, Stock UAE, etc.

Update different stock locations via the API

To update your stock per stock location via the API, first you need to retrieve your StockLocationId via the GET /v2/stocklocations endpoint.

You can then use the PUT /v2/offer endpoint to update the stock for each specific location. E.g.:

[   {
"MerchantProductNo": "ABCDE12345",     
"Stock": 15,     
"Price": 25,     
"StockLocationId": 35   
} ] 

NB: as there is only one price attribute per stock location, you need to make sure that the correct price is included in the call. Otherwise the price of the product is updated to zero across all stock locations.

For more information on how to update different stock locations via the API, check out the API reference.