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Importing vendor data

To help you transition quickly and easily to Lightspeed Retail, we'll help you import the inventory, vendors and customers you already have.

To import inventory data, go to Importing inventory data.

To import customer data, go to Importing customer data.

Main steps of importing vendor data to Lightspeed Retail

  1. Prepare a spreadsheet for your inventory data based on the Lightspeed Retail requirements.
  2. Format your spreadsheet for easy import. If your file is not formatted based on our requirements we'll return it to you to modify.
  3. Verify the data.
  4. Submitting your spreadsheet to our Retail Imports team.

Once you've submitted your spreadsheet to our Retail Imports team, you can view your ticket in the Help Center by clicking your name > Activities on the top right.

NOTE: Data import can take 5 to 7 business days to complete. If we have to edit your data we will send the file back to you for your approval. If your file is not formatted correctly, it will delay your import.

1. Preparing your spreadsheet

  1. If you are transitioning from a POS software to Lightspeed, export your current inventory data from your previous POS software to a spreadsheet software file such as Microsoft Excel. Lightspeed supports these file formats for importing:
    • csv
    • txt
    • xls
    • xlsx
  2. Create a backup of your original export file. The backup file is a precaution against any errors, and can also be used to verify your data.
  3. In your spreadsheet file, rename the column headings so that they match the Lightspeed Retail system fields. See Data fields for the inventory fields used in Lightspeed Retail.
  4. Review your spreadsheet data and fix any formatting or data errors as detailed in Data verification.

2. Formatting your spreadsheet

To avoid having to manually correct the data in your system, format your spreadsheet so that we can easily import it.

Example import file

You can use this example Excel file as a template.

NOTE: All City, State, and Zip Codes should be in their own columns, not merged into one cell. You can re-order the columns as you wish. If any columns do not contain data other than the heading, delete the entire column.

Heading Requirements Description
Vendor name Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor's name
Account number Text up to 25 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters.  Your account number with the vendor
Vendor Currency A purchasing currency that has already been created under Settings > General Options > Currencies. If you have multicurrency enabled in your account, you can assign one of your purchasing currencies to the imported vendor. You cannot create new purchasing currencies via import, however, so it will need to be created before importing.

Note: if you import a vendor currency that has not already been created in your account, the currency will default to your store currency with an exchange rate of 1.0.
Contact first name Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Contact's first name
Contact last name Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Contact's last name
Address 1 Text up to 25 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor's address line 1
Address 2 Text up to 25 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor's address line 2
City Text up to 25 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. City the vendor lives in
State Text up to 25 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. State the vendor lives in
Zip Numeric or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters.

Zip Code the vendor lives in.
Zip+4 format is acceptable for this field ("12345-1234")
Country Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Country the vendor lives in.
Work phone Numeric or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Work phone number of the vendor. Several formats are acceptable:(123)123-1234 or 123-123-1234.
Fax Numeric or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Fax number of the vendor. Several formats are acceptable:(123)123-1234 or 123-123-1234.
Mobile Numeric or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Mobile phone number of the vendor. Several formats are acceptable:(123)123-1234 or 123-123-1234.
E-Mail 1 Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor's primary email address
E-Mail 2 Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor's secondary email address
Website Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor's website
Custom Text up to 255 characters or blank. No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Can be used for a vendor number to quickly add a vendor to a document
Notes No returns, line breaks or foreign characters. Vendor-related notes

3. Verifying the data

After you create your import spreadsheet, scan the document for any erroneous data, which can cause the data import to fail.

  • Edit special characters, such as ☺↨♪♫♀♂¶▓ so that they display the correct data.
  • Correct rows that extend into other columns.
  • Erase cells with N/A so that they have a blank field.

Change cells with scientific numbers, such as 4.001E+11 (usually UPC or EAN values) so that they are regular integers instead, such as 40010000000. If you use Excel:

  1. Select the column with the scientific numbers.
  2. Click Format > Cells.
  3. Change the Category to Number, set Decimal places to 0, and then click OK.

To erase multiple N/A entries:

  1. Select the data you want to change, whether that's a row, column or the entire document.
  2. Press Ctrl+F or Find.
  3. Select the Replace tab.
  4. For the text you want to replace, type N/A.
  5. For Replace with, leave the field blank.

To use Concatenate to make your description column contain the size and color columns:

  1. I inserted another column, clicked the first cell (D2), and typed “=CONCATENATE(“. Then you can select the first cell you want to be displayed :::first. I clicked C2 then added the: ,”: “, (creates the separator “: “ between the first two cells that I want in this formula), then I clicked :::the cell that I wanted to be next (B2), added: ,” “, (creates the separator “ “ [I only wanted a space between the last two cells in the formula]), :::and then click the last cell (A2).

  2. Press Enter.

  3. You more than likely have more than one row, so if you want to apply this to all the rows, click the box and drag it to the bottom of the column, which gives you a list of concatenated results.

  4. If you click one of the cells, you will see that what’s in it is actually the =CONCATENATE function. To make the cells become “T-Shirt: Large, Red,” for example, copy the column and then paste special and select Values and number formats.

To correct multiple lines in cells or rows

  1. Highlight all of the data in the spreadsheet.
  2. Press Ctrl+F or Find.
  3. Click the Replace tab.
  4. In the Find box, while pressing Alt, on the numeric pad type 0010. Don't type anything in the Replace box.
  5. Click Replace all.

To add a missing 0 to UPC numbers.

Excel will trim the leading 0 from UPC numbers. To correct this, add "0" (a zero in apostrophes) to the beginning of a UPC number. Typically, UPCs are 12 digits long, so you could sort your spreadsheet by the PUCs and fix any that are 11 digits or fewer. This isn't always the case with UPCs, so check your product's barcode.

4. Submitting your spreadsheet to our Retail Imports team

After you prepare, format and verify your import spreadsheet file, create a ticket to submit it to our Retail Imports team:

  1. To create a ticket, follow one of the below workflows:
    • Click here for a direct link.
    • At the top of the page, click Submit a Request. Then from the product drop-down, select Lightspeed Retail.
  2. Fill in the Your email address, Subject, and Description fields.
  3. To automatically route your ticket to the Retail Imports team, from the Category drop-down, select Import > Customers/Inventory/Vendors.
  4. To attach your files, click Attach Files.
  5. To submit your ticket, click Submit.

NOTE: Licensed users are entitled to one free import per calendar quarter. Additional imports within the same calendar quarter are subject to an import fee.

Attachments

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