Another efficient way to add items to your inventory is to search for items in Lightspeed Retail's pre-built vendor catalogs. If you find the items you need, simply import them directly into your inventory. By doing so, it'll save you the time and expense of having to manually enter your item details (e.g. description, UPC and MSRP) or having to include them in an import file.

To import a vendor's catalog items, you first need to add the vendor to your account. To do so, you need to enable the industry it's associated with:

1. From the main menu, select Inventory > Vendor Catalogs.
2. Enable the industry the vendor is associated with. If you're not sure which industry to enable, find the vendor on our Pre-loaded Catalogs list. Don't see the vendor on the list? Submit their catalog to our Retail Imports team.

All the vendors that are associated with the industry you enabled are now added under Inventory > Vendors. Their catalogs are also enabled by default.

Now that the vendor's catalog is enabled in your account, import the catalog items you need using a purchase order. We recommend using a purchase order because it'll serve as a record of the catalog items you imported and it'll allow you to enter or scan their quantity on hand more swiftly.

1. From the main menu, select Inventory > New Order.
2. Select the shop you want to add quantities of the catalog items to.
3. Select a vendor.
4. Select Save Changes.
5. Under Add Items:

   • Enable the Search All Catalogs checkbox if you want to search the catalogs of all your vendors.

   • Keep the Search All Catalogs checkbox disabled if you want to only search the catalog of the vendor you selected.

6. In the Search Item Description field, enter or scan one of the following searchable details of the catalog item you want to import:

   • Description

   • Vendor ID

   • UPC

   • EAN

   • Manufacturer SKU

7. Select Search. Your search results display in the Catalog Results tab.
8. Optionally, select the eye icon to confirm the catalog item in the search results is the one you need.
9. Depending on how many catalog items you want to import to your inventory, follow one of these workflows:

   • To import one catalog item, select Import.

   • To import multiple catalog items at one time, select their checkboxes from the list of catalog results and select +Import/Add Selected at the bottom of the catalog results.

10. Review the prefilled item details and enter or select any additional item details you need. To get started, we recommend you at least review, enter and select the following:

    • Price

    • Default cost

    • Category

11. Select Save Changes > Select Item. The item is officially added to your inventory and the purchase order with an ORDER QTY. of 1.
12. In the ORDER QTY. field, enter or scan the quantity of the catalog item you want to add to your inventory.
13. Repeat steps 5-12 for the other catalog items you want to import to your inventory.
14. To add the quantities you entered in the ORDER QTY. field of the catalog items to your inventory, at the top of the purchase order, select Ordered > Check In.
15. Under Mark Items Received, select Receive All Items to automatically enter the quantity you entered in the ORDERED QTY. field in the # RECEIVED field.
16. Select Add Received to Inventory to add the received quantities to your inventory.

The catalog items should now be officially imported into your inventory.