You can add categories to products in Retail and in eCom.

• Add items to categories in Retail to keep the same category structure in both systems and to have automatic product-category syncing.
• Add products to categories in eCom to have a separate category structure from Retail.

Retail

Individually for single items

1. In your Retail account click Inventory.
2. Click Item search.
3. Click the title of an item. Locate the item by searching for it using the filters at the top of the screen.
4. Click None, located in the Details tab > Organize section > beside Category.
5. Select your category and click Ok.
6. Click Save changes.

Individually for many items

1. In your Retail account click Inventory.
2. Click Quick edit items, located in the INVENTORY MAINTENANCE section.
3. Set a dropdown menu option to Category and click Search. Add filters if necessary to narrow your results.
4. Click None or the category name and select the new category. Click Ok.
5. Repeat until all required products have assigned categories.

Import

You can import up to 1000 variants per import. If you have more products in your import, break the import file into parts less than 1000 variants to import all product-category links.

1. From the main menu, click Inventory > Item Search.
2. Make the necessary products visible in the results, using filters if required. Then at the top of the results on the right-hand side of the screen, click Export. 
   
3. Save your file in an easy to find location on your computer.
4. Open the saved file in your preferred spreadsheet software.
   
5. Locate the Category and Subcategory columns and type the category names for each product.
   • The names must be written exactly, or new categories will be made with the error upon import.
   • Try copying the category name from an existing product to ensure written accuracy.
6. Highlight and delete any products that have the correct category. This prevents you from modifying products accidentally.
   1. Highlight by selecting the row number(s) on the left-hand side of the spreadsheet.
   2. Delete by right clicking and selecting Delete row.
7. Remove all unnecessary columns. This ensures only the category fields are affected by the import.

   To delete products from eCom by import, the only necessary columns are:

   1. System ID
   2. Column
   3. Subcategory 1-9 (If subcategory is being added)

   To remove the unnecessary columns:

   1. Highlight by clicking the column letter(s) at the top of the spreadsheet.
   2. Delete by right clicking and selecting Delete column.

   

8. Save the spreadsheet in an easy to find location.
9. From the main menu of Lightspeed Retail, click Inventory > Import Items.
   
   
10. Click Close if a popup window appears.
11. Click New Import.
12. Click Browse, locate and Open the spreadsheet.
13. For Behaviour, choose Only update existing items.
14. Ensure Match on field is set to System ID.
15. Click Continue.
16. Review the import stats and ensure the number of products your importing equals the number of Updated items. Also, make sure the only fields with content are the Category fields. Once verified, click Import Items.
17. When the import is complete, test to ensure all intended products have the correct categories in Retail.

eCom

You can add products to any categories in eCom. Products will always retain the categories they're assigned, until edited or the category is deleted. Read Adding products to a category for more information.