Creating Product Families

Use Product Family Maintenance to create, copy, delete, and maintain product families.

When you create a product family, you can build it out of the following components:

Individual products.
Existing product families.
All products in a price line.
All products within a category.

In addition, you can determine whether a product family can be used with the Web Order Entry companion product.

Note: The Allow Duplicates In Product Families control maintenance record determines whether you can enter duplicate components in a product family. Entering duplicate components facilitates in ordering items grouped together in different configuration blocks.

Note: You must be assigned level 2 of the PRODUCT.FAMILY.MAINT authorization key to add or edit product families. If you are assigned level 1 of the authorization key, you can only view product families.

To create a product family:

From the Files > Product Additional menu, select Product Family Maintenance to display the Product Family Maintenance screen.
In the Branch/Territory field, enter the branch or territory in which to create a product family, or enter All to create a product family for all branches and territories.

Enter All for one of the following reasons:

A branch does not have specific products defined for that family. Branch-specific product families are independent of the default family, not a subset of it.
You want the product family to be used with Web Order Entry.

Note: You can edit or view product families only for branches or territories to which you have been assigned access.

In the Product Family ID field, enter New to create a product family.
At the prompt, enter an ID to assign to the product family.

Note: When entering a new product family ID, the system does not allow you to use an ID already assigned to a price line. This restriction prevents conflicts when accessing price lines or product families in Sales Order Entry. In addition, do not use the ampersand (&) character in product family IDs.

In the Description field, enter a short description of the product family.
In the Display in WOE field, enter Y to use this product family in Web Order Entry; otherwise enter N.

Note: The Display Catalog Products In WOE control maintenance record determines whether nonstock items display in Web Order Entry, regardless if they are included in a product family.

In the Product Description column, enter any of the following components to build the product family:

Component	Action
Individual product	Enter the product. In the Quantity column, enter the quantity of the product to add when the product family is added to an order. In the UOM column, the system enters the product's default unit of measure defined for sales transactions.
All products in another product family	Enter an ampersand (&) followed by the product family ID, for example, &zoepumps. Leave the Quantity column blank. This applies to individual products only. In the UOM column, the system enters the each (ea) unit of measure.
All products in a price line	Enter the word line followed by a tilde (~) followed by the price line ID, for example, line~zoe. Leave the Quantity column blank. This applies to individual products only. In the UOM column, the system enters the each (ea) unit of measure.
All products containing a selected word or phrase in the product description	Enter an exclamation mark (!) followed by the word or phrase, for example, !brass hex bushing. Leave the Quantity column blank. This applies to individual products only. In the UOM column, the system enters the each (ea) unit of measure.

Note: Use Alt-Delete to delete the selected line item from the product family. Use Alt-Insert to insert a blank line above the cursor position and enter a new line item.

Press Esc to save the product family and exit the screen.

Note: You must rebuild the product family index whenever you create new product families.

More Options from the Product Family Maintenance Screen

The Product Family Maintenance screen also offers these options:

Hot Key	Function
Del	Deletes the current product family record. At the confirmation, enter Delete.
Copy	Copies a selected product family to a new branch, territory, or product family record. To copy the current record: Use the Copy hot key to display the Copy screen. In the From family field, verify that you the correct product family to copy is displayed. The system enters the current product family ID. In the From branch/territory field, verify that the correct branch or territory from which to copy is displayed. The system enters the current product family's assigned branch or territory. In the To family field, enter the product family to which to copy the information as needed. In the To branch/territory field, enter the branch or territory to which to copy the information as needed. Press Esc to copy the product family.
Prod Maint	Displays the product record for the selected product. The Product Maintenance screen displays in view-only mode. Note: This hot key is active only if you have the PRODUCT.MAINT authorization key and the cursor is positioned on an individual product.
Expnd	Displays the products assigned to a selected price line. The Products from <price line> Selection screen displays. Add or remove products from the list, as needed.
Log	Displays changes made to the product family. The Maintenance Log Viewing screen displays.
Note	Attaches a note to the product family. In the Edit Note dialog box, enter a note and press Esc.
Cmt	Attaches a comment to an individual product in the product family. In the Product Comments dialog box, enter a comment for the selected product and press Esc. When the product family is added to an order, this comment displays for the product.