Product Attributes/ Options

When your products have options like size or color, you can create a variety of ways to display these.

  • Log into your admin
  • Add the option name.
    • Go to Catalog, Option Name Manager
    • Under ‘Option Name’, enter the name of the option (size, color, etc.)
    • Under ‘Option Type’, select the method customers will use to select their options
      • Drop Down is the most common and usually the best way.
      • Text is used if your product is customized with customer-defined text like a t-shirt or coffee mug.
      • Radio creates little circles that the customer checks. These don’t allow selection of multiple attributes per option.
      • Checkbox allows customers to select multiple attributes per option.
      • File is for things like online publications, where a customer may select a file to download.
      • Read-Only is a static option. You probably won’t ever have need of this.
    • Click ‘Insert’
  • Add Option Values
    • After adding the option name, click on ‘Option Values’ at the top of the page. This can also be found by going to ‘Catalog, Option Value Manager’.
    • Under ‘Option Name’, use the drop down menu to select the option you need.
    • Then enter option values one at a time.
      • For instance, if your option name was ‘Color’, your option values would be something like, ‘Red’, ‘Green, ‘Blue’.
      • You can enter a sort order if you don’t want the values to be listed alphabetically. This is helpful for things like Small, Medium, Large., which, without a sort order would be listed as ‘Large, Medium, Small’.
      • Click ‘Insert’.
    • Continue entering values until you have all the values entered for this option. You can come back later to add more if need be.
  • Associate the options with products
    • Make sure you have added the product that goes with the options you have entered. See Adding_Products.html
    • There are two ways to handle this part
      • If you’ve just entered options values, click on ‘Attribute Controller’ at the top of the page.
        • Then select the category from the drop down menu and select the product from the list and click ‘Display.
      • If you’ve just entered a product, from the categories/products listing (make sure you’re looking at the products in the correct category) you can click on the ‘circled A’ under Action for the Attributes Features associated with that product. Click on ‘Attributes Controller’ and the product will already be selected.
    • Under ‘Adding New Attributes’
      • Select the Option Name
      • Select the Option Value
      • Set further actions for this option if needed.
        • Price: if the option affects the price of the product
        • Weight: if the option affects the weight of the product
        • Order: if you wish to set a unique sort order
        • One Time: if there is a price increase that’s the same regardless of quantity purchased
        • Price Factor: multiplies the price of the product
          • If your product is $10, & the option’s price factor is 2, this will add $20 to the base price for this option.
        • Offset: removes multiples of the base price.
          • If your base price is $10, and the price factor for this option is 2 (adding $20), and the offset is 1 (take away $10), $10 will be added to the base price.
        • Attributes Qty Price Discount:
          • Quantity discounts (Attributes Qty Price Discount) are useful when the entire group of products being ordered has a different price if a certain number of them are ordered. Note: The price amount specified for a given number of items will be applied to the entire group of items--The price does not get applied to items in steps.
          • Syntax:

1:11,3:10.00,6:9.00,9:8.00,12:7.00,15:6.00, 45:5.00


Color Red

QTY

1

2-3

4-6

7-9

10-12

13-15

16+

PRICE

$11.00

$10.00

$9.00

$8.00

$7.00

$6.00

$5.00

As you can see, the number you enter is the maximum limit of the discount, and the price applied to anything below the number associated with it.

        • Onetime Attributes Qty Price Discount: Onetime Quantity discounts allow specific amounts to be applied to quantity discounts. Example: 400:5 will apply a onetime charge of $5 to an order with any number of items less than 400. Negative numbers work for in these entries as well, making them quantity discounts or quantity charges. This is useful if you define a base price and would like to allow the user to have the discount off the base price.
        • Price per Word – Free Words:
        • Price Per Letter:  - Free Letters:
        • Attribute Flags (the coloured boxes). These are used to help distinquish other features of the attribute such as:
          • Use for display only - attribute cannot be selected and added to cart. Good for things like "Select from Below" to force the customer to make their own choice and not just hit Add to Cart and get a pink ball instead of a blue ball
          • Attribute is Free when product is Free - the attribute will be free if the product is free otherwise prices you've set will apply
          • Default Attribute - sets the attribut as default so it is already selected
          • Apply Discounts - used by Product Sale/Special -this will apply the same type of discount that the product is getting from the products price vs the special or sale price
          • Include in Base Price - when products are priced by attributes if this setting is selected then the lowest priced attributes will all be added to the base price of the product and displayed to the customer.
          • Attribute Required for TEXT - means the customer must fill in this field before adding it to the cart
      • Attribute Images
        • To add an image to each attribute you can either type the filename into the 'Attributes Image Swatch' text box or
        • click BROWSE and select the image from your computer.
        • If you type in the filename then you will need to upload it to your server yourself and select the NO radio button under 'Overwrite Existing Image?'
        • click INSERT
      • Downloadable Products As Attributes
        • type in the filename of the download
        • type in how many days the download will expire
        • type in the maximum number of downloads that can be made
        • click INSERT
  • Copying Attrubutes to Other Products or Categories
    • You can copy the attributes from one product to another product or to every product in a category. The attribute images and any other attribute options for price or weight also get copied and can be edited once copied.
    • At the top of the attributes controller are several self explanatory buttons to other sections of the admin. The last two are both ‘COPY TO’. The first is to a product the second to a category
    • click COPY TO (product or category depending on your preference)
    • in the large scroll box choose the category or product you want to copy the selected product attributes to
    • You then have 3 options
      • delete first, then copy new attributes - this will delete any attributes attached to the products your copying to then it will add the new attributes
      • update with new attribute images/settings/prices, then adds the new attributes
      • ignore and add only new attributes - this will not alter any existing attributes, it will only add new ones
      • select one of the above and click COPY
    • the admin will notify you if this has been successful or not at the top of the screen