In everyday life, everyone must have heard about the SKU code, but in fact if we are not professional, not everyone can understand it in detail. Many of you will wonder what the SKU is? So why does each product need an SKU code? Especially professional business people need to put the SKU code to the most effective use? The following article will help you answer the questions – What is SKU? SKU number example, Why set an SKU product barcode? What is UPC? Difference between SKU and UPC.
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What is SKU?
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SKU is the acronym for Stock Keeping Unit, meaning inventory classification unit. According to the management of goods, SKU is a form of convention for the purpose of classifying items for sale, including parameters and attributes of that product to help us distinguish from other products.
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What is an SKU code?
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The SKU code on the product is the goods code for the purpose of expressing all information related to the product. These codes are not regulated nor standardized. Mostly, the number of SKU is not limited no matter how expanded your portfolio of goods is.
On the other side, the SKU also uses a single place or maybe a code corresponding to the storage unit. For example, you have two separate warehouses, but the special thing is that each of the same products in two different warehouses will have different SKU codes. This will make the management of goods more accurate and transparent. Moreover, the SKU is only related to the available goods and is ready for trading, not related to the goods that have been placed or are forwarded to the warehouse.
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Once a company has received the goods from the supplier, they will have the right to choose to keep the supplier’s SKU or be able to create a new SKU on their own. As long as the company feels fit and convenient. However, from experience, it is believed that the SKU code is an internal product management code, so it is recommended to create its own SKU code.
In general, in the field of warehouse management, SKU is a very useful tool that helps you search for products quickly, easily and scientifically.
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Why set an SKU product barcode?
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What is product SKU? For a product, the attributes that one can place in the SKU code include the following: product type, manufacturer, general description, material, size, colour, packaging and warranty policies. Therefore, SKU code is an important factor in the process of goods management and inventory management.
Therefore, we need to put SKU product barcodes because they will help you a lot in the business of sales and goods management.
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SKU code is an internal code that helps you quickly identify products to sell and manage goods effectively.
Different SKU codes will help differentiate different product versions.
SKU codes can help distinguish the same type of goods but in two different warehouses.
SKU codes can limit out-of-stock and loss during inventory management.
The SKU code is the point that links products to channels when selling multi-channel.
It can be said that managing goods with SKU code is an effective and cost-effective way to manage goods for shops and entrepreneurs because there is no need to invest in hardware.
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How to create a professional SKU code?
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The way to create the SKU code is not too complicated, we just need to use the letters or numbers to the information that you want to include in the SKU code. Here is some information that you should include in the SKU code including:
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- Brand name
- Branch name
- Product categories
- Product type
- Product version
- Colour
- Size number
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The above information fields should be placed in a consistent order in the SKU code. The length of the SKU is unlimited, as long as you arrange it so that it is reasonable, easy to remember and easy to understand. When you set an SKU code you should combine both letters and numbers to make it easy to separate between information fields.
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Example: KH12G318JR
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In particular, the first two letters show the brand name, the next two digits are the product line, the middle letter is the category of the product, the next three numbers are the product type and the last two letters are expressing the branch name.
If in case you set the entire SKU code to letter or number, you need to specify that each field of information is 1, 2 or 3 characters or you can use a mark (-) to separate the information fields from each other.
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Example: NFDASKLISM or NF-DA-SK-LI-SM
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2213373641 or 22-13-37-36-41
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– which separates for every two characters or numbers is an information field. According to such SKU codes, SKU codes will not have to become in vain, meaningless numbers that you can read from those characters that have a lot of information about the product.
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Create your own SKU code
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Sometimes when we add a new product, the supplier will create an SKU code for that product but it is best to set the SKU code yourself. There are many shop owners who are afraid to set their own SKU code or have to put the code by adding the supplier’s SKU code, moreover, there are many shops that use the code of the supplier. Because the SKU code is an internal management code, you should create your own SKU code for yourself to manage.
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Sort information fields in an SKU code
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How do I know what information to include in the SKU code? How do we make it easy to remember? It’s simple, like when you classify a product, it’s the same thing.
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We can take an example of a laptop product, let’s start with the product category that is “electronics” you sign as E, continue to the type of product is “laptop” symbol is L, followed by the brand, for example HP computer, you sign as HP, followed by the screen size is 12, finally core i7 symbol is i7,… Just like that, you will have an SKU code for HP 12″ core i7 product as ELHP12i7.
You should follow rules set from large categories to small categories for all SKU codes. Thus, when you look at any SKU code, it will be easy to identify the product quickly.
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Don’t give too much information
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Setting an SKU code means that it doesn’t have to cram too much information into your SKU code. In all product information fields, consider carefully what information is most important and can help you distinguish between one product and another, then include in the SKU code.
In addition, if you do not want to create too long SKU codes, you should optimize the number of characters for the SKU code when you convene on how to set the code. For example, you have 8 providers, you can suggest that each provider is 1 digit in the sequence of numbers from 1 to 8 instead of you having to abbreviate the first letter of the provider name into 1 code 2 -3 characters.
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Note fonts and characters
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In a string of SKU code characters, you should not use letters, numbers that are easy to confuse.
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For example: O or 0 (capital o or 0?), I or l (capital letters or lowercase l?),..
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If you are required to use characters like this, you can specify that only capital letters in that SKU code, letters and numbers are clearly separated. For example, instead of you setting the SKU code to ALE021, you set it to ALE-021, so you won’t have to be confused about whether it’s a number or a letter anymore.
In some cases, you should avoid inserting special characters SKU codes, such as “&,”, “/”, “#”, “@”,… These special characters will make the reader feel extremely confused and will easily cause formatting errors when managed with software or by excel files. And you should not start the SKU code in 0 digits because when managing in excel, for example, it is easy to understand that the SKU code is 01234ACD, the software will understand 1234ACD.
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Distinguish between SKU and UPC
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SKU or Stock Keeping Unit is a commonly used design, however it is often uncommon for a particular product. We can take for example the following: each supplier offers you a specific product a separate SKU for that product. Additionally, a product may have an MPN (Manufacturer Part Number) assigned by the manufacturer.
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UPC or Universal Product Code is standard for general product types and is used on almost all barcode systems. UPC or commonly known as product codes are always printed on the packaging, using them for the purpose of identifying the origin of the items. Amazon also has its own system commonly known as ASIN (Amazon Identification Number Standard), although they do not appear much outside of Amazon.
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We can simply say that the SKU is optimized for internal warehouse management, while UPC is standardized for anyone who can read (as is currently available).
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