Link supplies to products so orders reserve them

Allmoxy links inventory directly to your products, so each order reserves the right supplies from what the customer picked. For example, a customer chooses under-mount drilling for an 18" deep drawer and Allmoxy allocates the right size of under-mount glides from inventory. There are two ways to set it up: link a supply to each option of a dropdown attribute and use that attribute on a part, or put a fixed supply on a part. Either way, the part's formula says how much of the supply each item uses, in the supply's piece size.

Applies to: catalog orders on every shop that tracks supplies (itemized orders list their supplies by hand; see below). Editing attributes and parts needs Manage Catalog.

In this article

Before you start
Link a supply to each dropdown option
Use the association on a part
Or put a fixed supply on a part
Write the quantity formula
Supplies sold as their own line, and itemized orders
Check that it worked
Things to know

Before you start

Your supplies and locations exist; see Set up supplies, vendors and stock locations.
The product has a part for the piece that uses the supply, for example Hinges; see Parts: how a product is calculated.

Link a supply to each dropdown option

Use this when the supply depends on what the customer picks (sheet material, hinge type, glide size). A dropdown is a select-style attribute; see How attributes work.

Go to Settings > E-commerce > Product Attributes and open the select-style attribute you want to edit.
Make sure the setting that directly associates the attribute with supplies is checked.
Open the Supply Item Association view of the option table.
Label the association, for example Sheet Material. Renaming it later updates every part that uses it.
For each option, pick the Location (for example 1- Sheet Materials) and the Inventory Item (for example 3/4 - White) you want to associate. You can add up to 10 linked supplies per option.
Save the attribute.

If you need to associate more than 10 inventory items with one option, contact our implementation engineers through your Customer Success Manager or support@allmoxy.com.

Use the association on a part

Open the product, go to its Parts section and open the part that uses the supply.
Add a new Part Supply.
Select the attribute from the dropdown, then the association you labeled.
Write the formula that says how much of the supply one item uses (see below), then save.

On an order, the supply row follows the option the customer picked: 3/4 - White on a white door, a different sheet on a maple one.

Or put a fixed supply on a part

If you can't link a supply through an attribute (a part always uses the same hinge, say), open the part, add a Part Supply, select the Inventory option, and choose the specific supply by its Supply Location and Supply Name. Write the quantity formula the same way.

Write the quantity formula

The formula gives the amount of the supply one item uses, and it must come out in the supply's piece size: if the supply is counted in feet, the formula must give feet, not inches. On the order, the result is multiplied by the line quantity and added up per location and supply, so 2 hinges per door on a line of 5 doors is 10 hinges Needed.

Quantities that need arithmetic. For sheet goods you usually want square feet. Multiply height by width, then divide by 144 to turn square inches into square feet: a 24 by 30 inch slab door is 720 square inches, which is 720 / 144 = 5 square feet. For a product with several pieces (a cope and stick door), add each piece's area inside the one formula: the panel's width times height, plus the top rail's width times length, plus the bottom rail's, and so on for each part, then divide the whole thing by 144. Be careful with your parentheses so that the division applies to the whole sum.

Supplies sold as their own line, and itemized orders

A supply that is sold as its own order line (Available in catalog ticked on the supply) reserves from the supply's allocation location; a supply with no allocation location reserves nothing when sold. Itemized orders take their supplies from the rows typed on the order's Supplies section, not from parts; see Itemized orders.

Check that it worked

Create a test order with one or two products, save it, and open the order's Resource Allocation tab. The Needed column shows the totals for each supply the order calls for, per location: if you've set up Hinges as a part and connected it to your inventory, it tells you how many hinges this order needs. Needed is rebuilt every time the order is saved, so you can change the options and save again to see the supply row follow. If a number is off, see My supply counts or Need to Purchase look wrong. The inventory reports (Inventory in Use, Allocated Supplies, Supplies in Use) then show the supply at every stage of production; see Guide: Inventory and purchasing in Allmoxy.

Things to know

Lines with a manual price edit are skipped when the order's supplies are worked out, so a hand-priced line reserves nothing.
Renaming an association on the attribute updates every part using it; you don't need to touch the parts.
Exported products lose their part supply rows. After importing a product into another site, set its supplies up again.
Up to 10 supplies per option. Ask for help if you need more.