Product Families

A product family groups products that belong together. It also holds the attributes that make the variants of a configurable product. This page is for the person who keeps the catalogue.

A product has one family at most. A configurable product must have one, because Beelocity reads the family to make the variants. For any other product, the family is optional.

What Families Do

Families do two things:

1. Organization

Families group related products. “Apparel”, “Electronics”, “Building Materials” and “Office Supplies” could each be a family, one for each broad part of your business. The Products list shows each product’s family, and its filter button can narrow the list to one family.

2. Attribute Definition

A family holds attributes. The “Apparel” family might hold Size, Colour, Material and Care Instructions. You add them on the family’s Attributes tab, and one attribute can sit on several families.

Beelocity reads a family’s attributes at one moment only. When you create a configurable product, it makes one variant for each combination of the family’s variant attributes, such as Size and Colour. It does this once, so a later change to the family adds no variant and changes none. See Product Attributes for details.

No product form shows a field for a family’s attributes. So an attribute that makes no variants holds no value on any product, and it does nothing there.

Creating a Family

1. Open Inventory → Setup and its Product Families tab.
2. Click New.
3. Fill in:
   • Name: a clear name for the family, such as “Textile Products” or “Electronic Components”.
   • Code: already filled in with the next one (FAM-000004 after FAM-000003). Keep it, clear it to get the next one when you save, or type your own (TEXTILE). Beelocity keeps a code that you type.
   • Parent family: optional. Pick the family above this one to build a tree.
   • Active: turn this off if you no longer use the family. It stays on its products, and the product form still offers it.
4. Click Save.

After you save, add attributes to the family. A family with no variant attributes makes no variants, so it is only a label.

Managing Attributes on a Family

Open a family and go to its Attributes tab. The tab has two lists: Attributes on this family and Attributes you can add. Here you can:

• Add an attribute. Click Add beside it in the second list.
• Take an attribute off the family. Click Remove beside it in the first list. The attribute itself stays on the Product Attributes tab, and no variant changes.
• Mark an attribute. Make required and Make optional change the Required mark on this family. Beelocity only stores this mark, and no form asks for the value.

To create an attribute, or to change its name, type or choices, use the Product Attributes tab. That tab also decides whether an attribute makes variants.

See Product Attributes for attribute types, variant attributes and how to set them up.

Family Hierarchy

You can place families in a parent-child tree with the Parent family field. The tree only keeps the list in order. A child family takes no attributes from its parent, and each family holds its own. A configurable product reads the attributes of its own family and no other. The Child families tab on a family lists the families directly under it.

On the Product Families page, the filter button beside the search box narrows the list to the children of one Parent family. It can also show only Active or inactive families (see Working with lists).

Example

Apparel
├── T-Shirts
├── Pants
├── Jackets
└── Accessories

Electronics
├── Phones
├── Tablets
├── Accessories
└── Components

Building Materials
├── Cement & Concrete
├── Steel & Metal
└── Wood & Timber

The tree helps you find a family in a long list. If you have 20 or 30 families, you can narrow the list to the children of one parent.

Tips

• Give one family to one type of product. A configurable product gets a variant for each combination of its family’s variant attributes. So group products that need the same choices. T-shirts and pants both need Size and Colour, but a phone needs Screen Size and Storage, so it belongs in another family.
• Finish a family’s attributes before you create its products. Beelocity makes variants once, when you create the product. If you add an attribute later, existing products keep their variants. You then add any new variant by hand on the product’s Variants tab.
• Keep family names broad. “Clothing” is a better family name than “Red T-Shirts in Cotton”. Use product categories for finer sorting.
• Use the tree to find families, and not to share attributes. A child family takes nothing from its parent, so the tree changes nothing on a product.