About Virtual Catalogs

Virtual Catalogs

A Virtual Catalog consists of virtual positions that typically represent the ATS quantity of a product in a location or across all locations in a network. It segments inventory so retailers can manage what is exposed to different channels/markets. It also takes in 'Controls' to affect the amount of inventory available to sell on any given channel.

A Virtual Catalog retrieves data from two sources:

•  Inventory Catalog — provides inventory on hand updates.  
•  Control Groups — provides Buffers and Exclusions

Virtual Catalog Workflow

The Virtual Catalog Workflow is responsible for calculating virtual inventory positions and updating the Virtual Catalog. These virtual positions provide selling channels (e.g., eCommerce sites) with an accurate picture of inventory that is ATS, preventing overselling or underselling.

How ATS is calculated

Recap of concepts and abbreviations:

• Available to Sell (ATS)
• Stock on hand (SOH)
• 'Buffer Stock' refers to the units below which an item at a particular location will be unavailable for online orders.   

In the Inventory Module, ATS is calculated using the formula: ATS = SOH + CONTROLS

ATS considers buffers and exclusions (see Controls) that have been applied to a specific Virtual position within a Virtual catalog. 

Example of an ATS calculation

An example referring to the top row of the diagram below:

• There are 15 units of shirts in Location A
• At location A, a buffer of -5 has been for shirts
• Once the buffers are applied, the Virtual Catalog will calculate the Available-to-sell (ATS): 15 SOH - 5 buffer = 10 ATS

Modelling Different ATS Scenarios

Inventory Segmentation

Inventory segmentation helps set aside a certain amount of inventory to cater to the needs of different channels or groups. It is a virtual division of inventory within the same facility based on logical groups. This capability ensures that each channel has sufficient inventory to satisfy demand and that any one channel cannot over-consume inventory at the expense of other channels.

A Virtual Catalog can be created for each channel to implement segmentation and distribute inventory among different channels, such as EComm, Retail, and Wholesale. For example:

• VC_EComm
• VC_Retail
• VC_Wholesale

Control Groups associated with each Virtual Catalog can also be created, in addition to Controls of type 'percentage buffer' to segment the inventory

These buffers can be: 

• 50% for EComm
• 20% for Retail
• 30% for Wholesale.

Reducing Overselling

Overselling can happen if there is a discrepancy with SOH figures within the source systems. It can also occur if the stock is in a store location and someone buys one of the items and either:

• Fluent Order Management is not aware of this
• If an item is damaged and has not been taken off sale
• A retailer has an unexpected increase in sales (or a flash sale), and more stock is sold before the ATS finishes updating

Retailers want to avoid overselling because not being able to fulfill an order for a customer will lead to a poor customer experience and will cost the retailer time and money.

A Control can be used to reduce the quantity visible as ATS to reduce the likelihood of overselling due to stock inaccuracies. 

Reference Controls can be applied at different levels of hierarchy depending on the retailer's requirement.

E.g., a retailer may want to protect a whole category from overselling because it is very popular - they could apply a quantity buffer at a whole category level. Otherwise if the oversell risk applied to a single product at a specific location they could apply a buffer control at the Product/Location level to prevent overselling.

Virtual Catalog Data Model