Managing Assortments (3I5)

The figure shows the basic set-up of a Retail organization with the headquarters (US Retailer Inc.), and their distribution centers and stores. Additionally, there are the (external) business partners: suppliers for merchandise procurement, and customers (wholesale, re-sellers,..), and consumers on the sales side.

This unit focuses on the headquarters processes, which cover site maintenance, setting up merchandise categories, and creating retail articles, including vendor data. Furthermore, assortment modules are created, connecting sites and articles. To complete master data maintenance, sales prices are created. With that, the basis for retail operations are set.

In solution process Sites for Retail (3I3), sites are set up across SAP Central Business Configuration, retail-specific product configuration, and master data maintenance in the application. Site groupings are created for use in reporting, as selection criteria in various applications, and to select sites in various applications. The merchandise category hierarchy, covered in solution process Product Taxonomies for Retail (5FJ), is the central classification for the retail articles. Characteristics can be used to define attributes for information purposes, but can also be assigned to classes, which are then used to define the variants of generic articles. The solution process Products for Retail (3I1) explains the retail article categories single article, generic article, and structured articles, and how to maintain vendor-article specific data in purchasing info records. It also introduces functions for managing retail article master records, such as data creating via interface, mass maintenance, discontinuation. The Assortments (3I5) solution process introduces the maintenance of assortment modules, which are used to connect articles and sites, which includes the creation of article-site specific data in the background. With that, the articles are ready to be ordered, received, and sold in the sites. Actually, to be sold, a sales price has to be defined for the articles. The system supports the creation of sales prices for the articles on different pricing levels in the sales price calculation function, as explained in solution process Sales Pricing for Retail (3I4).

Each solution process represents a lesson in this unit, and can be completed individually.

This lesson covers the solution process Assortments (3I5).

In the retail industry, specific terms differ from the standard terms used in other lines of business. The following terms are used synonymously in this document:

For each retailer, defining the assortment of each store is one of the central strategic and operational tasks.

In Assortment Management, a Retailer defines which articles should be managed in which stores in which period of time. For example, if a retailer runs a do-it-yourself (DIY) store chain, as well as a supermarket store chain, it must be ensured that the DIY articles are assigned to the DIY stores, and the food articles to the supermarket stores. To that end, Assortment Modules, which are used to connect the assigned products and stores, are created in SAP Retail. For the assigned article, and the assigned store, a listing condition is created, which includes the assignment period. For assortment management purposes, a local assortment, that is, a site-specific assortment is automatically created in the background once a new site is fully maintained, which includes the maintenance of the site's business partner (customer data).

In that way, the assortment of a store usually consists of a number of assortment modules. For each article and store, the relevant assignment periods to the assortment module are defined, so that the range of articles for a store can change over time: for example, seasonal items typically have a shorter assignment period than basic, year-round articles. From a logistics point of view, the articles have to be procured in time, so that they are available in the stores for the defined sales period:

• The sales period is defined in the article master
• The procurement period is defined via the assignment periods in assortment management

The process of defining the article-site relationships in assortment management is referred to as listing. Each relationship is always time dependent, that is, the definition of the time periods, for which a product can be ordered, received, and sold, is essential.

In SAP Retail, a site can only order an article, if a valid listing condition (= time-dependent article-site assignment) exists for the planned delivery date in the purchase order item. With a valid listing condition, it can then also be goods receipt posted. The article is then available for sales according to the sales period defined in the article master.

In case an article, which is not listed, should be received (goods receipt posted) into a store, the system checks if subsequent listing is allowed, or not allowed for the store (this is a site-specific configuration setting).

In summary: The assortment module management solution provides a flexible and immediate approach to defining listing conditions. While the listing conditions define the procurement periods of products at retail sites, sales periods are defined in the product master data and are thus not targeted by the assortment module management solution.

In the application, Assortment Management begins with creating assortment modules. For online (manual) creation, you use the app Manage Assortment Modules (F4892). This is the central app, which allows you to create assortment modules and assortment module versions, to assign articles to the versions, and to assign stores (assortment users) to assortment modules. All these assignments are time-dependent, which offers maximum flexibility. Via the Edit button, you can make changes to an existing assortment at any point in time. Let's look at the features and functions step by step.

Creating Assortment Modules: Retailers can define their assortment management concept according to their own business rules. For example, assortment modules could be created by:

• the different areas in the store, that is, creating assortment modules by shelf, e.g. for household goods, for fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, dairy, …)
• merchandise category or merchandise category hierarchy structure
• the presentation of items on the sales floor (for example per area for fashion brands)
• ... any other customer specific criteria

Creating Assortment Module Versions and Assigning Articles: In fact, each assortment module has at least one version. Within an assortment module, each version has a certain validity period. For example, in geographical zones with substantial temperature differences between the winter and summer seasons, a DIY assortment module 'outdoor toys' may include children snow shovels and snow sliders during winter time - reflected in one assortment module version, versus water toys and other beach equipment during the summer period - reflected in another version. There may be gaps in the validity periods of an assortment modules' versions, but no overlaps, and a version has a minimum duration of 1 day.

This means, articles are not directly assigned to an assortment module, but to one, or several versions of an assortment module. However, each article assignment still has its own validity period, which can be the same, or within the version's period.

When you assign a product to an assortment module version using the Manage Assortment Modules app, you can choose whether the system assigns the product only to the selected version, or to the follow-on versions as well.

Assigning Assortment Users: In this app, you can also assign the assortment users, that is, the local store assortments. Note: The assortment user assignment level is the assortment module, not the version(s). You can also assign a store for multiple assignment periods. The assortment user's assignment period does not depend on the existing validity periods of the assortment module versions.

In contrast to the central Manage Assortment Modules app, which allows you to assign stores (actually their local assortments), to your selected assortment module, the Assign Store to Assortment Module (F4893) app takes the store-centered approach for the assignment. First of all, it allows you to copy the assortment of an existing store to a target store. This is particularly useful for a new store opening. Furthermore, the app allows you to select a store, and display the existing assortment module assignments. There, you can add - again specifying an assignment period - further assortment modules (one or more in one go). You can also terminate, or adjust the current assignment periods for each assigned assortment module. It is also possible to click an Assortment Module: the link takes you to the Manage Assortment Modules app. The Assign Store to Assortment Module app also offers a detail view for each assortment module, where you can see which articles are assigned to that module, for which period of time. In that detail view, you can also choose to exclude an article, or undo an exclusion for the selected store.

Compared to the central app Manage Assortment Modules, the Assign Product to Assortment Modules (F4894) app offers a product-centric approach to connecting articles and assortment modules. In this app, you start selecting a product, and then, in the detail view, you see the existing assortment module assignments. For those, you can adapt the assignment period, or also choose to replace a product with a follow-up article. You can add your selected product to further assortment modules.

When you drill down further, to see the details for your selected product and a specific assortment module, you can see the relevant versions of that module, which add up to the overall assignment period of the article and assortment module. Note: When you assign a product to an assortment module using the Assign Product to Assortment Modules app, the system assigns the product to all versions that are valid today or in the future. Thus, the product's assignment period for the assortment module can extend over more than just one version. However, also for the newly assigned assortment modules, you can use the Adapt Assignment Period function to control the listing period.

As articles and assortment users are assigned to assortment modules with individual periods, the listing conditions are created for the intersections of both periods.

Assign Products to Distribution Centers: Last but not least, you use this app to list articles for your distribution centers (DC), that is, for the local assortments of your DCs. As for the stores, also for each DC, the system automatically creates a local assortment in the background when the DC is fully maintained, that is, including the business partner (customer data). In the app, you start searching for one or more products. You then select one or several products, and choose Assign, where you select one or more distribution centers. In the detail view for an article, you can see the assigned DCs, and there you can then also specify the assignment period for each DC. By default, the assignment is maintained from the current day - unlimited (12/31/9999). Here, you can also choose to delete assignments, or add new ones.

Tip: When you search for your article(s), and you want to see if they have any DC assignments yet, you can choose No in the Assigned to DC? search field.

As mentioned earlier, it is essential that articles are listed in the relevant sites. A valid listing condition is a prerequisite for ordering, and goods receipt posting. But what happens in listing? Besides creating the listing condition itself, the system also creates site-specific article master data. This for example includes valuation data, as well as settings for automatic procurement (forecasting, replenishment).

Summary: Based on your assortment management data, the system creates the listing conditions for the sites, and generates the article logistics data for these sites, in case these don't yet exist (as these could also be created manually via the article maintenance function). With that, your articles are ready to be ordered, and received, and - considering the article sales period - ready to be sold in your sites.

The Listing Overview (F7745) app, you can display listing conditions for the article and store combination along with assortment module, promotion and allocation table information. Additionally, it allows you to navigate directly to relevant applications in order to view details of the store, promotion, assortment module and product. The field listing level provides a hierarchical overview of the listing data per article and store: Listing level L (Listing) generally indicates that a listing condition exists for the shown period. Listing level A (Assortment) shows the assortment modules, and listing level V (Version) the assortment module versions, which are the concrete source of the listing conditions.

Postprocess Assortments (F6835) app: With this app, you can schedule and monitor the generation of missing listing conditions and site-specific product master data. The app is a specialization of the generic Application Jobs app. It provides the predefined Generation of Listing Conditions and Product Master Data job template. Always schedule the job using the job template after you have migrated (via .xls upload) your assortments for assortment users (for instance, stores) and/or for distribution centers. In addition, schedule the job using the job template whenever an error occurs during the automated assortment postprocessing triggered by the assortment module management solution.

Monitor Assortment Postprocessing Errors (F4891) app: With this app, you can monitor errors that occurred during the generation of product master data. Each time you create or change an assignment related to an assortment module, the system immediately creates and adapts the listing conditions and, if necessary, initiates the generation of product master data. These automatic processing steps support you in keeping the listing conditions up to date, reducing the number of errors that occur during the generation of product master data, and eventually simplifying the resolution of these errors. The Assortment Module Management Log (F5477) app allows you to display the application log entries for the assortment module management solution. The app is a specialization of the generic Application Logs app.

For the assortment module management solution, the business configuration settings allow you to:

• define the lead time for advance notifications that the system sends to users who are responsible for processing errors that occur during master data generation. These responsible users are also defined - by merchandise category - in a separate configuration step.
• specify whether the system ignores or considers the opening date and closing date of a site when calculating the respective listing conditions.
• see the retention period that defines the number of days for which the system retains the assortment module versions after they have expired: The predefined value is 365 days.

There are comprehensive APIs for Assortment Module Management, specifically the Assortment Module (A2X) (Version 0002), and the Product Assignment to Distribution Center (A2X) OData services to integrate external applications, such as assortment planning tools, with the assortment module management solution in SAP S/4HANA Cloud.

Summary

The key process flows covered in the tutorials for this process are to:

• Manage Assortment Modules
• Assign Products to Distribution Centers
• Assign Product to Assortment Modules
• Assign Store to Assortment Modules