Adding Items

Create materials, services, and products in your catalog

Adding Items

Adding items to Products & Services builds the catalog that powers usage tracking, project costing, and purchase orders. Only a name is required, so you can start small and fill in detail over time.

Quick Start: Add an Item

Select Products & Services in the sidebar
Click Add Item
Enter a Name (required) and choose an Item Type
Add SKU, category, unit, and unit cost as needed
For materials, set an initial quantity and reorder point
Click Create Item

Choosing an Item Type

The item type determines whether the item tracks stock.

Type	Tracks quantity?	Example
Material	Yes	6" PVC casing, bentonite, well caps
Service	No	Drilling, pump installation, water testing
Non-inventory	No	Drop-shipped or one-off goods

When you pick Service or Non-inventory, the quantity and reorder-point fields disappear, since those items are stockless.

Item Fields

Field	Required?	Purpose
Name	Yes	The label shown throughout the system
Item Type	Yes	Material, Service, or Non-inventory
SKU	No	Your internal code, used for search and reordering
Manufacturer SKU	No	The vendor or manufacturer part number
Category	No	Grouping for filtering and reporting
Unit	No	How the item is measured (foot, bag, each, hour)
Unit Cost	No	Cost per unit, used for value and project costing
Description	No	Specs, usage notes, or vendor detail

Categories are free text. Type a new category name on any item to create it, then reuse it from the category filter on the list.

Common Units

Unit	Used for
Foot	Casing, pipe, screen
Bag	Bentonite, grout, cement
Gallon	Chemicals, fuel
Ton	Sand, gravel
Each	Fittings, caps, seals
Hour	Labor and services

Unit Cost drives value and cost calculations: quantity times unit cost equals total value. Updating an item's cost applies to future calculations; past transactions keep the cost recorded at the time.

On an item's detail page you can also work out a retail price from a markup (or a markup from a target retail price) using the built-in calculator.

Stock Settings (Materials Only)

Material items can hold two stock fields at creation.

Field	Purpose
Initial Quantity	The count on hand when you create the item
Reorder Point	The threshold that triggers a Low Stock warning

If you are migrating from another system, you can create items with a zero quantity first, then set opening balances with a stock adjustment noted as "Beginning inventory count" so the transaction history stays clean.

Tax and Accounting

Setting	Purpose
Taxable	Whether tax applies when the item is billed
Tax Category	How tax is resolved for the item on invoices
Income Account	The accounting income account the item maps to

Multi-entity companies also see an Entity selector; leaving it on the default shares the item across all entities.

Setting Initial Stock After Creation

If you did not set a quantity up front, add it with a stock adjustment.

Open the item from the list
Click Adjust Stock
Choose Add (or Set to enter an exact count)
Enter the quantity from your physical count
Add a reason note like "Initial inventory count"
Save the adjustment

Importing Many Items

To add items in bulk, use Import CSV on the Products & Services list. The wizard uploads a CSV, auto-maps columns, previews the result, and creates the items. Name is the only required column; SKU, category, unit, unit cost, quantity, reorder point, description, and location are optional. Imports are capped at 1,000 rows.

Troubleshooting

Can't create the item?

Confirm the Name field is filled in
Check that unit cost and quantity are valid numbers

Item not showing in project dropdowns?

Refresh the page and confirm the item saved
Check that your user has access to Products & Services

Managing Items - View and edit items
Stock Level Tracking - Reorder points and stock status
Transactions - Log adjustments and usage
Purchase Orders - Order materials