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Catalog Item: Preferred Vendors

Access Preferred Vendors in Catalog Items

Click on the Catalog then Catalog Items tab.

Clicking the 'edit' icon or creating a new Catalog Item, you are presented with the dialog described in the Editing Catalog Item - General section. Once there, clicking the 'Preferred Vendors' tab you will see the following screen.

Overview

Preferred vendors

The preferred vendors table allows administrators to specify which vendor is means to fulfill a particular catalog during the distribution process.

See the Vendors section for more information on vendors & distribution.

Configuring Vendors

  Name Description
1 Preferred Vendor List This table provides a list of all vendors assigned to this catalog item.
2 Add Vendor

Click to add a new Preferred Vendor to the list.

See "Adding a Vendor" for instructions.

3 Edit Vendor Click to edit an already specified vendor.
4

Delete Vendor

Once you've selected a previously define channel, click this button to remove it.
5 ▼ Move Down Change the priority order of a selected vendor. moving the selected vendor down in priority.
6 ▲ Move Up Click to save your changes and close the dialog.
7 Save Click to save your changes and close the dialog.

Adding a Vendor

Once you click "Add" or "edit" the following screen will appear.

  Name Description
1 Vendor Selection Specify the preferred vendor.
2 Vendor Priority

Specify the vendor priority. If multiple vendors are assigned to a catalog item, the system will select the first vendor that supports this catalog item type.

For Example

Vendor A is configured to accept "Personalized" catalog items.

Vendor B: is configured to accept "Print on Demand and AdHoc" items.

"CatalogItem A" (a personalized catalog item) is configured with two vendors. shown below in priority order.

  • Vendor B
  • Vendor A

During the distribution process, the system will first check if Vendor B has been configured to handle Personalized documents.

  • Since Vendor B is not defined to handle "personalized" catalog items, the system will them move onto the next vendor in the list.
  • In this case Vendor A does support 'Personalized' catalog items, so it will be chosen to handle the distribution.

For more information on the distribution process, vendors and workflow states see the section on distribution.

3 Catalog Name An optional field that, if provided, will be passed the vendor of choice during the distribution process.
4 Catalog Location An optional field that, if provided, will be passed the vendor of choice during the distribution process.
5 Done An optional field that, if provided, will be passed the vendor of choice during the distribution process.

Do I have to configure a preferred vendor for each catalog item?

No. Preferred vendors are a means for Administrators to tell the system to bypass the generic vendor matching process.