Generic Items

Generic Items

Generic Items may be used in recipe-building and are used to group items with different CU measures. Create a Generic Item when you have two or more inventory items that are the same ingredient but counted separately when taking an Audit. Generic Items may also be used in Recipes and depleted accordingly. 

For example you can use Generic Items if you have both a 750mL and a 1L bottle of the same liquor, or you buy your avocados in 60 count as well as 45 count cases, but make your guacamole with whatever avocados are ripe that day. Generic Items allows you to blur the two items together and see their purchases, depletions, and inventory counts either separate, or all rolled up together.

To create and use a Generic Item:

1. Find the Items you would like to consolidate from your Items List. 
   
   
   
   
2. Navigate to Items & Vendors > Generic Items.
   
   
   
   
3. Select + New Generic Item.
   
   
   
   
4. Select a unique Item Name, Category, and Count Measure. Note that the Count Unit will always be "1", this cannot be changed. Once complete click on the Generic Items tab in item details panel.
   
   
   
   
5. Search and select the Items with different CU measures. Once complete, Save Item.
   
   
   
   **Note** If using Generic Item in recipes, the platform will deplete in descending order e.g. 750mL bottle before the 1L in the example shown.
   
   
   
   
6. Once complete, Save Item.
   
   
   
   
7. When adding ingredients to recipes you will be able to select your new Generic Item as an ingredient. As mentioned above when depleting generic items the system will deplete all of the first item first, and then start depleting from the second, and move down the list.
   
   

Generic Items and Director

You can set up Generic Items at Director and they will sync down to the store level if the store has ANY of the ingredients in the Generic Item. As a result, this is an excellent way of managing recipes at Director even if your stores are buying slightly different items from their various regional vendors.

For example if you sell Guacamole and some of your stores buy a 60 count case of avocados, and others buy a 45 count case of avocados, you can make a Generic Item at Director linking these two items together, then make your Guacamole recipe at Director using the Avocado Generic Item, and when the recipe is synced down to the store level the Avocado Generic Item will deplete from the avocado item that store has in their inventory. 

Alternate Uses

While the above described examples (varying bottle sizes and differing case sizes across markets) are the primary use of the Generic Items function, it can also be used creatively for circumstances like a rotating keg tap (when the other taps don't change frequently). For a rotating keg tap you can just add the new keg to your Generic Item list when you receive it, and then once the system has depleted the items above it on the list it will automatically start depleting from the new keg. This should be in line with you replacing the old keg with the new keg on the line.

Related article(s)

• Creating Recipes and Subrecipes
• Adding Individual Items
• Managing Items