Create a blemished product

A blemished product is a separate, inventory-bearing copy of an existing standard product — used to track and sell open-box, lightly damaged, or B-grade units apart from your pristine stock. It carries its own SKU, its own FIFO inventory, and a link back to the product it came from, plus a condition and optional reference describing why it's blemished.

You create one from the source product's detail page. SKU.io duplicates the product for you, stamps it as blemished, and records the link — you only supply the new SKU and (optionally) the condition and reference.

To understand where blemished sits among the other product types, see Product types explained.

Before you begin

• You need the products.update permission. Without it the Create Blemished Product action is hidden. See Product permissions reference.
• The source must be a standard product. Blemished products can only be derived from standard products — not from a bundle, matrix, kit, variation, or another blemished product. The Create Blemished Product action appears on standard and kit detail pages, but choosing it from a kit is rejected on save (see If the source isn't a standard product).
• Blemished is inventory-bearing. Once created it holds its own stock, FIFO layers, and cost basis, independent of the original. For how stock and FIFO work, see Inventory overview.

Create the blemished copy

1. Open the source product's detail page (from the products list, click its SKU).
2. Open the Actions menu and choose Create Blemished Product. The Create Blemished Product dialog opens.
3. The Blemished SKU field is pre-filled with a suggested SKU (see How the suggested SKU is generated). Accept it or type your own — it must be unique across every product, including archived ones.
4. Optionally fill in Condition (for example, Open box or Scratched) and Reference (a free-text note or ticket number). Both are optional.
5. Click Create.

SKU.io creates the blemished product in a single transaction and takes you straight to its detail page. The new product:

• Is stamped with the blemished type.
• Copies the source product's attributes, categories, images, and pricing tiers. Supplier links aren't copied — attach suppliers on the new product yourself (see Manage a product's suppliers).
• Records the original SKU in the blemished product's MPN field, so you can always see which product it came from.
• Stores the condition and reference you entered, plus a link back to the original (derived_from_product_id).
• Starts with zero stock — the dialog doesn't move any inventory. To bring in units, see Give the blemished product stock.

On the new product's detail page, the Blemish Info card shows the condition and reference and links back to the original product.

How the suggested SKU is generated

When the dialog opens it asks SKU.io for a suggested SKU based on your Blemished SKU Pattern (configured under Settings → Blemished Products, alongside the Auto Generate SKU Pattern for Blemished Products toggle). The pattern supports two tokens:

Token	Expands to
{{sku}}	The original product's SKU
{{date:FORMAT}}	Today's date, formatted by FORMAT (for example {{date:YYYYMMDD}})

So a pattern like {{sku}}-BLEM-{{date:YYYYMMDD}} on source SKU WIDGET-1 produces WIDGET-1-BLEM-20260713. If that SKU already exists, SKU.io appends .1, .2, and continues incrementing until it finds a free one, so the suggestion is always unique.

Notes:

• The pattern must contain a {{date:...}} token. If it doesn't, the suggestion can't be generated and the dialog reports an error — fix the pattern in Settings → Blemished Products.
• The suggestion is only a starting point. You can overwrite Blemished SKU with anything unique before clicking Create.

Give the blemished product stock

The Create Blemished Product dialog creates the record only — it never moves inventory, so a freshly created blemished product has zero on hand. Bring stock in whichever way fits how the unit became blemished:

• Adjust stock on the blemished product — add the units with an inventory adjustment — a stock increase — choosing the warehouse, quantity, unit cost, adjustment date, and an optional note.
• Move the unit out of the original — if the blemished unit came off your good stock, decrease the original product by the same quantity with its own adjustment, so your standard on-hand stays accurate.
• Through a return — when a customer return is graded as blemished, the returns workflow can create (or top up) the blemished product and land its stock in one step: it decreases the original product and increases the blemished SKU together, moving the unit across automatically. That flow lives in the returns area — see Receive and grade a return.

Edge cases and rules

If the source isn't a standard product

The blemished type only makes sense as a copy of a standard product, so SKU.io enforces that on save: the source must exist and be a standard product. Because the Create Blemished Product action is also offered on kit detail pages, choosing it from a kit passes the dialog but is rejected when you click Create, with a validation message that the original must be a standard product. Bundles, matrix parents, variations, and existing blemished products never expose the action.

If the blemished SKU already exists

The SKU you enter must be unique across all products. If you type a SKU that already belongs to any product, Create fails validation and the blemished product isn't created — pick a different SKU (or accept the auto-generated suggestion, which is always unique).

There is a separate "add stock to an existing blemished product" path that tops up an existing blemished SKU instead of erroring on the duplicate. That path isn't exposed by this dialog — it's used by the returns workflow so that repeated returns of the same condition accumulate onto one blemished product rather than failing. From the products page, one blemished SKU is created once.

Editing the condition or reference later

The condition and reference are stored on the blemished product, not baked into it. Edit them any time from the blemished product's detail page — see Edit a product's details. Changing them doesn't affect the original product or the blemished product's stock.

Related channel features (elsewhere)

• Auto-listing blemished stock to eBay or Amazon, and blemished coverage reports, live in the Listings and reporting areas — they're out of scope here and are covered in the Listings guide (coming soon).
• Creating blemished products from returns/RMAs is part of the returns workflow — see Receive and grade a return.

Next steps

• Set a product's price — blemished units usually sell below the original; pricing tiers are copied but you can override them.
• Manage a product's suppliers — supplier links aren't copied, so add them here.
• Adjust inventory — bring the blemished unit into stock.
• Product types explained — how blemished compares to standard, kit, bundle, and matrix.

Video transcript

A blemished product is a separate copy of a standard product — used to track and sell open-box or lightly damaged units apart from your pristine stock. You make one from the source product's detail page: open the Actions menu and choose Create Blemished Product. The dialog suggests a unique SKU for the copy — accept it or type your own. Optionally add a condition, like Open box, and a reference note. Click Create, and SKU makes a blemished copy with its own SKU, inventory, and a link back to the original — starting at zero stock.