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Products with Variations

Customize shipping attributes for parent and child products in ShipperHQ

Table of Contents

Overview

With ShipperHQ, you can match different shipping criteria to both products and their variations. 😊 For example, if you sell a configurable product like a Bike with various wheel sizes, you might want to pack these in different box sizes depending on the wheel size chosen by the customer. By default, ShipperHQ uses the parent's attributes. However, it's important to know that BigCommerce does not support using parent attributes over child attributes. This is because BigCommerce sends each product as a standalone item, so ShipperHQ only sees the variant product's attributes if they are included in a request. ⚠️

Parent/Child Relationship

In the Bike example, associating shipping attributes with child products helps get accurate sizes. For items like t-shirts with different colors or sizes, where packaging might be consistent, you may associate shipping attributes with the parent. Product attributes impacting shipping include:

  • Shipping group
  • Origin
  • Dimensions

These attributes can vary depending on your e-commerce platform. 💡

Configuration Options

ShipperHQ defaults to looking at attributes defined on the parent product, except for weight. To alter this setting:

  1. In your ShipperHQ Dashboard, click on Websites in the Basic Setup section.
  2. Select your website from the Websites table.
  3. Go to the Advanced tab.
  4. Uncheck the Use Parent for Attributes option.

Selecting this option makes child product attributes take precedence over those defined on the parent. Click here to use parent attributes in ShipperHQ

💡 Note for Shopify: If the option to use parent attributes is selected, you won't see the variants when editing shipping properties. Deselecting the option reveals these variants.

Example

Consider a product in the cart with the configuration: Parent: Light

  • Shipping group: none

Child: 10-bulb

  • Shipping group: LARGE-LIGHT

Child: 4-bulb

  • Shipping group: MEDIUM-LIGHT

When Use Parent is selected, no shipping group is assigned to the 10-bulb light in the cart. If Use Parent is unselected, the shipping group is set to LARGE-LIGHT. You can set up rules accordingly, like adding a $3 surcharge for large lights and $2 for medium ones. 😊

Bundle Products

Bundle products in Magento are handled similarly to configurable products. If the parent attribute option is checked, ShipperHQ considers the parent's attributes. If not, it looks at the attributes of the products within the bundle.

Virtual Products

You can choose to ignore virtual products at the Website level under advanced options. This ensures they are excluded from any calculation rules, like price-based rules, since virtual products generally aren't shipped. However, you can include them if needed. ✅

Custom Options

In Magento, custom options for products do not allow for associated shipping data as attributes can't be assigned to them.