Configure Product Variants in Odoo 17 Manufacturing

Product variants in Odoo 17 are cases of a product that varies by certain attributes such as size, colour, or material. These variants are managed through the Product Variants feature in Odoo 17, allowing manufacturers to simplify their operations by giving a wide range of options to customers. Odoo provides robust features for easily managing product variants within its manufacturing module.

In this blog, we’ll be going into how Odoo 17 facilitates the creation, configuration, and production of product variants.

The base product will act as a base for creating variants. Attributes are the characteristics that differentiate one variant from another. These attributes could be size, colour, material, configuration, or any other specification. Manufacturers create variants by defining the attributes associated with the base product and specifying the possible values for each attribute. For example, a footwear manufacturer might create variants of a shoe based on size (38, 40, 41) and color (red, blue, black).

Each product variant may have its own Bill of Materials (BoM), which lists the materials, components etc required for its production. This allows manufacturers to customize the production process for each variant based on its requirements. Manufacturing product variants requires careful production planning to ensure that the right quantities of materials are available. Effective planning helps to reduce waste, and lead times, and meet customer demand efficiently.

Let’s check how we can manufacture a variant of the base product using the Odoo 17 Manufacturing module.

In Odoo, a single Bill of Materials (BoM) can be applied to multiple variants of the same product. This consolidated approach reduces the necessity to handle separate BoMs for each variant.

Utilizing a unified BoM for products with variants makes more efficient management of manufacturing processes.

Enable Product Variant

To view the product variants feature in Odoo, follow these steps:

1. Go to the Inventory module.

2. Click on Configuration and select Settings.

3. Scroll down to the Products section.

4. Locate the Variants option and enable it.

5. Once enabled, click Save to apply the settings.

Create Custom Product Attributes

After activating the product variants feature in Odoo, follow these steps to create and edit product attributes on the Attributes page:

1. Access the Attributes page:

• From the Inventory app – Configuration – Attributes
• Click the Attributes button.

2. Create or edit attributes:

• To create a new attribute, click New on the Attributes page.
• To edit an attribute, click on the attribute you wish to modify and then edit.

3. Customize the attribute:

• Assign a Name to the attribute.
• Select the desired options for Display Type
• In the Attribute Values tab, click Add a line to add new values for the attribute.

• Repeat this process to add multiple values if needed.

• Once all desired values have been added, click the Save icon to save.

Configure Product Variants to Base Product

To apply created attributes to specific variants of a product, follow these steps:

1. Inventory app > Products > Products.

2. Click on the product you want to modify, then make changes.

3. Go to the Variants tab.

4. Under the Attribute section, click Add a line to introduce a new attribute, and select from the available options in the drop-down menu.

5. In the Values section, choose from the existing values in the drop-down menu.

6. Repeat this process for all attributes that need to be added to the product.

7. After all desired attributes and values are selected, click Save to apply the changes.

Apply Bill of Materials (BoM) Components to Product Variants

To associate components with product variants in your Bill of Materials (BoM), follow these steps:

• 1. Manufacturing app > Products > Bills of Materials.
• 2. Create a new BoM by clicking create and if you want to edit an existing BOM, click on the edit button.
• 3. In the Bills of Materials form, add the main product by selecting it from the drop-down menu in the Product field.

• 4. Under the Components tab, click Add a line to add components to the BoM.
• 5. Select the components from the drop-down menu.
• 6. Mention the quantity of each component required and select the unit of measure.
• 7. In the Apply on Variants section, choose the specific product variants to which each component applies directly from the drop-down menu.

If a component is not assigned to any specific variant, it’s used in all variants of the product. The same flexibility applies to operations and by-products. They can be shared among variants or assigned to specific ones as needed. When creating a BoM for multiple variants, leave the Product Variant field blank. It’s only used when creating a BoM for a single variant. After making all necessary adjustments to the BoM, click Save at the top to ensure your changes are applied.

Manufacture Variant of BoM Product

To manufacture a variant of a Bill of Materials (BoM) product, follow the steps below.

1. Go to the Manufacturing module and select Manufacturing Orders

2. Create a New Manufacturing Order using the New button.

3. In the Manufacturing Order form, select the product variant you want to manufacture

4. Enter the quantity of the variant you want to produce in the Quantity field.

5. In the Bill of Materials section, select the Bill of Materials (BoM) from the list and it will automatically appear based on the variant you selected for manufacturing.

6. Configure any additional operations or work centres required for manufacturing the variant, and it’s not mandatory and we can add it if necessary.

7. Once all the necessary details are entered, click on the confirm button to initiate the manufacturing process.

8. Once the manufacturing process is complete, mark the manufacturing order as done for the completion of the process.

Odoo 17 offers powerful tools and features for effectively managing product variants in the manufacturing process. Using Odoo’s flexible configuration options, manufacturers can improve productivity and meet the requirements of customers effectively.