Vendors

Managing your vendor relationships is a critical part of running a bridal shop. CloudBridal provides comprehensive vendor management features to help you maintain accurate vendor information, organize color guides, track size charts, and manage order addons.

Setting Up Your Vendors

We recommend adding your vendors before creating inventory items or customer orders. To manage your vendors:

1. Navigate to the Vendors page from the sidebar
2. Click the New Vendor button to add a new vendor
3. Fill in the vendor information form (detailed below)

Having your vendors set up first makes it easier to associate inventory items and create purchase orders.

Vendor Information Fields

The main vendor form includes the following fields:

General Information

• Internal Name: The name used internally for the vendor
• Display Name: The customer-facing name shown on receipts and the showcase
• Address: Physical address for the vendor
• Email: Primary contact email address
• Phone Number: Main phone number for vendor contact
• Website URL: Vendor's website or ordering portal
• Contact Full Name: Your primary contact person at the vendor company
• Account Number: Your account or customer ID with this vendor, which is included in correspondence between you and the vendor (e.g. purchase order emails)
• Inactive: Toggle to mark vendors you no longer do business with
• Internal Notes: Rich text editor for internal comments about the vendor
• Inventory Showcase Description: Customer-facing description that appears in your inventory showcase for the vendor
• Additional Vendor Fields: If you've enabled vendor custom fields in Vendor Settings,**** they'll appear in this section

Color Management

The "Default Colors" tab in the vendor form allows you to set up standardized color options for this vendor's products:

Color Groups

Organize similar colors into logical groups based on the vendor's catalog. This makes color selection easier when creating inventory items. For example, if their bridesmaids dresses are all available in a standard set of colors, you can create this grouping and apply it to your bridesmaids dresses for the vendor.

Individual Colors

If the vendor has a fairly consistent standard set of colors, you can add them in this section. Then later on, you can apply any applicable colors to the inventory item itself.

Size Charts

The "Size Guide" tab allows you to create a standardized size chart for this vendor:

1. Add sizes with corresponding measurements (bust, waist, hip)
2. Arrange sizes in the correct order using drag-and-drop
3. Save to make this reference available when placing special orders

This size guide appears when creating customer orders for dresses from this vendor, helping your staff select the correct size based on customer measurements.

Addons

The "Addons" tab allows you to configure pre-defined add-on items that can be quickly applied to special orders from this vendor. This feature streamlines the ordering process by creating a standardized catalog of common modifications or upgrades that customers frequently request.

Setting Up Addon Groups

Organize your addons into logical groups to make them easier to find and manage:

1. Create Addon Groups: Click "Add Addon Group" to create categories like "Fees" or "Customizations"
2. Group Configuration:

• • Group Name: Descriptive name for the category
  • Display for Item Types: Optionally limit which inventory item types can use addons from this group
  • Non-Taxable: By default, addons inherit the tax rate from the main order. However, you can mark an addon group as non-taxable if that particular addon type is exempt from sales tax. E.g. "Rush Shipping Fees"
  • Discountable: By default, percentage-based discounts do not apply to vendor addons. However, if you mark the group as discountable, addons from that group will be eligible for discounts at the time of sale

3. Addon Configuration:

• • Addon Name: Descriptive name for the addon. E.g. "Rush Shipping Fees"
  • Wholesale Price: Your cost for the addon
  • Retail Price: The price you want to charge for the addon

Applying Addons to Inventory Items

Once you've configured your vendor addons, you can set up which addons are eligible per-item. See the documentation here. This is an optional process but recommended if a particular inventory item is only eligible for some of the addons. Even if you don't configure this, you will still be able to include addons at the time of sale.

Applying Addons to Special Orders

Addons can be applied to special orders for that vendor. To learn how to create a special order, see Making a Sale. During that process, you will see an Addons field in the form where you can select one or more addons to apply to the order. You can also create free form addons simply by typing in a value and entering a price.

Lead Time Management

The "Lead Times" tab allows you to configure automatic expected arrival date calculations for purchase orders and customer orders. When you change an order status to "Ordered," CloudBridal will automatically calculate and populate the expected arrival date based on your lead time settings.

Setting Up Lead Times

1. Navigate to the "Lead Times" tab in the vendor form
2. Click Add Lead Time to create a new lead time rule
3. Configure each lead time with the following fields:

Lead Time Configuration Fields

• Lead Time (Days): The number of days needed to complete orders (required)
• Applicable Item Types: Optionally limit this lead time to specific inventory item types (e.g., "Wedding Dress", "Bridesmaid Dress")
• Applicable Add-ons: Optionally apply this lead time only when specific add-ons are selected (e.g., "Rush Order", "Custom Embellishment")

Tip: Leave item types and add-ons blank to create a default lead time that applies to all orders from this vendor.

How Lead Times Work

CloudBridal automatically selects the most specific matching lead time for each order:

1. Most Specific: Matches both item type AND add-on(s)
2. Item Type Only: Matches the item type
3. Add-on Only: Matches the add-on(s)
4. General: No restrictions (applies to all orders)

Example: If you configure three lead times:

• 30 days (no restrictions)
• 45 days (for "Wedding Dress" only)
• 60 days (for "Wedding Dress" + "Rush Order" add-on)

When a customer orders a wedding dress with rush order, CloudBridal will use 60 days because it's the most specific match.

When Lead Times Are Applied

Lead times automatically calculate the expected arrival date when:

• A customer order status changes to "Ordered"
• A purchase order status changes to "Ordered"

The system adds the lead time days to the ordered date to calculate the expected arrival date. When automatically set, you'll see a lightning bolt icon next to the date field showing which lead time was applied. For purchase orders with multiple items, CloudBridal uses the longest applicable lead time to ensure the arrival date accounts for all items. You can always manually override the auto-calculated expected arrival date if needed.

Updated on: 03/10/2025