In today’s diverse business environments, your company probably encounters products that are bought and sold using different units of measure (UoM). This situation arises frequently if you’re in an industry like retail, manufacturing, and/or distribution. These industries often find that the purchase units differ from the selling units.
Managing these conversions yourself can be error-prone and inefficient. Fortunately, Odoo provides you with a powerful and flexible system for handling products with multiple units of measure, simplifying your inventory and sales management.
The new Odoo 19.0 version has a different way to manage UoM's, Unit Categories are now deprecated and the concept links directly to packages.
Why Use Different Units of Measure?
Different units of measure are used for practical reasons:
Purchasing: Bulk buying to reduce costs (e.g., liters, tons, pallets).
Sales: Selling in convenient consumer units (e.g., bottles, boxes, kilograms).
Inventory Management: Maintaining a consistent internal unit for accurate stock tracking.
When units differ across purchase, inventory, and sales, precise conversion is crucial to avoid stock discrepancies, pricing errors, and logistical confusion.
Setting Up Units of Measure on Odoo
Step 1: Enable Units of Measure
Go to Inventory > Configuration > Settings.
Check the Units of Measure option.
Save your changes.
Step 2: Define Units of Measure
Navigate to Inventory > Configuration > Units of Measure Categories.
Create or edit units within the same category.
Set the Ratio to the reference unit.
Step 3: Assign Units to Your Product
In the product form, set the Unit of Measure (usually the sales unit).
Set the Purchase Unit of Measure to reflect how you buy the product.
Business Case:
Your company SteelPro Ltd. buys raw steel sheets from a supplier in 5-ton batches but sells small quantities to customers in kilograms.
Step 1-Setup Units of Measure (UoM)
Kilogram (kg) is the reference unit in the “Weight” category.
Ton (t) is created with factor 1000 (1 ton = 1000 kg).
Step 2- Product Setup in Odoo
Product Name: Steel Sheet
Product Type: Storable Product
Unit of Measure (UoM): Kilogram
Purchase UoM: Ton
Vendor: SteelSuppliers Inc.
Step 3- Creating a Purchase Order
Purchase Order quantity: 3 Tons
Price per Ton: $1,000
Total Cost: $3,000
Your supplier ships the 3 tons to your warehouse.
Step 4 -Receiving Shipment
You receive 3 Tons (3000 kg) of steel.
Odoo automatically converts 3 Tons → 3000 Kilograms and adds to your stock.
Inventory now shows: Steel Sheet -3000 kg in stock
Step 5 - Selling to Customer
Your customer orders 20 kg of steel sheets.
Sales order created with quantity 20 Kilograms.
Price per kg: $1.2
Total Price: $24
Odoo deducts 20 kg from stock:
- Stock after the sale: 2980kg remaining
Step 6- Inventory and Reporting
Warehouse staff track stock in kilograms.
Purchasing team orders in tons.
Your sales team sells in kilograms.
Reports show unified stock quantities in kilograms with accurate costing.
Benefits in this Example:
No manual math required to convert tons to kilograms.
Clear and consistent stock level tracking.
Pricing and invoicing correctly reflect units sold.
Smooth communication with suppliers and customers.
Conclusion
Effectively managing your products with different units of measure in Odoo improves operations across purchasing, sales, and inventory management. By leveraging Odoo’s built-in unit conversion features, your business can ensure accurate stock tracking, pricing, and reporting without manual calculations. This flexibility not only reduces errors, but also improves efficiency and communication with your suppliers and customers. Overall, this makes Odoo an essential tool for companies like yours that deal with complex product measurements.
To learn more about managing different units of measure for the same product, feel free toContact us
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