The Product Catalog function allows you to store, retrieve, and manage data to be used in advertising materials such as catalogs, promotional flyers, CD-ROM disks, on-line services (WWW, Compuserve, etc.), and multimedia kiosks at the point-of-sale.

Data that can be managed includes:

• From the SAP Retail database: article master data, prices, assortments

• Structure information (which includes rough placement of articles within the catalog)

• From the SAP Document Management System: multimedia objects (images, sound, video, animation, etc.)

• Text, which can be created and edited via SAPscript

You can then combine this data as desired using the Product Catalog component. This has several advantages:

• You can manage everything through a single system, rather than having to keep track of some objects in R/3 and some elsewhere.

• You can use the same data for several different media (print, Internet, and so on).

• You can export data from R/3 for use with your own or other third-party production software to produce a camera-ready (or multimedia) catalog.

• You can easily produce a new version of the catalog whenever desired (e.g., Summer catalog, Winter catalog, and so on).

• You reduce the possibility of errors (for example, since pricing is automatically calculated and the latest price is always in the database, you can’t insert the wrong price).

Use this component if you want to:

• Manage data for product catalogs or other advertising materials

• Manage data for online stores for the Internet

• Export up-to-the-minute article and pricing data to an external production software package

To create product catalogs or other advertising materials, you must first configure the Article Master Data and Pricing components.

In addition, if you want to integrate images, audio, or video in your product catalog, then you enter this data in the Document Management component. Text can be entered either in SAPscript, or in a document produced with third-party word processing software and then managed in the SAP Document Management System.

• Ability to create Internet online stores with integrated customer master record creation, order entry, and choice of payment (invoice or credit card).

• Ability to create a catalog in hierarchical format, where users can drill down from general categories to more specific ones (for example, home electronics > televisions > specific TV models). This is especially useful for on-line catalogs.

• Products can appear more than once. For example, computers can be sold under both "home electronics" and "office equipment." You can, of course, have the same article appear in different sections with different pictures, yet ensure that the price will be consistent wherever the article appears.

• Product catalogs can be created and maintained in a multiuser environment, meaning that several people can work on the same piece in parallel.

• Product catalog data can be exported to third-party systems, either in IDoc format from the Product Catalog menu, or via a BAPI.

This component does not produce a final product catalog for print purposes. Instead, it provides the data relevant for the catalog, along with the BAPI which allows you to export data, then import it into the production software of your choice. Product catalog data can also be exported in IDoc format.

However, the R/3 software is itself sufficient to produce an on-line product catalog for the Internet with no additional software.