What is SKU?
A single purchasable variant of a product, such as one size and color of a shoe, as a retailer lists it.
Definition
A SKU (stock keeping unit) is the most granular item a shopper can add to a basket: one size, color, pack size or configuration of a product. A style of sneaker offered in five sizes and two colors is one product and ten SKUs.
Data Purl records every SKU it observes weekly, and rolls SKUs up to products, brands, categories and companies.
How Data Purl measures it
SKUs are identified from each retailer's product pages and variant selectors, then grouped to their parent product. Availability and markdown are observed at SKU level, which is how measures such as in-stock rate and markdown breadth see individual sizes selling out or going on sale.
Why it matters
Size-level data shows what a product-level view hides: a style can look fully stocked while its core sizes are gone, or look full price while only the tail sizes are discounted.
Questions
What does SKU mean in retail data?
A SKU (stock keeping unit) is one purchasable variant of a product, such as one size and colour of a shoe. Retail data counts SKUs to measure availability and markdowns at the level shoppers actually buy.
See the data for your coverage
Start free in the analytics portal, or talk to the founders about the full dataset delivered to Snowflake or S3.