Duplicate product
A duplicate product is one physical item held as two or more records in a catalogue, such as two SKUs, two product pages or two rows in a feed.
- Duplicate listing
- Duplicate record
What it means
Duplicates start in supplier files because nobody in the chain shares a key. The manufacturer codes a tap one way, the distributor another, and your buyer a third. Put two files together and the same tap appears twice, with nothing in the spreadsheet to say so.
The barcode is the best first test. Google notes that product identifiers “are assigned to each product by the manufacturer”, so the same item carries the same number whoever sells it.1 Look for pairs by GTIN, then by brand with MPN, then by a normalised title with brand and key attributes. Check each pair against the manufacturer’s page.
Some pairs only look alike: variants, new and used copies, multipacks and own-brand versions are separate products. When two rows do merge, merge field by field. Keep the code you drop as a supplier code, so that supplier’s next file updates one product instead of creating two.
Think of it like this
It is like one friend saved twice in your phone, once as Jo Smith and once as Joanne Work. Messages go to both, and neither entry has the whole story.
For example
A distributor’s row says TAP-ARC-CH, Nashwick Arc Basin Mixer Chrome. The manufacturer’s says NW/ARC/BM/C, ARC MONO BASIN MIXER TAP CHR. Both carry the barcode 5060123456783, so these are one tap on two rows.
Why it matters
Left in, a duplicate becomes two pages, two prices and two stock lines for one item. Shopify’s importer tells products apart by handle and WooCommerce’s by ID or SKU, so a pair under two codes imports as two products.23 Google Merchant Center flags products that share a GTIN, multipack and condition, which could mean “one product listed twice in your product data”.4
Not to be confused with
Variants are not duplicates: a chrome tap and a brushed brass tap stay as two rows in one group. Google says “Each product and variant of a product (different colours or sizes) has its own GTIN”.5
Sources
- Google Merchant Center Help. About unique product identifiers.
- Shopify Help Center. Using CSV files to import and export products.
- WooCommerce documentation. Product CSV Importer and Exporter.
- Google Merchant Center Help. How to fix: Duplicate GTIN.
- Google Merchant Center Help. GTIN [gtin].