Creating a Breakdown Product
The Breakdown feature helps you accurately track and manage products that are split into multiple outputs, improving inventory control, reducing waste, and simplifying production.
The Breakdown feature in Supply’d’s Production module allows you to split a single product into multiple individual items. The original product, the Breakdown product, is treated as one unit, and when processed, it is divided into its component products. Unlike a Production product, you are dividing an existing item rather than creating something new. This one-step process is ideal for businesses such as butchers or oil producers, where a single item is transformed into several usable products.
Here's a few examples where this feature may be useful :
Butcher
Input: whole chicken.
Output: Various cuts (eg. wings, breasts, maryland).
Breakdown allows accurate tracking of yield and component inventory.
Oil Producer
Input: Bulk seeds or raw oil.
Outputs: Refined oil, meal, husk, waste.
Why it’s useful: Splits raw input into sellable products and by-products.
Breakdown products help manage inventory when bulk items are received, allowing you to track the quantities of each component accurately in Supply’d.
This document takes you through the process of adding a Breakdown Product.
Adding a Breakdown Product
Before adding a breakdown product, you must first set up the individual products or items that it will be broken down into.
In our example below, we’ll break down a 10kg bag of chicken (our Breakdown Product) into:
30 breasts
30 maryland
20 wings
So we have set these up as individual products in Supply’d.
Complete the Product Details & Custom Fields
Complete the Product Details and any optional Custom Fields sections, as explained in the Adding & Updating Products document.
The following steps will walk you through entering all the necessary details for your breakdown product.
Labelling Details
The relevant details for labelling food products such as ingredients, nutrition, storage type and more.
👉 See the Labelling Details document for full details on completing this section.
Buy Product
Toggle on if you buy this product from a supplier. Enter the supplier's name and click 
.
Complete the Buy Product details as explained in the Buy Product section of the Adding & Updating Products document.
Production Stages
This section defines the stages of production.
In Supply’d, stages in production runs represent the step-by-step process of manufacturing a product. Each stage breaks down the production workflow into manageable parts, such as mixing, baking, or packaging - depending on your product setup.
For a Breakdown product there will only be one stage.
Here’s how the stage will work in a production run:
The stage will have components and instructions.
Once the stage is finalised, Supply’d records the consumption of inventory for the stage and the finished products will be added to your inventory.
This structured approach ensures accuracy in tracking materials, labour, and output throughout the breakdown process.
To add the stage, click 
or Add a Stage.
You will be prompted to save your product before adding/editing the stage. Click 
.
The Edit Production Stages form will appear. Complete the fields as follows:
Stage Name
Enter a name for the stage. You can simply call it "Breakdown" or choose any name that best describes your process.
Stage Colour
Select a colour to represent this stage of production.
Using different colours for each stage makes it easier to visualise and track the progress of products through your production process.
Labour
To include labour costs for this stage, enter the time it takes to complete it in hours and minutes. Supply'd will calculate and display the total cost of labour for this stage.
To be able to track labour costs for a Production item, you’ll first need to set up Labour Tracking in your Production Settings.
On the Production Settings page, in the Labour Tracking section, select "Yes" in the Enable Tracking field and enter a Default Hourly Rate. In the example above, the rate has been set to $50.00 per hour.
Processing
Enter the estimated processing time once staff have completed their part.
Department
Select the department(s) this product belongs to.
Instructions
Add any instructions for completing this stage.
Click 
to add the stage.
The Production Stages section will now look something like this:
Additional Options for Production Stages
Before saving or when editing Production Stages, clicking the 3 dots in the top right will open a menu with additional options.
Save
Saves the production stage. This is an alternative to using the 
button at the bottom of the page.
Copy Stages From
The Copy Stages From option allows you to reuse an existing production stage from another product when creating a new Breakdown Product. Instead of manually creating the stage again, you can copy the stage, saving time and ensuring consistency in your production workflow.
How it works:
When adding a Breakdown Product, select Copy Stages From.
Choose an existing product that has the stage you want to reuse.
The stage (names, colours, and sequence) are copied to the new product.
You can then edit or adjust the stages as needed for the new product.
Benefits:
Saves time by avoiding repetitive setup.
Maintains consistency across similar products.
Reduces errors by using an already-tested stage setup.
Click on, or type in, the field to show a list of your products to choose from.
Click
to add the stage to the current product.You will be asked to confirm as this will override any stage you may have already entered.
Make any changes required after the stage has been copied.
Import Production Stages
This option allows you to upload a list of production stages from a CSV file, instead of entering them one by one. This is a quick way to set up or update stages in bulk, especially helpful when working with lots of products or complex processes.
Importing Production Stages is especially useful for full production products, since Breakdown Products have only one stage.
👉 The process is fully explained in the Production Stages section of the Creating a Production Product document.
Breakdown Items
The items and quantities of product created in this breakdown.
Click
. The Edit Breakdown Items form will open.
Click on, or type in, the field that says Type Product Name to display a list of your products and ingredients.
Select the first item that this product will be broken down into to and click 
.
A form will open for you to add the quantities.
Complete the fields as follows:
Batch Code Prefix
Add an optional prefix to use when generating batch codes for this item. This field should contain characters only, using digits as a prefix may cause the automatic increments of production batches to be incorrect.
Quantity
Enter the number of units of this product that will be created.
For example, we're breaking down our chicken into breasts. We are wanting 30 chicken breasts, so the Quantity is 30.
Measurement
The total weight of this product, in grams, which the system uses to calculate the quantity needed per unit.
For example, the Quantity of chicken produced in this stage is thirty 100g chicken breasts, making a total weight of 3,000g.
Repeat the above steps for all items being created.
Click
to add all items.
The items will appear in the Breakdown Items section.
Additional Options for Breakdown Items
Prior to saving or when editing the Breakdown Items, clicking on the 3 dots in the top right will display a menu.
Save Items
Saves the breakdown items. This is an alternative to using the button at the bottom of the page.
Copy Items From
The Copy Items From option allows you to copy breakdown items and their quantities from another product into the current breakdown product. This is useful when multiple breakdown products produce the same or similar outputs.
Instead of manually adding each breakdown item, you can select an existing product and automatically duplicate its breakdown items. Once copied, you can adjust the quantities or remove items as needed to match the new breakdown.
Benefits:
Saves time by avoiding manual entry
Keeps breakdown outputs consistent across similar products
Reduces the risk of setup errors
Example: If several breakdown products create the same finished items in different quantities, you can copy the breakdown items from an existing product and simply adjust the amounts.
Click on or type in the field will show a list of your products to choose from. Click 
to add these items to the current product.
You will be asked to confirm as this will override any items you may have already entered. You can edit any changes required after the items have been copied.
Import Items
Opens the Import Production Items form allowing you to upload a list of production items from a CSV file, instead of entering them one by one. This is a quick way to set up or update items in bulk, especially helpful when working with a lot of products.
Click Download the template. The Export Production Items form will openen.
Select Sample Data from the Data Source menu and click
to download the template.
Open the template in a spreadsheet application such as Excel or Numbers and complete the fields in the spreadsheet.
You should remove the sample products from the file before importing it into Supply’d to prevent them from being added to your bundle.
Once completed, export or save the file as a CSV (comma-separated values) file.
Return to Supply’d, open the Import Production Items, upload the completed CSV file, click
and follow the on-screen prompts to confirm the import.
After the import completes, review the details to ensure the information has been imported correctly and make any changes required.
👉 The import process is explained in more detail in the Production Items section of the Creating a Production Product document.
Complete the Sell Product? & Remaining Sections
👉 Refer to the Adding & Updating Products document for details on how to complete this and all remaining sections.
Editing a Breakdown Product
If you would like to edit a product:
Select Products from the main menu.
Click on the product you want to edit.
Click on the 3 dots in the top right and select Edit Product.
The Edit Product form will open.
Change any fields as required following the guidelines above for Adding a Breakdown Product.
Click 
to apply the changes.
Removing a Breakdown Product
If you would like to remove a product:
Select Products from the main menu.
Click on the product you want to remove.
Click on the 3 dots in the top right and select Remove Product.
You will be asked to confirm. Click 
.
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