Learn More About Target Margins
How Target Margins Work
Access requirements. Setting a department-level target margin needs "Departments" view/edit access. Setting an item-level value needs the same access as editing that item elsewhere (Product list / Purchase Orders / Data Cleaner, depending on where you're setting it). Fixing flagged items in Data Cleaner needs "Data cleaner" access at that specific store — view-only shows the same information but nothing is editable.
It's a target, not a rule. A target margin never changes a price by itself and never blocks a sale — it only powers suggestions and warnings elsewhere in Back Office.
Two levels, one override. Set it at the department level and it applies to every item in that department. Set it on a specific item and that value wins over the department's, for that item only. An item with neither has no target margin at all.
It's not the same thing as "Minimum margin." Departments also have a separate "Margin requirement" field and "Minimum margin" toggle — that pair drives the unrelated "Below minimum margin" warning on the Products table. Don't confuse the two; see Troubleshooting below.
Where to Access Each Feature
To… | Go to |
Set a target margin for a whole department | Departments → [department] → Sales setup → "Target margin" |
Set or override a target margin on one item | The item's edit page or item drawer → "Target margin" |
Review prices against targets after receiving | Receiving flow → "Suggested pricing updates" |
Find and fix items selling off-target | Data cleaner → "Margin issues" tab |
Setting a Department-Level Target Margin
Set the department value first — every item without its own value inherits it automatically.
Step 1
Go to Departments.
Step 2
Click the department you want to edit. The Departments table shows a "Target margin" column, so you can see which departments already have a value.
Step 3
In the "Sales setup" section, enter a percentage in the "Target margin" field.
Step 4
Save the department.
Every item in the department without its own item-level value now uses this target. Tables refresh in the background, so the new value can take a moment to appear everywhere.
Note: the "Sales setup" section also has a "Margin requirement" field with a "Minimum margin" toggle next to it. That's a different, unrelated control — see How Target Margins Work above.
Setting an Item-Level Target Margin
An item-level value always wins over the department value. Use it for items that should run hotter or leaner than the rest of their department.
Step 5
Open the item — either its full edit page, or the item drawer that opens on the right when you click an item name in tables such as the receiving review.
Step 6
Find the "Target margin" field. Its placeholder shows the department default when one exists.
Step 7
Enter a value between 0 and 100. Entering more than one decimal place doesn't get rejected — it's silently rounded to one decimal (for example, 32.53 becomes 32.5). The helper text under the field tells you what's in effect:
"Overrides department default (X%)" — this item has its own value.
"From department: [department name]" — no override; the item inherits the department value.
Step 8
Save.
To remove an override later, clear the field and save — the item falls back to the department value. The item drawer's read-only view shows the effective "Target margin," with "From department: …" underneath when the value is inherited.
Reviewing Suggested Pricing Updates When Receiving
When you receive a purchase order, items whose average cost changed appear in a "Suggested pricing updates" review: "Items with cost changes that may warrant a price adjustment based on your target margins."
Step 9
Receive the purchase order as normal. The review table shows each changed item with its Department, Old avg cost, New avg cost, Old Retail Price, Retail Price, Old margin %, New margin %, and Target margin %.
[SUGGEST ADDING SCREENSHOT HERE]
Step 10
Use the "Pricing tools" controls above the table if needed. The Margin/Markup toggle switches the margin columns to markup for the whole table, and the Rounding picker ("99¢", "95¢", "49¢", "None") controls how prices round when you set them by margin.
Step 11
Work through the three groups:
Items to consider repricing — the new margin is more than 10 percentage points above or below the item's target margin.
Items without target margin — neither the item nor its department has a value set.
Items within expected range — the margin changed but stayed within 10 points of target.
Step 12
To reprice an item, edit its Retail Price cell directly, or type a percentage into the New margin % cell — the retail price recalculates from it instantly, using the selected rounding.
Step 13
To set a missing target, click the item's Target margin % cell, enter a value, and confirm. This saves an item-level value on that item (not the department), and the table refreshes to reflect the new grouping.
Fixing Margin Issues in Data Cleaner
Data Cleaner is per-store and permission-gated: you need Data Cleaner view access for the store to see it, and Data Cleaner edit access at that store to make fixes (otherwise everything is read-only).
Step 14
Go to Data Cleaner and pick the store.
Step 15
Open the "Margin issues" tab. An item is flagged when a stock movement from the last 90 days added inventory at a margin outside the acceptable range. This includes receiving, recounts, and manual adjustments — not sales, which remove rather than add inventory. Receiving lines you checked "Skip margin checks for this line" on while receiving are the exception: that receipt no longer counts as a margin issue here, and its row isn't highlighted in the fix modal either. When several movements qualify, the reason shown comes from the oldest one.
Step 16
Click an item's fix action to open the margin-fix modal. To work through several at once, select multiple items and click "Fix margin issues" — the modal footer then shows Back, a "N of M" progress bar, and Next item. (A single-item modal has no queue footer.)
Step 17
In the modal header, review the five figures: Retail (click to edit — saves a price change), Avg Cost, Avg Margin, Target (click to edit — saves an item-level target margin and immediately re-evaluates the issues), and Difference (margin minus target). Avg Cost and Avg Margin are the item's store-wide averages, so they often differ from the margin on a specific flagged movement below. If you enter a Target outside 0 to 100, nothing is saved and a "Validation error" message appears telling you what's wrong.
Step 18
In the movement table, look for highlighted rows with a warning icon — those margins fall outside the acceptable range. Click Edit on a problem row to correct its source: a received-inventory row edits the purchase order line (completed POs only), a recount row edits the inventory count (completed counts only), and manual adjustments or initial-import rows edit the stock movement itself. Fixing the cost there corrects the margin.
Step 19
If the item has no retail price at the store, the modal instead shows "Set Retail Price" ("This variant needs a retail price before margin calculations can be performed"). Enter a price and click "Set Price" to proceed.
What counts as an acceptable margin: by default, anything between 10% and 80%. A target margin can only ever widen that band, never narrow it — the flagged zone is anything below the lower of 10% or (target − 10 points), or above the higher of 80% or (target + 10 points). So an item with a mid-range target (say 35%) is flagged on the same 10–80 band as an item with no target at all; only a very low or very high target extends the band.
Where Else Target Margins Appear
Surface | What shows |
Departments table | Each department's Target margin |
Merging duplicate items | A "Target margin" row in the merge review, where you pick which item's value survives. It compares only item-level overrides — two items that both inherit from the same department show as equal and blank |
Troubleshooting
Target margin won't save / value rejected. Item-level values must be between 0 and 100 — that range is enforced and will block a save outside it. There's no such rejection for decimal precision; more than one decimal is just silently rounded down to one.
An item shows a target margin the merchant never set on it. It's inherited from the department. The item drawer shows "From department: [name]" under the value. Clearing the item's field restores inheritance.
The merchant edited the Target value in the margin-fix modal (or the receiving table) and now the item ignores the department value. Both of those save an item-level override, not a department change. Clear the item's Target margin field to go back to the department value.
A department's target margin changed but tables still show the old number. The update fans out to the department's items in the background; give it a moment and reload.
The receiving review says "Items without target margin." Neither the item nor its department has a value. Set one on the department (the section's info icon links there) or enter it on the line itself for a one-item fix.
The merchant set a target margin but Data Cleaner flags exactly the same items as before. Expected for mid-range targets. The flagged band is never narrower than "below 10% or above 80% margin" — a target only widens it. Target margin's main effect is the receiving review's ±10-point grouping, not tighter Data Cleaner flagging.
An item the merchant thinks is mispriced isn't in Data Cleaner's Margin issues. The check only looks at inventory-adding stock movements from the last 90 days at that store. Older cost problems, or margins inside the acceptable band, won't appear.
Data Cleaner treats an item as having no target margin even though its department has one. If the department is deactivated, the Margin issues list ignores its target margin, while rows inside the fix modal still honor it — so the two can disagree. Reactivate the department or set an item-level value.
The margin-fix modal is read-only or has no Edit buttons. Either the user has Data Cleaner view access but not edit access for that store, the rows aren't flagged as problems (Edit only appears on highlighted rows), or the source isn't editable (the PO or inventory count isn't completed).
The modal's Avg Margin doesn't match the flagged row's margin. The header figures are store-wide averages for the item; each row's "Margin for inventory added" uses that movement's own cost. A difference is normal.
A "Below minimum margin" warning shows in the Products table. That's the department's separate "Minimum margin" requirement, not the target margin. It only fires when the department's "Minimum margin" toggle is on; adjust it under Sales setup.
The user can't see Departments or Data Cleaner at all. Both left-nav entries are permission-gated per role (Data Cleaner also per store); check the user's permissions.