UPDATE:The launch date has changed from Nov 16, 2020 to Dec 2, 2020.

What is changing?

To simplify the listing experience, Amazon will no longer require the "department name" attribute in feeds for listing products in the shoes category. To derive the department name, Amazon will use two attributes which already exists as required attributes in the Custom Inventory File Template for shoes and Shoes.xsd: footwear_age_group/ShoeSizeAgeGroupValues and target_gender/TargetGender.

Starting Nov 16, 2020 Dec 2, 2020, we will make the following changes:

Feed templates:

• Custom Inventory File Template for shoes. The department_name attribute will be removed.

• Shoes.xml. The Department element will not be required.

Feed processing: Feeds for creating or updating shoe listings that include the department name attribute will be processed, but the attribute will be ignored. Amazon will automatically derive the department name from the footwear_age_group/ShoeSizeAgeGroupValues and target_gender/TargetGender attributes, which are mandatory. This applies to both newly created and existing listings. For more information, see Department removal from listing experience in the Seller Central Help.

Which marketplaces are affected?

This change applies to the US, Spain, UK, France, Germany, Italy, India, and Japan marketplaces.

Who is affected?

Developers with applications that create or update shoe listings using the custom Inventory File Template for shoes or the Shoes.xsd schema are affected by this change.

What action is required?

If you have an application that is affected by this change, be sure to update your application workflow to remove the department name attribute in any shoe listing feeds that you submit after we update the custom Inventory File Template for shoes and Shoes.xsd on Nov 16, 2020 Dec 2, 2020.

For more information

For more information, please see Department removal from listing experience in Seller Central Help.