If you decide to change the SKU naming convention you use to reference your products, you can use the purge and replace option to do this. In general, it is not recommended to use the purge and replace option to routinely manage your inventory levels. Use the purge and replace option sparingly and for special cases where you need to start from scratch with new inventory counts or need to make changes to your SKU-naming conventions.
Purge and replace deletes your entire inventory and replaces it with the contents of the file you are uploading. To upload a purge and replace feed, follow the steps below.
Once file validation is complete, File type is auto-detected for most cases, except inventory loader and non-Amazon files. If the File type is not auto-selected, use the drop-down menu to select your file type.
You should not use the purge and replace option to change your SKUs in the following two cases:
Specifically, we don't recommend using purge and replace to perform the following tasks:
If you have a large inventory, it is not recommended to make regular purge-and-replace uploads with inventory files containing only in-stock products. If your file does not contain a complete list of the products you want to make available for sale, you may unintentionally remove listings and product data contributions for some of them. Also, the processing time of a file with the purge and replace option may take several hours and your available inventory levels may change during that time.
If you run out of stock on some products, use the Price and Quantity file to set the stock levels to 0. You can use this file to modify all of your listings, including those that were submitted manually through the Add a Product tool. It is also a more efficient process that saves you the additional effort of re-listing your products later.
Although it is not recommended, you may use the purge and replace option to keep the products you list on Amazon synchronized with your own product database. The risk with this practice is having an error in your inventory file or uploading the wrong file, which may potentially erase your entire inventory on Amazon. This could result in lost sales opportunities while you re-list your products.