You do not need a new system to list stock on Sparehawk. A CSV or XLSX export from whatever you already run is enough, and the import maps your column names to ours rather than the other way round.
The minimum
Four columns get a line published:
| Field | Example | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Part number | 6ES7315-2EH14-0AB0 |
As printed on the part. Spaces and hyphens do not matter. |
| Brand | Siemens |
Omit it only if your whole file is one brand. |
| Condition | New surplus |
Your own wording is fine; you map it once. |
| Quantity | 3 |
Integer. Use the hidden-quantity option rather than a fake number. |
Everything else is optional, and every optional field answers a question a buyer would otherwise have to ask before ordering.
The fields that make a line sell
Price and currency. A buyer comparing six offers clicks the ones with numbers first. If you cannot publish a price for commercial reasons, you can hide it per line — but publish where you can. Why prices are open sets out the reasoning.
Lead time in days. The number of working days from order to dispatch. Leave it blank for in-stock items rather than entering 0; the import understands “in stock” from the quantity.
Your own number and cross-references. Your internal SKU and any alternative part numbers help us match lines the first time.
Description. A short text title. It names the part when the part number is new to the catalogue.
Warranty, minimum order quantity, a different ship-from country, notes and a datasheet are not read from the file. Set them per offer in your dashboard after the import, starting with the lines buyers look at most: an offer with a stated warranty sells against one without.
Condition mapping
Our four grades are new_oem, new_surplus, refurbished and used. Your file will say something else — “N”, “NEU”, “Gebraucht”, “REF”, “A-Ware”. During import you map your words to ours once, and the mapping is remembered for every later upload of the same shape.
Be accurate rather than generous. A line described as new surplus that arrives visibly used generates a dispute, a poor review and a refund, and all three cost more than the price difference. Buyers read the four grades as the guide to conditions defines them.
File shape
- CSV or XLSX, first row is the header.
- One row per (part, condition). If you hold the same part as both new surplus and refurbished, that is two rows, not one row with two quantities.
- UTF-8 for CSV. Excel’s default Latin-1 export mangles German and Polish company names; save as “CSV UTF-8”.
- No merged cells, no totals row, no colour-coded meaning. Colour does not survive an export.
- Decimal separator: either
.or,is accepted, consistently within a file. - Size: files up to tens of thousands of rows import comfortably. Split anything larger by brand.
What happens after upload
- Parse. We read the file and show you the first rows as we understood them.
- Map. You confirm which of your columns is which of our fields, and how your condition words translate. This is the step that takes five minutes the first time and zero minutes afterwards.
- Validate. We report rows that cannot be published and why: no quantity, an unrecognisable part number, a condition that did not map. Nothing is published until you have seen this.
- Publish. Matched lines go live against catalogue parts. Lines whose part number we do not yet have are queued for identification rather than discarded.
Keeping it current
Freshness is visible to buyers: every offer shows the date its data was last published, and a stale offer is marked as such. A weekly re-publish keeps that date recent, and that matters because a buyer with a line down will not gamble on a three-month-old stock figure.
Three ways to stay current, in ascending order of effort and descending order of ongoing work: upload the same file on a weekly reminder; put the file somewhere we can fetch on a schedule; or use the supplier API to push changes as they happen. All three produce the same result on the page — the difference is only how much of your week it takes. The developer page describes the supplier API.
Common first-upload problems
- Part numbers with the brand prefixed into the same cell. Split them; the import can also do it if the pattern is consistent.
- A quantity column containing text like “auf Anfrage”. Use the hidden-quantity option instead.
- Prices including VAT in one file and excluding it in another. State which; buyers compare on net.
- Duplicate rows for the same part and condition. The last one wins, which is rarely what you meant.