Guide · Brands import
Brands
You can already create a brand just by naming it on a product row. This is for editing the brand's own fields: its SEO title, meta, search keywords, image and URL.
Commands
| Command | Description | Behaviour |
|---|---|---|
| NEW | Create a new brand. | Fails if a brand with the same name already exists. |
| UPDATE | Update an existing brand. | Uses Brand ID if given, otherwise finds the brand by name. Fails if there is none. |
| MERGE | Create or update. | The default. Updates the brand if the name exists, creates it otherwise. |
| DELETE | Delete a brand. | Uses Brand ID if given, otherwise finds it by name. |
| REPLACE | Refused for brands. | Fails the row. Re-creating a brand would give it a new id, leaving every product that used the old one with no brand. Use UPDATE. |
| IGNORE | Skip this row. | Does nothing, and is recorded as skipped rather than as a success. |
Columns
| CSV column | BigCommerce field | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
Command | — | Optional | NEW | MERGE | UPDATE | DELETE | IGNORE. Default MERGE. |
Brand ID | id | Optional | BigCommerce brand id. Give it for UPDATE or DELETE and no lookup is needed. |
Brand Name | name | Required | The brand name. BigCommerce keeps it unique, which is why a brand can be found by name alone. Not required if you give a Brand ID. |
Page Title | page_title | Optional | SEO title for the brand page. |
Meta Keywords | meta_keywords | Optional | Comma-separated, e.g. "shoes,running". |
Meta Description | meta_description | Optional | SEO meta description. |
Search Keywords | search_keywords | Optional | Extra words that should find this brand in store search. |
Image URL | image_url | Optional | A publicly reachable image. BigCommerce downloads it and re-hosts it, so what comes back is its own URL, not yours. |
Custom URL | custom_url | Optional | Storefront path. The leading and trailing slashes are added for you. |
Metafields
Brands carry metafields like products and categories do, in the same columns:
| Column | Holds |
|---|---|
Metafield: ns.key | the value. One column per field, e.g. Metafield: forix.founded. No dot means the custom namespace |
Metafield Permission: ns.key | who may read it: app_only, read, write, read_and_sf_access or write_and_sf_access. The *_sf_access pair is what exposes it to your theme |
Metafield Command | MERGE (default) adds and updates the listed fields, DELETE removes just those, REPLACE makes the listed ones the only ones |
BigCommerce requires a visibility on a brand metafield, so something always decides it. Leave the permission column out and a new field gets write_and_sf_access, while an existing one keeps what it had.
A DELETE row leaves the value cell empty. The column name is what names the field to remove.
Metafields are written after the brand itself, because a new brand only gets its id once it exists. If a metafield fails, the brand still saves and the row says what did not land.
You can also fill a brand metafield across every brand at once from Fill fields. See shared metafields.
Example file
Command,Brand ID,Brand Name,Page Title,Meta Keywords,Meta Description,Search Keywords,Image URL,Custom URL
MERGE,,Sagaform,Sagaform,"glass,nordic",Nordic glassware,sagaform,https://example.com/sagaform.jpg,sagaform
MERGE,,Common Good,Common Good,,Natural cleaning products,,,common-good
UPDATE,35,,Sagaform — Official,,,,,
DELETE,,Discontinued Brand,,,,,,Things worth knowing
- The name filter is exact. Searching brands by name matches the whole name, not part of it — so "H&M" and "H & M" are two different brands, exactly as they are in the BigCommerce admin.
- Images come back different. BigCommerce downloads the image you give and serves its own copy, so an export shows its URL rather than the one you imported. Re-importing that is harmless; it just will not match your original.
- Deleting a brand does not delete its products. They are left without a brand.
- Blank cells never overwrite. A column you leave out, or leave empty, is not sent; a cell holding only spaces counts as empty.
- A brand created mid-import is recovered, not failed. With several workers on one file, two rows can try to create the same new brand at once. BigCommerce refuses the second, and rather than failing that product row the app looks the name up instead — which also covers someone adding the brand in the admin while an import is running.
- Check before you run. The file check flags any column that would be ignored, and a dry run previews every row without writing anything.