(NOTE: These instructions are for Zen Cart sites. For instructions for WordPress/WooCommerce sites, click here.)

Options such as “Size” and “Color” must be created and managed in the Admin; they cannot be uploaded with the product spreadsheet. Once your products have been imported, either by way of the spreadsheet or one-by-one in the admin, Options can be added to the products. If you then upload a new spreadsheet the options will not be disturbed, but you will need to add options to any new products.

In the Admin >> Catalog,  You’ll see “Option Name Manager”, “Option Value Manager” and “Attributes
Controller” (“Attributes” and “Options” mean the same thing in this
system). 

Creating your Option Names

The “Option Name Manager” is where you will create your Option Names, such as “Size”, “Color”, etc. Enter the Name of the Option you want to create in the blank under “Option Name”. If you have more than one option and want to control what order they appear, you can put a number in the “Order” blank, starting with “0”, “1”, “2”, etc. In the “Option Type” dropdown you can select whether you want the option to be displayed as a dropdown list, radio buttons, checkboxes, etc. Click the “Insert” button to save the Option.

Once your Option Names are saved they will appear like this:

Note that the blanks are still there for you to create new Options if you wish.

Giving Your Options a Value

The “Option Value Manager” is where you will assign the values to your Options. For example, for the option “Size” the values might be “Small”, “Medium” and “Large” or “10”, “11”, “12”, etc. The Option Names you have created will be displayed in the Option Name dropdown list. To enter new values, select the Option Name you want to work with from the dropdown, and enter a value in the “Option Value” blank. Put a number in the “Order” blank to dictate the order that the options will appear in. NOTE: Not assigning an order could result in the following: “1”, “10”, “2”, etc.

Click “Insert” to save the Value.

Assigning Options to Products

Once Option Names are created and Values Assigned to them, you
need to assign the options to the products which need them.  When you go to the
“Attributes Controller”, you’ll see a dropdown with all your Categories. 
Select the Category/Subcategory where your new product is located and you’ll see
a list of the products in the SubCategory like this:

Below you’ll see the current options that are available to
use:

To add Letter options, click “Letter” under Option Name,
scroll down and click the value “A” under Option Value.

HOWEVER, there is a faster way!

Since there are already products with the Letter options
assigned, select one of those and click “Copy to Product” or “Copy to Category”
if all the products in the Subcategory where the new product is located
should have the same options.

If you choose to copy to a single product, you will get a
list of all your products in alpha order so you can choose the one to add the
options to.  If you choose to copy to a category you will get a list of
categories.