A furniture catalog that turns “oak veneer” into “solid oak” sends shoppers into the wrong comparison. The product may appear in a solid-wood filter even though the supplier only described its surface. For ecommerce and merchandising teams, the fix is to record which part a material belongs to and what role it plays, then use those details consistently in filters, product descriptions and channel feeds.
Key takeaways
- Keep the material, the furniture component and the material’s role together. A wood surface does not establish what is underneath it.
- Separate construction facts from color and finish names before building filters or generating product copy.
- Preserve detailed material records internally, then prepare a supported summary for each destination instead of forcing every fact into one field.
A single Material field can hide the distinction buyers need
An entry such as “oak, medium-density fiberboard (MDF), steel” tells a catalog team what materials are mentioned, but not where they belong. Is the oak a solid tabletop, a veneer on the doors or only the name of a color? Is the steel the frame or a small handle?
Those are different buying questions. A shopper looking for a solid-wood tabletop should not have to open a PDF to discover that “oak” describes a thin surface over another material. A comparison table that presents both products simply as “oak” removes the distinction the shopper was trying to compare.
The issue appears in real supplier information. IKEA’s US BOASTAD sideboard page separates its door materials from its rail and leg materials: the doors include particleboard and oak veneer, while the rail and legs use steel. The point is the component-level structure, not an assessment of that product’s quality. Flattening the manufacturer’s list into one undifferentiated material value would lose that structure. IKEA BOASTAD material details
Start by deciding which distinctions your shoppers actually use. A dining-table category may need tabletop construction and base material. An upholstered-chair category may need upholstery composition and frame material. Do not force both into an identical collection of empty fields.
Record what each material describes
Use three questions when reading a supplier specification:
Which component is this about? Name the tabletop, door, leg, frame or upholstery rather than treating every statement as a description of the whole product.
What is the material? Retain the supplier’s supported material name instead of shortening it to a broader, more attractive claim.
What role does it play? Distinguish a structural material from a surface layer or finish. A finish describes a treatment or appearance; it does not by itself prove the material beneath it.
Consider this fictional supplier entry for dining table T-204: “Top: oak veneer over MDF. Base: steel, black powder-coated finish.” The following mapping keeps the useful meaning intact. It is a teaching example, not a Merchkit output or a customer result.
| Catalog field | Supported value | What it helps the buyer understand |
|---|---|---|
| Top surface | Oak veneer | The visible wood surface is veneer, not a claim that the entire top is solid oak. |
| Top core | MDF | The supplier identifies the material beneath that surface. |
| Base material | Steel | The base material is separate from the top. |
| Base finish | Black powder coating | The black finish belongs to the base, not the tabletop. |
Keep the original sentence and its source with the mapped values. If a reviewer later questions the “Top core” field, they can check the supplier wording rather than reconstructing the decision from the product title.
Build filters from supported facts not keyword matches
A rule that sees “oak” anywhere and adds a “solid wood” tag would misclassify the fictional table. Instead, define what each filter promises and which field supplies it.
For example, a “Top construction” filter could offer “Solid wood” and “Veneer over MDF” where the source supports those descriptions. A separate “Base material” filter could include “Steel.” The table belongs under “Veneer over MDF” and “Steel”; it should not enter a solid-wood-top result merely because its surface contains oak.
Be equally careful with finish names. If another supplier calls a finish “Walnut” but does not identify the underlying material, preserve that name as a finish and leave the construction unresolved. Do not infer walnut timber from the name or a brown wood-grain image.
For upholstery, separate the fabric composition from the frame. A chair’s polyester cover does not establish whether its frame is wood or metal. If the supplier gives a fabric blend, keep the stated composition together; do not silently convert a blended cover into a single-material claim.
Prepare a channel summary without losing the source detail
Your internal catalog can retain more detail than a destination accepts. Google Merchant Center’s material attribute is a single field describing the main material or fabric. Its guidance permits a primary material followed by up to two secondary materials separated with slashes; color and size belong elsewhere. That is a destination rule, not a reason to discard component-level records in your catalog. Google material attribute guidance
Choose the channel summary from the verified product facts and the destination’s current requirements. Do not turn the example table into a universal feed template: the supplier sentence alone does not establish which material should be considered primary for every destination.
Keep the product page clear even when the feed is shorter. “Oak-veneered MDF top with a powder-coated steel base” explains the example without making a whole-product solid-wood claim. The same approved facts should inform descriptions and answers to material questions, rather than allowing each output to reinterpret a vague “oak” tag.
Check the buyer facing result before a batch goes live
Review the output where buyers will encounter it, not only in the data table. Test a veneer item, a confirmed solid-wood item and an item whose construction is unknown. Check whether each appears under the intended filter and whether its title, specification table and description agree.
Then try a supplier update that changes only the base finish. It should not replace the top material or apply the new finish to every component. These are checks for your team to perform, not a claim that a particular platform automatically enforces them.
If sources conflict, hold the disputed statement for resolution. A filled field is not proof of an accurate description. The product data completeness guide explains why a catalog needs both coverage checks and checks against the correct product source.
How this gets done in Merchkit
Merchkit can help your team prepare these details without repeatedly copying the same kinds of material statements across a supplier assortment. Keep the component definitions clear, then review the proposed values before they become buyer-facing claims.
Bring the material evidence to the product. Attach the relevant supplier document or product-page source to the matching record. This gives enrichment the context needed to distinguish the tabletop from the base.
Define the fields once. Create clear attributes such as Top Surface, Top Core and Base Material, with instructions that preserve the supplier’s distinctions. Reuse that setup rather than writing a new interpretation for every item.
Prepare and review the values. Run enrichment for the selected products, then inspect its rationale and source references. Correct unsupported whole-product claims and leave unresolved materials for follow-up. Your team still owns the filter definitions and final approval.
Book a Merchkit demo with a furniture supplier file to discuss how to turn its material descriptions into clearer catalog attributes.
