What is Vape Product Metadata?
Product metadata is a set of information associated to each of the unique SKUs you sell. We need product metadata from you to be able to calculate excise taxes that are based on mL of liquid, category of product or the presence of certain ingredients.
Product Metadata for the Vape Industry
The current set of required fields to comply with the various excise tax laws in the US is:
SKU
This is the unique identifier that your ecommerce system uses for each product and/or product variant. It is the key we use to connect product information to each checkout card or order.
NAME
This is the name of the product, for reference only.
BRAND
This is the manufacturing brand for the product. Some Excise Tax reports require this to be provided.
VOLUME
This is the volume of vape ejuice in mL. It should be in number format with no units included.
WHOLESALE COST
This is the per unit cost paid by the wholesaler to acquire the product.
WHOLESALE PRICE
This is the per unit price paid by a retailer to purchase the product from a wholesaler or distributor.
MSRP
Manufacturers suggested retail price.
RETAIL
The actual retail price.
VAPE SYSTEM TYPE
A descriptor allowing us to match products against various excise tax laws. The options are:
- Liquid - a standalone liquid intended for use within Open vape products (see below).
- Parts - coils, glass, etc.
- Open - a vape system that can be refilled.
- Closed Cartridge - a cartridge filled with liquid.
- Closed Single Use - product cannot be refilled.
- Battery Only - a battery but not device.
- Pack - a bundle of items - the lower level items will be expanded to determine the individual system type for each.
NICOTINE
A flag on SKUs for products that contain nicotine.
EXEMPT
A flag on SKUs for products that do not qualify for any vape industry taxes.
PACK CONFIG
A field that allows you to bundle a set of SKUs with existing product metadata into a single SKU that is purchased by customers with the correct excise taxes based on the included SKUs.
PACK QUANTITY
A field that allows you to multiply the quantity for purposes of "per unit" taxes on pack items sold as a single quantity in your ecommerce system.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can we have only one value for system type, not multiple?
Correct - you get one value for system type.
Are water pipes exempt and what system type would they be if not exempt?
We cannot give you legal advise so for what it's worth - Many consider these exempt from vape-specific taxes and classifications since they’re not technically vape products. A more strict interpretation might suggest that these are open systems and should be classified as such.
What about pouches? Are those single use?
Pouches are not technically vape systems. Support for those is coming soon... If they're important to you and you're reading this please reach out to us with when your expected first sale is anticipated to take place.
A disposable vape pen could be single use and also closed (we think), where would that go?
We cannot give legal advise but we’ve seen others categorize a disposable vape pen as either a Closed Single Use or a Closed Refillable device, depending on its design.
- Closed Single Use: These vape pens are designed for one-time use only and are not intended to be refilled or reused.
Closed Refillable: These pens, although disposable, are designed to be refilled before disposal.A disposable vape pen could be single use and also closed (we think), where would that go?
We cannot give legal advise but this sounds a match for Closed Single Use.
How do we handle product with variants?
For products with variants, the parent product is never actually in the cart as it is always one of the variants. Token of Trust doesn't require the parent products in our database so you can just focus on providing the children.
Is there a way to automate updates and changes to Product Metadata?
Yes, we have a feature called Product Sync for this purpose but source systems vary so it is not supported everywhere - see Product Sync for details.