MeritSKU is engineered to evaluate product viability before you commit capital to inventory, packaging tooling, or ad campaigns. This guide walks through an end-to-end evaluation cycle in less than 5 minutes, demonstrating our deterministic landed cost math and fail-closed draft boundaries.
1. Overview & Invariants
Unlike speculative market research tools that guess unit margins from scraping retail MSRP, MeritSKU ingests actual supplier price breaks, calculates complete integer minor-unit (cents) landed costs, and enforces strict governance over ad budget allocations.
Throughout this quickstart, all catalog pushes default strictly to draft status. MeritSKU will never publish a live listing to your storefront without an explicit human decision override.
Draft-Only Invariant Enforced
2. Step 1: Submit Product Intake Payload
You can evaluate a candidate SKU either via the web interface or directly through our authenticated REST API v2. Provide the supplier factory quotation, package physical dimensions, and target selling price.
curl -X POST https://api.meritsku.com/v2/skus \
-H "Authorization: Bearer msku_live_mock_5a8f12c9b4e3" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"title": "Ergonomic Lumbar Support Cushion",
"factoryUnitCostCents": 540,
"targetRetailPriceCents": 3499,
"weightGrams": 680,
"dimensionsMm": { "length": 420, "width": 380, "height": 110 },
"supplierCountry": "CN",
"targetMarket": "US"
}'3. Step 2: Automated Evidence Extraction
Within 1,500ms, MeritSKU extracts and normalizes the 12 distinct landed cost factors. The system pulls current ocean/air spot freight rates, computes applicable customs tariffs (HTS Chapter 9404), and checks domestic 3PL fulfillment fees based on dimensional cubic volume.
Integer Minor-Unit Math
4. Step 3: Inspecting MeritScore & Decision Verdict
The evaluation engine produces a single structured verdict: ADVANCE (Score >= 75), CAUTION (Score 50–74), or REJECT (Score < 50).
Alongside the 0–100 score, the engine computes an orthogonal confidence metric (0–100%) indicating the empirical completeness of supporting evidence.
| Metric | Evaluated Value | Target Threshold | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| MeritScore | 84 / 100 | >= 75 | ADVANCE (Clear Winner) |
| Scoring Confidence | 92% | >= 80% | High Provenance |
| True Landed Cost | $11.82 (1182¢) | <= $14.00 | Passed |
| Breakeven CAC | $23.17 (2317¢) | >= $18.00 | Strong Buffer (66.2%) |
5. Step 4: Pushing Draft to Commerce Store
When an evaluated product meets your margin criteria, clicking "Push to Store" pushes a complete draft listing (including SEO-optimized titles, feature bullet points, and mock pricing) directly to Shopify or WooCommerce.
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