Item Tags: Find a Whole Menu in One Search, Whatever Categories It Sits In

A catering catalogue grows sideways. The winter menu’s canapés sit in Canapés, its mains in Buffet, its desserts in Sweets, and the boxed lunches you sell to one corporate client are spread across four categories. When you build a quote you know the group you want, “everything on Menu 1” or “the Winter 2026 dishes”, but your categories don’t.

Item tags fix that. They are your own labels for catalogue items, such as Menu1, Winter 2026 or Wedding set, and you can use them to find and pick a group of items, whatever categories they sit in.

Item Tags and Quote Tags Are Different Lists

Puree already has tags for your quotes, enquiries and opportunities (Wedding, Corporate, Christmas). Those describe a job. Item tags describe what you sell, and they are a separate list:

• An item tag is never offered on a quote, enquiry or opportunity, and a quote tag is never offered on an item.
• Each list has its own names and colours, so you can have a Wedding quote tag and a Wedding set item tag without one getting in the way of the other.

Menu, beverage, equipment and miscellaneous items can be tagged. Venue items have no Tags field.

For the quote tags, see Tags.

Managing Your Item Tags

Item tags live on the same page as your quote tags. Go to Settings → Tags and choose the Item tags tab. Click New item tag, give it a name and a colour, and save.

The tab has its own search box and Show deleted toggle. Edit renames a tag or changes its colour, Delete removes it from use, and Restore brings a deleted tag back. A deleted tag stops showing on your items and stops matching searches, but it isn’t lost.

Tagging Items

One Item at a Time

Open an item from the items list. In the Classification block there’s a Tags field. Click Add tag, then tick the tags you want. Each tag shows as a pill in the field, and the × on a pill takes it off.

Typing in the list filters your tags. To create a new one, type its name and press Enter.

On an item you’ve already saved, each change saves straight away, a new tag included. You’ll see Saving… and then Saved beside the field, and you don’t need to click the item’s Save button. Nothing else you’ve changed on the form is saved with it. On a new item, the tags (and any new tag you’ve typed) are saved when you save the item.

Many Items at Once

Click Bulk edit in the toolbar at the top of the items list. There are two ways to tag from there:

• The Tags column. Every row has a Tags cell that works like the item form’s field. Tick or untick a tag, or type a new name and press Enter, and it saves at once.
• Add tag and Remove tag. Tick the rows you want, choose Add tag or Remove tag from the field list, pick the tag, click Apply, and confirm Update N items? when prompted. Adding a tag leaves each item’s other tags alone, and so does removing one: only that tag comes off.

Add tag and Remove tag appear once your account has at least one item tag that hasn’t been deleted. Create your first in any Tags cell or on the Tags page.

Tagging a season’s menu this way takes a couple of minutes: filter to a category, tick its rows, add the tag, and move on to the next category.

Finding Items by Tag

Once your items are tagged, you can search and filter by them in five places.

• The items list. The Search items box matches tag names as well as item and category names. It searches within your current filters (category, section and the visibility toggles), so clear Category and Section to search across every category: then Menu1 lists every item tagged Menu1. There’s also a Tag filter beside Category and Section, which combines with the search and the other filters. A Tags column shows each item’s tags, in the same style as the Quotes page.
• Building a quote. On a quote’s items page, the item search matches tags too. Tags show as small coloured pills beside each item in the search results, in each category’s list, on the lines you’ve added, and in the item window when you add or edit a line. They are for you only and are never saved onto the quote.
• Online menus and order forms. On the Items tab of an online menu or online order form, each item shows its tags, and Search all items matches tag names. Search Menu1 and the eligible active items tagged Menu1 are listed, ready to include. Customers viewing the menu or form never see them. See Online Menus and Online Order Form.
• Kitchen reports. An All tags dropdown appears on Next 7 days, Next Week, Next 4 weeks, Daily Orders, Production Report, Item Report, Upcoming Items and the Shopping list, on the Menu, Beverages and Equipment tabs (beside All Sections on the Menu tab when your account has sections). Choosing a tag keeps only the lines for items with that tag, combined with the sections and the tab. A bundle’s contents and a package’s lines count under their own item’s tags; on the report views, a bundle set to Show the bundle as one item counts under the bundle’s own tags instead. Orders with no matching lines drop out. On the seven report views, Download CSV and Print PDF follow the filter, with the tag named in the PDF heading; the Shopping list has no download. It lists live item tags only. See Kitchen Reports.
• Packages. When you set up a flexible (customer choice) rule, the Choose eligible items window shows each item’s tags, and Filter items matches tag names across every category. Filter by the tag, then use Select all in each category you want, to select that category’s visible matches. The filter also matches parts of item and category names as well as tag names (Menu1 matches Menu10 too), so check the matches before you select. A choice rule can span several categories within one section (Menu or Beverages) but can’t mix sections, and items you’ve already selected stay selected while you filter. The tags only help you choose: they aren’t saved on the package. The fixed items picker doesn’t show or search tags. See Packages.

A Few Ways to Use Them

• Menus. Tag each set menu’s dishes (Menu1, Menu2) so you can find the whole menu in one search when you build a quote or an online menu.
• Seasons. Tag Winter 2026 while you plan it, and the whole season is one search away on the items list.
• Clients and venues. Tag the items you only offer one corporate client or one venue, so they’re easy to find and hard to offer by mistake elsewhere.

Keep the list short and meaningful, like quote tags. A handful you actually search by beats dozens nobody remembers.

Questions or ideas? Email us at email@puree.app.