Question:
Product Variants should be separated from the products. We should be able to add product variants and groups in a separate section and then add the variants and variant groups to the products of our choice. That way you can create one variant group and attach it to many products. It’s also nice when you can edit the variant and have those changes take effect for all the products the variant is linked with. It would be much more functional this way.
Answer:
Variant groups can be created independently of products on the product variant screen next to the variant group dropdown there is a link titled “Manage Variant Groups” if you click that it will take you to the manage variant groups screen where you can setup a master list of variant groups that can be selected across products. The variants themselves cannot be setup independently of products but on the variant screen at the bottom there is a copy variant feature that allows you to copy variants from one product to another this should speed up your data entry.