One product, five categories, five URLs — pick the canonical home

One product, five categories, five URLs — pick the canonical home
Client sold a drill that lived under Power Tools, Cordless, Deals, DeWalt, and New Arrivals. Each path generated a different URL. Five indexed copies of one product, splitting all signals.
The move:
— Assigned each product ONE canonical URL — its primary category path.
— Every other category lists the product but links to the single canonical URL. No path-based URL variants.
— Breadcrumb on the product page always shows the canonical trail, no matter which category you clicked from.
— If your platform forces path-based URLs, canonical the four duplicates to the primary one.
Watch the "primary category" logic. Don't let it default to "most recently added category" — that reshuffles canonicals every time inventory changes and torches your indexed signals overnight.