How do you keep track of your inventory?

[veggiegymrat]

Do you manually input every item you sell into an excel spreadsheet? That's basically what I'm doing now and I have the cells formulated to automatically calculate ebay/paypal fees when I enter all the info...isn't there a better/easier way?

Actually, in truth - I just toss the invoices and incoming packing slips in one pile, then throw outgoing slips and delivery confirmation receipts in another pile. Once all buyers have won or lost their dispute against me, I count what's left, and relist that many plus whatever inventory might have arrived. A week before Valentines day, I find some young man in college who fell in luv with a coed and needs some loot to buy a gift to impress the amour. I stuff some ca$h in his hand and show him the piles. Ask him if he remembers Sesame Street. If yes, I tell him to start counting. If no, I show him some torrents of the Count, then tell him to start counting. When he's done, I check my watch, give him some more loot and a pint of Scotch.

Job's done.

[iamaseller]

inFlow Inventory Software | Inventory System

inflow inventory: they have a free edition which will hold up to 100 different items and the standard edition which is $299

the free version is adequate enough for me. tons of nice features to cover your sales, purchases, inventory, reports, importing/exporting to pdf, excel, etc.

been using it for a month now, best i've used hands down!

[veggiegymrat]

vic, so do you list every single item you receive at one time? You don't space them out at all? You receive 200 items in one order and you list them all?

iamaseller-thanks for your input-I'm gonna see if that would work for me

Ah. If the volume is small, yes. But I choose day and time, I don't just do it the instant something arrives. If the volume is large, I might split it in 3 and list some. Then when sold, wait a day then list again.

It's subjective. Depends on what I have, season, night of the week.

If I were to deal in pencils, and 200 arrived, I'd list all at once.

If I just received 40 designer swimsuits on the last Tuesday in March... I think I'd maybe hold them all until the first Friday of May, then list 10. Depending on how rapidly summer was or was not arriving, I might list higher qty and sooner OR might not list for a few weeks and re-evaluate.

I diversify and I plan my purchases in my head for upcoming holidays, seasons, trends, etc.

I plan my listing based on sporting events or popular TV shows that might influence my start and end times. Holiday traffic is a factor too. So many things.

The devil is in the details, as some of us are well aware. But after the deal is done, the mop up can wait until some other day. I don't put much priority on processing data I won't use for months or longer. So sales tracking based on transaction history - I'm happy to have a general sense of what's what.

Things change. Numbers do funny things. A jagged red line on graph paper, a flat yellow line, a green one that steadily dips - because of last season's data ... Good for having a 'feel' of your performance. But next year could be vastly different than the history of last year would predict. I try to look ahead by a few months and only base my thinking LOOSELY on old info. Forecasting is 'where it's at'!

[Burst]

If a seller had more than 10 things they were selling. Having InFlow would be handy. However, the seller only has a few main items and can count by hand and note down for later listing.

[veggiegymrat]

Well, I just recently had the problem of selling something I didn't have....my bad, never had that happen before. I don't like to list everything all at once because I only sell about 20 items but have tons of each, so don't want to list them all at once. I definitely need to do some sort of "log" when I receive something and then update everytime my auctions end. I wasn't doing that-I was only recording sales when they ended.

[tmyboy811]

i always keep at least 50 available, when it go below that number, i order more.

[Burst]

A seller always hates meaningless downtime.

[proudpapa4]

I was using Stone Edge.

[SECondplaygames]

Vic, 1....2....3.....ahahahaah.

^^^^^^^^^^^^

You're hired.

[gibsonton]

I buy in Bulk so between the house, attick , shed and storage unit have roughly 50,000 items .so i have no idea what i have and got way in over my head but i appear to be making money so that is good .I would advise everybody to invetory and not get in the mess like i have with no idea of what i have and often where something is when i sell .. i will spend 30 minutes pulling 30 orders and 2 hours tring to find one item, if i ever even find it - Good Luck ,

[TigerLord]

Vic's stories are always enjoyable, he seems to have a colourful life

[veggiegymrat]

Holy crap gib! LOL, I have one little closet half full

[hitch]

I was, and partially still am too lazy to use software to track my inventory. Maybe if I ever hire someone, I will have them track it all via software so I can keep up much easier.

My system is very rudimentary, I has Hash marks LOL , I have a big white and I track it like that. I have 24 items that I sell. One reason why I like it like this is because I can see it at all times so I will know what's coming in and going out.

I have the following Columns for each row:

"On- Hand" , "Sold" , "Back Ordered" , "Incoming"

I've been using this system for about 3 years now, and I'm able to keep up. I try to keep my incoming trip what I sell (My margin will allow me to replace 3 units for every 1 sold). But I usually order 1 for 1, because I like to take the money and go party or something

The problem I ran into while practicing the good ol "order when sold" philosophy is 1) it takes me about a week to get the item from china and about a week for the end user to get it, so that would be a 2 week wait for them. Once Ebay started the DSR ratings, my shipping time got me suspended! lol so now I try to ship same or next day to keep that together.

Moral of the story, HASH MARKS ROCK!