Inventory manager

The problem it solves

Stock is money that has stopped moving, and most small businesses do not know how much of it they are holding. The count in the spreadsheet was accurate at the last physical stocktake and has been drifting ever since, because sales get recorded and consumption does not.

Two costs follow. You run out of something in the middle of a job and lose a day, or you over order to be safe and tie up cash in stock that sits for months. The second one is quieter and usually larger.

What the demo shows

A stock list with a reorder level on every item. Adjust a quantity with the plus and minus buttons and everything recalculates. Items at or below their reorder level flag themselves amber, items at zero flag red, and the total value at the top moves as you go.

The reorder level is the whole point. Without it, a stock list tells you numbers and leaves you to work out which ones matter. With it, the list tells you what to do today.

What a real build adds

• Stock movements rather than manual adjustment. A sale reduces stock, a purchase increases it, and the count stays right because it is derived from what actually happened.
• Purchase orders raised from the low stock list, so noticing and ordering are one action instead of two.
• Supplier records with lead times, so the reorder level accounts for how long delivery actually takes.
• Barcode scanning using a phone camera, which is what makes stocktakes bearable.
• Multiple locations, if you hold stock in more than one place.
• Batch and expiry tracking where it matters, with alerts before stock becomes unsaleable.
• Movement history per item, so when a count is wrong you can see where it diverged instead of guessing.
• GST ready valuation reports your accountant can use directly.

The number that usually surprises people

Total stock value. Most owners are within a rough range on volumes and considerably out on value, because value is volume times cost and nobody multiplies it out. Seeing the figure on one screen changes purchasing decisions faster than any report.

The second useful number, which a real build adds, is stock age. Items that have not moved in ninety days are cash you have already spent sitting on a shelf, and identifying them is often the single most valuable thing a system like this does in its first month.

What a build like this involves