Inventory how-to

How to create a reordering routine that takes 15 minutes a week

Pick one day and time each week, work from a single list of what needs ordering soon, and approve or adjust instead of starting from scratch.

Short answer: Pick one day and time each week, work from a single list of what needs ordering soon, and approve or adjust instead of starting from scratch. Most of the time goes to decisions, not data gathering, so the key is having the numbers ready before you sit down.

Why weekly reordering is slow in the first place

Most of the time in reordering gets lost checking stock levels variant by variant, guessing how fast things are selling, and emailing suppliers one by one. If you have to open a spreadsheet, scroll through products, and do mental math on sales speed, 15 minutes is not realistic.

A routine only works if the hard part, figuring out what needs ordering and how much, is already done before you sit down. Your weekly session should be about approving decisions, not making them from scratch.

Set a fixed day and a fixed scope

Pick one day a week, same time, and treat it like a recurring meeting with yourself. Monday morning works well because it gives suppliers the full week to respond.

Limit the scope to SKUs that actually need a decision this week. Do not review your whole catalog. A good routine only shows you items approaching their order-by date, based on lead time and safety days, so you are never looking at products with weeks of stock left.

Build a short checklist

A 15-minute session should follow the same steps every time: open the list of SKUs due for reorder, check the suggested quantities against anything you know that the system does not (an upcoming promotion, a supplier delay, a product being discontinued), adjust quantities if needed, and approve. Group by supplier so you are not switching context between emails.

Keep adjustments rare. If you are overriding suggested quantities every week, the underlying sales window or safety days are probably set wrong, and fixing that saves more time than manually correcting it each week.

What to do outside the weekly session

Save anything that is not a reorder decision for a separate, less frequent review. That includes checking in received stock, confirming supplier lead times are still accurate, and adjusting safety days for products with unreliable suppliers. Doing this monthly instead of weekly keeps your weekly session short.

Step by step

  1. Choose one fixed day and time each week for reordering, and do not skip it.
  2. Work from a single list of SKUs approaching their order-by date, not your full catalog.
  3. Group items by supplier before reviewing quantities.
  4. Check suggested quantities only against information the system would not know, like a planned promotion or a known supplier delay.
  5. Approve purchase orders rather than rebuilding them from scratch.
  6. Log receiving as stock arrives, even partial deliveries, so next week's numbers stay accurate.
  7. Once a month, review lead times and safety days separately from your weekly order session.

Worked example

A small homeware store sells a mug at 6 units a day on average. Lead time with the supplier is 10 days and they keep 4 safety days, so the reorder point is 6 x (10 + 4) = 84 units. On Monday the store has 90 units on hand, so it is not due yet. The following Monday, after selling roughly 42 units across the week, on-hand stock is around 48, below the 84 reorder point, so it shows up on the weekly list with a suggested order quantity already calculated and rounded to the supplier's case pack of 24, giving 48 units ordered rather than a raw 36.

How SteadyShelf helps

SteadyShelf builds the weekly list for you: it calculates order-by dates per SKU from lead time and safety days, suggests quantities rounded to case packs, drafts the purchase orders, and sends a weekly reorder email so you are reviewing a short, ready-made list rather than building one. It will not tell you about a planned promotion or a supplier problem it does not know about, so that judgment still has to come from you. It also does not handle per-location stock, so if you sell from more than one location you will need to account for that manually.

$29/month flat, unlimited products and suppliers, 30-day free trial. Run the numbers now with the free reorder point calculator.

SteadyShelf is launching on the Shopify App Store. Join early access to get the install link first.

Related guides

All inventory how-to guides ยท Inventory glossary

FAQ

What if my supplier lead times change often?

Update the lead time as soon as you notice a pattern of change rather than waiting for your monthly review. A stale lead time throws off the order-by date and either triggers orders too early or too late.

Should I review every product every week even if nothing is low?

No. Reviewing products that still have weeks of stock left is what makes reordering slow. Only look at items that are actually approaching their reorder point that week.

Let SteadyShelf do this math for every SKU

Order-by dates per supplier, seasonal forecasts and draft POs for your Shopify store. $29/month after a 30-day free trial.

Get early access