Why you have too much inventory

You are ordering from stale demand data

If you set reorder quantities once and never revisit them, you keep buying for a sales rate that no longer exists. A product that sold fast last year but has slowed down will keep getting the same order size unless someone manually checks it every time.

Minimums and case packs push you past what you need

Suppliers often set minimum order quantities or case pack sizes bigger than what you actually sell in a reasonable period. If you always round up to meet a minimum without checking how long that stock will last, you end up with months of cover on slow movers.

Safety stock is too generous or not tied to lead time

Safety days should reflect how unreliable a specific supplier's lead time is, not a flat number applied to every SKU. If you add the same safety buffer to a supplier who ships in 3 days and one who ships in 45 days, the fast supplier's items pile up unnecessarily.

You are ordering too far ahead of actual need

Ordering a large days-of-cover target "just in case" ties up cash and shelf space. The further out you cover, the more exposed you are to demand changes between order and arrival, which often means leftover stock.

Step by step

1. List your slowest-moving SKUs by days of stock on hand.
2. For each one, check if the reorder quantity was set from current daily sales or from an old assumption.
3. Compare supplier minimums against how many days of sales that minimum actually covers.
4. Separate safety days by supplier reliability instead of using one number for everyone.
5. Lower your days-of-cover target for fast suppliers with short, dependable lead times.
6. Recalculate order quantities using daily sales x (lead time + days of cover) minus what you already have on hand and on order.
7. Review this monthly, not just when you happen to notice a shelf is full.

Worked example

A store sells a hoodie at 2 units a day. The supplier lead time is 10 days, and the owner has been padding orders with 20 days of safety stock "to be safe," plus rounding up to a 200-unit case pack. That order size covers 100 days of demand (200 units / 2 per day) when only (2 x (10+20)) = 60 units were actually needed to hit the reorder point. The case pack minimum alone is the real problem here, not the demand forecast.

How SteadyShelf helps

SteadyShelf calculates order quantities from your actual 28-day sales window and each supplier's lead time and safety days, then rounds to case packs and minimums, so it stops orders drifting from stale assumptions. It does not do multi-location forecasting, so if excess stock is sitting in one location while another is short, you still need to check 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

• Why you keep running out of stock
• Why your reorder points keep being wrong
• How far ahead should you order for the holidays
• Why simple forecasts often beat complex ones

All inventory how-to guides · Inventory glossary

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