Inventory Management Software

Inventory management software keeps track of how much stock you have, where it is and what it's worth, and helps you keep those records accurate. For ecommerce brands that usually means stock levels per location, stock on order from suppliers, stock value and regular stock counts. Many tools also connect to purchasing and reordering, so stock information is used to make decisions, not just recorded.

Keep one stock record per location and make sure every movement updates it: sales, deliveries, returns and count corrections. Shopify already holds stock per location, so the hard part is keeping those numbers right and seeing them next to incoming orders and stock value. Northmast reads stock from all your Shopify locations, shows stock value per location and updates the right location when you receive, return or count stock.

Multiply the quantity on hand of each item by its cost, then add everything up. Businesses use different cost methods, such as first in, first out (FIFO) or a weighted average, and your accountant may prefer one for your annual accounts. Northmast values stock at each item's current cost and shows the total in your reporting currency, flagging items without a cost instead of counting them as zero.

A stock count is a physical check of the products on your shelves, compared with what your system says you have. Many brands do a full count once or twice a year and count fast sellers or expensive products more often, known as cycle counting. The aim is to find differences early, before they lead to overselling or wrong reorder decisions. In Northmast, processing a count updates your Shopify stock to the counted quantities.

Book every stock movement as it happens and count regularly, so your Shopify stock reflects what's on the shelf. Northmast does this inside your Shopify store: received purchase orders are added at the right location, returns to suppliers and reversed deliveries are deducted, and processed stock counts set Shopify to the counted quantities. It works with the products and locations you already have in Shopify, so stock never has to be typed in twice.

Inventory management is about the stock you have: how much, where and what it's worth. Replenishment is about the stock you'll need: what to reorder, when and how much. The two depend on each other, because every reorder decision starts from your current stock and what's already on order. If the stock figures are wrong, the reorder advice is wrong too.

Yes, with software that combines stock management and purchasing, so orders and stock update each other. In Northmast, receiving a purchase order adds the goods to stock, returns to suppliers deduct them, and open orders show up as incoming stock and in reorder recommendations. Stock value and margin are in the same app, so you don't have to piece the picture together from separate tools.

Look for accurate stock per location, a clear view of what's on order, a stock value you can explain and a simple way to count and correct stock. Check that it works with your store platform and covers purchasing, so data isn't entered twice. And look at how it handles missing or outdated data: software that tells you when a number isn't reliable is worth more than software that always shows a confident figure.