The last box of chocolates
Your website offers add-ons with every bouquet: a box of chocolates, a helium balloon, a small teddy, a glass vase, a scented candle. Customers love them, and they add to each order.
On a busy Saturday, the shop sells the last three boxes of chocolates to walk-in customers. The website does not know. By Sunday evening, six online orders include chocolates. On Monday, the workroom finds the shelf empty and someone rushes to the supermarket, or rings customers to offer a substitute.
Balloons are worse. The helium cylinder runs low, and the website keeps selling balloons nobody can inflate.
Why add-on stock is always wrong
Add-ons are small items, and nobody counts them properly. They are ordered when someone notices the shelf looking empty.
Shop sales and website sales are recorded in different places. The till knows it sold three boxes. The website knows it sold six. Nobody adds the two together.
Some add-ons depend on other stock: balloons need helium, vases come in sizes that match certain bouquets. Running out of the underlying item makes the add-on unavailable even if the balloons themselves are on the shelf.
What out-of-stock add-ons cost
| Problem | Effect |
|---|---|
| Website sells items not in stock | Substitutes, refunds or rushed shopping trips |
| Shop and website sales separate | Stock count always out of date |
| Helium or vase sizes run out | Add-ons sold that cannot be made |
| No reorder prompts | Running out before peak days |
| Customers disappointed | The gift was not quite what they ordered |
Add-ons are often the highest margin part of an order. They are also where customers notice when something is missing.
Substituting an add-on is harder than substituting a stem. A customer who chose a particular brand of chocolates or a balloon that says 'Happy 40th' has a specific gift in mind, and a different box or a plain balloon rarely feels like the same thing. The workroom is left choosing between an awkward phone call and a quiet swap that may lead to a complaint.
Breakages and short deliveries creep in as well. A vase chipped on the shelf, a teddy returned by a customer, a box of chocolates past its date, a supplier delivery that came in two items short. None of those reach the website count unless somebody updates it, and in a busy shop nobody does.
How we keep add-ons accurate
- Each add-on is set up with a stock count, updated from both till sales and website orders.
- Where your till and website share stock data, we connect them. Where they do not, we add a simple bridge so a sale in either place reduces the same count.
- Add-ons that depend on other items, such as balloons on helium, are linked, so the add-on is hidden when the underlying stock is marked low.
- When stock falls to a level you set, the item is hidden on the website or marked unavailable, so customers only choose what you can supply.
- A reorder prompt goes out when stock is low, with extra prompts before Valentine's, Mother's Day and Christmas based on what sold last time.
- Deliveries from your suppliers are added in a few taps, so counts stay accurate.
If your website platform already handles inventory and simply is not connected to your till, connecting the two may be all you need, and we will say so.
Add-ons that are always there
When the last box of chocolates sells in the shop, the website stops offering it within moments. A reorder prompt arrives before the shelf is empty. Balloons disappear from the website when the helium is marked low.
- One stock count for shop and website sales
- Out-of-stock add-ons hidden automatically
- Linked items like helium and vases handled
- Reorder prompts before peak days
Peak planning becomes easier too. Last year's add-on sales for each peak are on record, so the order for chocolates and balloons before Mother's Day is based on what actually sold, not on how the shelf looked the week before.
Is your website selling what you do not have?
- Online orders include add-ons you have run out of.
- Add-on stock is counted by eye.
- Shop and website sales are not combined.
- Balloons have been sold when the helium was low.
- You have made emergency shopping trips for add-ons.