A one-off chair sold twice
Your social enterprise sells what your trainees make or restore: refurbished furniture, upcycled items, pottery, textiles, woodwork, prints. Many items are one-offs or come in small batches. You sell through a Shopify, Etsy or WooCommerce shop, at weekend markets and craft fairs, at a pop-up in a shopping centre before Christmas, and to a couple of independent shops on wholesale terms.
On Saturday a customer at the market buys the restored oak chair from your stall, paying on the card reader. On Saturday evening someone else buys the same chair on the website. On Monday, a volunteer has to email the online customer to apologise and refund. It is the third time this month. The wholesale customer's order for twenty mugs was confirmed from the spreadsheet, which said thirty in stock, but twelve had gone at the Christmas fair.
Why every channel has its own number
Each sales channel was added when it became useful, and each keeps its own stock count.
| Channel | Where stock is recorded | Updated when |
|---|---|---|
| Online shop | Shop platform | When someone remembers after an event |
| Market stall or fair | Card reader, cash tin | Rarely, if ever |
| Pop-up or partner shop | Their till or a sale-or-return sheet | When they report back |
| Wholesale | Spreadsheet or email | When the order is packed |
| Workshop output | Nowhere, or a whiteboard | When a batch is finished |
For one-off items the margin for error is zero: there is exactly one, and it can only be sold once. For small batches, a few sales in the wrong place are enough to oversell.
What overselling costs
Customers who are refunded after buying something are disappointed, and they are less likely to buy again. Online platforms may also penalise shops that cancel orders.
Volunteers and staff spend time apologising and refunding. The events team takes fewer items to markets than they could, to be safe, and sells less. Wholesale customers lose confidence when orders are short.
One stock record across every channel
What we build connects your channels so they share one stock figure.
- Each item or product is recorded once, with its photos, price and quantity, when the workshop finishes it, and published to the online shop from there.
- Your card reader at markets and events, such as Square, SumUp or Zettle, uses the same product list, so a sale on the stall reduces stock everywhere, including the website, within minutes.
- For one-off items, the moment of sale matters most: a sale on any channel takes the item off the others straight away.
- Stock taken to an event can be marked as at the event, so the website can show it as available soon or hide it, depending on your choice.
- Wholesale orders are entered against the same stock and reserve items when confirmed, so the same items cannot be sold elsewhere.
- Sale-or-return stock at partner shops is recorded as held there, with a simple monthly report from them updating what sold.
We connect through the APIs of the platforms you use, such as Shopify, WooCommerce and Etsy, or through a tool like Make or Zapier where that is enough. If your online platform can already share stock with your card reader, we help you set that up before building anything new.
The next market weekend
On Saturday morning the events team marks the items going to the market. On the website, they show as 'at our market stall today'. At eleven the oak chair sells on the card reader, and by five past eleven it is off the website.
On Monday a wholesale customer orders twenty mugs. The system shows eighteen available after the weekend, so the order is confirmed for eighteen with two to follow from the next batch, and the workshop sees the shortfall on its list.
Is overselling a problem for you?
- You have sold the same one-off item twice.
- Stock on the website is updated by hand after events.
- Wholesale orders have been confirmed from out-of-date figures.
- You take less to markets than you could, to avoid overselling.
- Nobody knows exactly what is at partner shops.