Inventory items

Before you start, open these. They are both under Stock in the menu: Stock Items and Inventory Categories.

Can’t find one? It may be turned off for your business, or your account may not be allowed to open it. Ask the person who set up your FeePrime. They can fix both.

An inventory item is a thing you hold. That is different from a product, which is a thing you sell. The Products course covered why. This is the other half of that pair.

The basics

Name and SKU identify it.
Inventory category files it.
Price unit of measurement says what a quantity means. Kilograms, litres, boxes.
Description and photos describe it.
Supplier prices record what different suppliers charge you.

Tracking method is the big decision

This field decides how much detail the system keeps. It is far easier to get right at the start than to change later.

Quantity based. You care how many, not which ones. Screws, cement, rice. This is most things.

Serial number based. Every single unit has its own identity. Vehicles, machines, phones under warranty. Powerful, and heavy going: every movement has to name the exact units.

Lot tracked. Units share a batch identity. Not one identity per unit, but a number of units per batch. This is the middle option, and it is what food, medicine and farming businesses need for expiry dates and recalls.

Indefinite. The stock never runs out. For things that behave like stock on documents but have no real quantity.

Pick the lightest one that answers the questions you will actually be asked.

Serial-tracking screws will have everyone hating the system by Thursday.

Batches and shelf life

For a lot tracked item:

Shelf life days sets how long a batch lasts.
Lot type describes what kind of batch identity it carries.
Lot allocation strategy decides which batch goes out first.

There are three strategies:

First expired, first out. What perishable goods need.
First in, first out. Oldest stock first, whatever its expiry.
Manual. Somebody chooses each time.

First expired, first out is the right default for anything with an expiry date. It is the difference between selling stock before it turns and finding it at the back of the store afterwards.

Your categories say what buying means

An inventory category has a name, an optional lot type, and a purchase treatment: for resale, raw material, consumable, or packaging.

That last field is not just filing. It says what buying the thing means.

Goods you will sell on. Materials you will change into something else. Things used up running the business. Or packaging.

It affects how your purchases are treated in your accounts, so set it on purpose rather than accepting whatever is first in the list.

Try it

On staging.feeprime.com, create one quantity based item and one lot tracked item with a shelf life. Notice how differently they behave when you receive stock.

Then try changing the tracking method afterwards. Feeling how much it resists you is the lesson.