Inventory Management for Online Shops: A Simple Stock System for Bangladeshi Sellers

Two problems quietly hurt almost every growing online shop. The first: a customer pays the advance for a panjabi in size XL, and when you go to pack it, the shelf is empty. The second: a cupboard full of last season's kurtis that nobody wants, money you paid months ago that is still sitting there. Both come from the same gap — weak inventory management. The good news is that you do not need a warehouse, a barcode gun or expensive software to fix it. You need one clear system and a few habits.

This guide walks through that system step by step: how to count what you have, keep one true stock number, decide when to reorder and how much, and turn slow stock back into cash. The examples use taka and the kind of products many Bangladeshi Facebook and website sellers stock — clothes, cosmetics, gadgets and home items.

What inventory management means for an online shop

For a small online seller, inventory management simply means always knowing five things:

1. What you have — every product, in every size and colour.
2. Where it is — on your shelf, at the tailor, with a courier, or on the way back as a return.
3. What is selling — and how fast.
4. When to reorder — before you run out, not after.
5. What is stuck — stock that is not moving and is holding your cash.

When any of these is fuzzy, you lose money in one of two directions.

Too little stock (stockouts and overselling). You take orders you cannot send. The customer waits, gets annoyed, cancels, and may leave a bad comment. You also wasted the money you spent on the ad that brought them. Overselling is especially common when you sell from a Facebook page and a website at the same time, from the same shelf.

Too much stock (overstock and dead stock). You bought 200 pieces because the supplier gave a good rate, but only 60 sold. The other 140 are your cash, frozen. That is money you cannot use for the products that are selling.

Good inventory management sits in the middle: never "sorry, it's finished" on a best seller, and never an empty bKash balance because of stock.

Step 1: Count everything once, properly

You cannot manage what you have not counted. Pick a quiet morning and do one full count.

Give every item a short code (SKU) that names the product, colour and size, so nobody confuses two similar items.

Count each size and colour separately. "We have 23 panjabis" is not useful when a customer wants black XL and there are only 3. Most overselling happens at this level, not at the product level.

Write down the cost price too. Multiply each count by what you paid and add the rows: that is the money sitting in your stock, often more than sellers expect.

Worked example: 14 white L panjabis at a cost of ৳850 each is ৳11,900. Add every row the same way and you might find ৳1,80,000 of stock on your shelves. That is real money, and from today you will manage it like money.

If you sell products with sizes and colours on your own website, set each size and colour up as its own row with its own stock — see how to add sizes and colours with different prices.

Step 2: Keep one true stock number

After the count, the hard part is keeping the number right every day. The rule is simple: every movement of goods changes the stock number, at the moment it happens.

Stock goes out when:

• an order is confirmed (website, Facebook, phone or walk-in)
• you give a free sample or a gift
• an item is damaged or lost

Stock comes back in when:

• an order is cancelled before it leaves
• a returned parcel comes back and you have checked it is in sellable condition
• new goods arrive from your supplier or tailor

The most common mistake is keeping different counts in different places — a notebook for the Facebook page, the website's number, and whatever is in the owner's head. Pick one place and make every channel and every person use it.

Handle returns carefully. A parcel that comes back from Steadfast, Pathao or RedX is not automatically sellable. Open it, check for stains, missing tags, broken seals or damage, and only then put it back into stock. Keep a small "damaged" list for the rest, with the cost, so you know what returns are really costing you. (Fewer returns means less of this work — see how to reduce courier returns.)

If your shop runs on eCommerce Autopilot, this part is automatic for website and admin-panel orders: each order takes its pieces out of stock, and changing an order to Cancelled or Return puts them back. Customers cannot order more than you have. You can try it free, and the Help Centre explains how stock is added and tracked.

Step 3: Set a reorder point for each product

A reorder point is the stock level at which you place the next order with your supplier. When stock falls to that number, you reorder — no guessing, no waiting until it is finished.

How to work out the reorder point

You need three numbers for each product:

• Daily sales — how many pieces you sell on an average day. Take the last 30 days of sales and divide by 30.
• Lead time — how many days your supplier, tailor or importer takes from your order to goods on your shelf.
• Safety stock — a few extra days of sales, to cover a slow supplier or a sudden jump in orders.

The formula:

Reorder point = (daily sales × lead time) + safety stock

Worked example. Your blue lawn three-piece sells about 4 pieces a day. Your supplier in Narayanganj takes 6 days to deliver. You keep 2 days of sales as safety stock, which is 8 pieces.

• 4 × 6 = 24 pieces will sell while you wait for new stock
• • 8 pieces safety stock
• Reorder point = 32 pieces

So the moment your stock of this three-piece drops to 32, you call the supplier. By the time the new batch arrives, you should still have around 8 left.

How much to order. A simple rule for small shops: order enough for a fixed number of days, for example 15 days of sales. For the three-piece, that is 4 × 15 = 60 pieces. At a cost of ৳900 each, that order ties up ৳54,000. If that is too much cash for you right now, order 10 days (40 pieces, ৳36,000) and reorder more often. Smaller, more frequent orders keep cash free; larger orders may get a better rate. Choose based on your cash, not on the supplier's pressure.

Write the reorder point next to each product in your sheet. In eCommerce Autopilot you can set a single alert number for the whole shop, and the Low stock alert report lists every product at or below it — a quick weekly check of what to reorder.

Step 4: Give your best products the most attention (ABC sorting)

Not every product deserves the same care. A simple way to decide is ABC sorting:

• A products — the few items that bring in most of your sales. Never let these run out. Check them every few days.
• B products — steady, middle sellers. Check them weekly.
• C products — the long tail of slow sellers. Keep low stock, reorder only on demand, or stop stocking them.

How to sort. Take last month's sales for each product in taka (pieces sold × selling price), list them from highest to lowest and add up as you go down the list. The products that make up roughly the first big chunk of your sales are your A products; the bottom group, which together bring in very little, are your C products. The exact cut-off is your choice — what matters is that you know which products pay the bills.

Worked example for a small fashion page with a monthly sales total of ৳3,00,000:

In this example, two products bring in ৳1,90,000 — almost two thirds of the month. A stockout on the three-piece hurts far more than a stockout on any C item. If your shop has a website, the Best sellers report is a quick starting point for finding your A products.

Step 5: Turn dead stock back into cash

Dead stock is anything that has not sold for a long time — many sellers use 60 or 90 days as the line. It costs shelf space, attention, and cash you could spend on A products.

First, put a number on it. Suppose you have 40 printed kurtis that have not sold in three months, bought at ৳650 each. That is ৳26,000 of your money doing nothing.

Then pick a way out:

1. Bundle it. Pair a slow item with a best seller: "Buy the three-piece, get the matching scarf at half price." The best seller carries the slow item out of the door.
2. Discount it, honestly. A clear-out price that recovers your cost is better than holding stock for another season. Selling those 40 kurtis at ৳700 instead of ৳1,050 still returns ৳28,000 — more than you paid, and the cash goes into stock that sells.
3. Sell it in one lot. Another seller or a wholesaler may take the whole lot at a low price. You lose margin, but you get the cash and the space back in a single day.
4. Use it as a gift. A free small item with orders above a certain amount can raise your average order value.

Before you choose a discount, check your margin so you know the lowest price that still makes sense — the steps are in how to calculate profit margin.

And stop making new dead stock. Most of it comes from bulk buying a new design before you know it sells. Test with a small batch first, watch the first two weeks of sales, and only then order more.

Step 6: Build a weekly stock routine

A full count once and then nothing will drift out of shape within a month. A short weekly routine keeps the numbers honest. Use this checklist:

• Count your A products on the shelf and compare with your stock number.
• Look at every product at or below its reorder point and place orders.
• Check returned parcels from the week: back into stock or into the damaged list.
• Write down any damaged, lost or gifted items.
• Look at products with no sales in 60 days and decide: bundle, discount or stop.
• Check goods on the way from suppliers: what was ordered, what has arrived, what is late.
• Once a month, count B and C products too, one shelf or category at a time.

When the shelf count and the stock number do not match, find the reason before you overwrite the number: usually an order packed but never entered, a return shelved without updating stock, or the wrong size packed.

Step 7: Plan ahead for Eid, Puja and the winter season

Demand in Bangladesh jumps around big festivals and seasons. Eid in particular can bring in more orders in two weeks than a normal month, and suppliers and tailors are busy too, so lead times get longer just when you need stock most.

• Start early. If your tailor normally takes 7 days, plan for much longer before Eid.
• Use your own numbers. Look at what sold in the same weeks last year, by product and size. If you are new, start from last month's sales and grow carefully.
• Go deep on A products, not wide. Enough of your 5 best designs in every size beats a little of 30 designs.
• Plan the money. Note how much cash the festival stock ties up and when COD payments from the courier will bring it back, and keep a buffer.
• Plan for after. Decide before Eid what happens to leftovers — a post-Eid offer, or keeping basic colours for next season.

Common inventory mistakes and how to fix them

The one thing to do today

You do not need to fix everything this week. Do one thing today: pick your three best-selling products, count every size and colour, and work out a reorder point for each one. Write the numbers somewhere everyone on your team can see. That alone will stop most stockouts on the products that matter most.

Next week, add the weekly routine; the week after, deal with dead stock. Step by step your stock stops being a guess, and the cash it frees goes back into products your customers actually want.