Out of Stock

[PyroBarry]

I really don't understand why so many vendors have problems with "out of stock" merchandise. Lots of people have issues with it because of additional shipping costs and so forth.

On our website, we keep an inventory, and if there is no more of a particular item, you know immediately, that it is sold out. When we get or make more, we adjust the inventory in the shopping cart to reflect that. Why don't more suppliers do that? It is simple to do. Same thing with sales ... we adjust the prices on our website to reflect the sale price, or issue coupon codes to use. None of this, "we will refund your paypal account the difference" or whatever.

When I see a "we will refund the difference" ... I look someplace else for the product. I have heard too many horror stories, and I really don't want to have to track down the money.

Often times when somebody see's an item out of stock, they will email us and ask when it will be available, and ask us to hold the order until we can fill it with exactly what they want.

Any thoughts on this?

[PaulaD]

Some people also sell at shows and in stores so it's impossible to keep their stock exact. My customers want their money back when I am out of stock (which is rare) and I am happy to oblige.
Paula

[PyroBarry]

Good point Paula ... didn't think of that.

[lunamoonshadow]

The only time I ever had an out of stock with LBSupplies Jon shipped it months later at his own cost (what a riot--I had forgotten I even had it out there! He's a doll!).
Gail ( To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 1 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) has never had an out of stock on any of my orders--in fact, sometimes I've found if she shows "out" on something & I email her, she MAGICALLY finds a little bit of some for me!! :D Paula's done that for me too!
LauschaLady (Grace) is usually dead-on & so is Reenie (flamekissed) on her website...Bill @ Moretti & More usually has more stuff hidden away (like Gail ;)) if you call him...the smaller vendors are usually dead-on, or have "extra" not on the sites...Oh, so does Mary McDuck! She'll special order for you if you need stuff! :D
Love my McDuck findings!!!
~luna

[PyroBarry]

Nice post Luna ... the exact thing generally happens her too. When somebody is looking for something that is listed as sold out, there is always a little more here, and offer that to those who email us with that special request. I think I can safely say that every time somebody has emailed us requesting that sold out item, we have had it every time.

[Kalera]

A lot of small vendors build in a "buffer" to their stock so they never oversell anything.

Big vendors have a MUCH harder time controlling inventory... between the amount of stock to be counted in, and the variables in selling at shows, a storefront, etc, it can be really difficult to keep an accurate inventory. With a huge volume of sales, it becomes more likely that an employee will mis-ring an item, failing to take it out of inventory, or will miss-ship something, or will throw in a freebie and forget to take it out of inventory. Multiply this by hundreds of sales daily, and it becomes a real problem to keep inventory accurate.

With smaller vendors, it shouldn't be as much of a problem, if they take regular inventories to catch discrepancies.

[Lorraine Chandler]

Every single time I order from Arrow Springs I have at least one item out of stock..even if I ask them to check to make sure..I will get the phone call later.

The nice part is I always get the phone call and after being a lampworker for 4-5 years now I am used to it and it is not bothersome. I imagine it is very hard to keep track.

If they will get the item in soon or it was on sale I wait for it, if not I move to one of my other suppliers and order it from them. Just depends on how badly and quickly I need the item.

Lorraine

[Reenie]

I also have an ebay store which I really need to close because if I sell on that....then it's not taken from the website and it throws my whole inventory off.
I need to make sure that both inventories "mesh" but I can't even fathom changing over 700 products on ebay. They sure don't make it easy!!!
But normally, our stock is right on since I go through inventory almost weekly.

[McDuck]

I ship both to customers and some wholesalers and I do send lots off to shows to be sold. Its impossible to go through each and every item I sell to update each time I do it, so I try to do it the best I can. I ship at MY COST on back orders and have been known to upgrade shipping to Express USPS if I have alot of orders to fill and they dont get out in a timely manner. I consider it good customer service when things go awry but I try for it not to happen. But then there are customers who order even when the little sign says ZERO -0 !!!

[Firebrand Beads]

You should also be aware that, in this economy, many distributors are wary about having too much money "on the shelf" in the way of unsold stock. So sometimes they will wait until sales are moving on a particular item, then go to the manufacturer with a rush order.

BTW, if you hear the headlines but don't really understand what's gone on in the world of 'commercial paper' in business (that has to do with huge corps trading cash around just for their day-to-day needs) NPR's "This American Life" has some fantastic shows that really make sense of the financial mess, in actual spoken English, lol. You can get most of them on podcast anymore. The upshot of that stuff is, HALLELUJA FOR SMALL BUSINESSES!!

[PyroBarry]

I listened to that "This American Life" podcast some time ago. I think it is the best podcast I have ever listened to.

[Artistic License]

Perhaps for those vendors selling at multiple venues, how about trying to separate your stock??? Allowing just so much to be allocated for on line purchases, another allocation for shows, etc etc. Hell, I even do that when I have booked more than one show for a weekend. I split my stock so that each place has enough without trying to oversell any one place. It makes sense and doesn't make for angry customers.
Red

[PaulaD]

That wouldn't work for me. I just don't have enough space and I wouldn't want to risk loosing a sale either because I didn't have enough stock with me.
Paula

[Tesorobeads]

I have also found that Arrow Springs is usually out of stock on something I order. I usually make a point to ask them call me so at least I know so I can order stuff elsewhere if I need to.

As long as I know I don't have a problem with an item being out of stock. Why shop at one place anyway it is fun to share business amongst a variety of vendors as they all stock some different.

Debbie