Inventory management options

To get started it's important to know how and when Candid can read inventory. The graphic below breaks this down between the different systems Candid works with:

As you can see there are a number of different ways you can manage your inventory in Candid. The best way to figure out what's best for your workflow is to ask yourself the following two questions:

1. Where do I want I want my Candid inventory to come from?
2. When do I want it to get captured and/or reserved?

We'll discuss the possible answers to these questions in more detail below.

Question 1:

Where do I want my Candid inventory to come from?

In Candid, there are three possible answers to this question:

1. I have an unlimited pool of inventory and don't require special inventory settings
2. I have a limited pool of inventory that is set aside just for Candid
3. I have a limited pool of inventory that I share with another sales channel

In all three cases, to get started, head to your product manager page and click on the inventory tab:

Location Scenario 1:

I have an unlimited pool of inventory that doesn't require special inventory settings

This is the simplest use case - sell what you want and make more as needed. This is great for pre-sales and JIT manufacturing and is Candid's out-of-the-box default.

To use this setting, make sure "Available Stock Only" is in the "Off" setting for all relevant products. You'll see an infinity sign, indicating that the available stock is INFINITE.

Candid still tracks the number of units sold, though, so you'll want to visit your inventory settings and ensure it's pulling from the correct location. You can find your inventory settings by clicking on Visit settings inside the gear popup in the inventory tab:

Then, find the Inventory Settings panel. Select where you want the stock to be pulled from (Candid or one of your connected ecommerce locations):

In certain circumstances, you may be sending the order downstream to a connected 3PL service where you don't actually want Candid to subtract the inventory. If this applies to your setup, you can contact support from within the Inventory Settings panel and we'll get things set up however you need:

Location Scenario 2:

I have a limited pool of inventory that is set aside just for Candid

If you want to keep your Candid inventory totally separate from your DTC ecommerce system, this is the way to go. Candid lets you set wholesale stock entirely within the app, automatically reserving and decrementing with every purchase, and limiting buyers to the quantities you set within Candid. This is especially handy if you're coming to Candid via CSV or manual product creation, as there isn't an ecom store to sync with.

To use this setting, toggle "Available Stock Only" to ON for the relevant products. This should turn the infinity signs into numbers. If you're able to edit these quantities directly, you're all set. If you aren't able to edit these numbers, that means that your inventory location is set to somewhere outside of Candid, and you'll need to update your inventory settings to pull from Candid per the instructions in Location Scenario 1 above:

Tip: remember to refresh the page if you don't see the numbers change right away.

Location Scenario 3:

I have a limited pool of inventory that I share with another sales channel

In this scenario, you might have a single stock that serves wholesale, ecommerce, brick-and-mortar, etc. This is great for brands with single-site DTC retail, or closeouts/immediates, where you just want to get inventory down to zero via any and all channels at once.

Alternatively, you might have a separate inventory location just for wholesale that you nevertheless prefer to manage from within your ecommerce platform. Shopify, in particular, is well-suited to this due to its multi-location inventory support.

To do this, follow the steps in Location Scenario 2 above and simply select your connected ecommerce platform:

Note: All stock numbers are read-only using this setting.

How this setting looks in the product manager:

Question 2:

When do I want it to get captured and/or reserved?

Wholesale orders have a few extra "gotchas" relative to DTC orders, and chief among these is the limbo state where an order has been approved but not yet shipped. For some sellers, these two steps are predictably sequential, and you're able to treat them as functionally similar to a normal retail sale. But in other circumstances, the time between approval and shipment can span months, and with multiple open orders across multiple channels, it becomes increasingly important to differentiate between what's physically on your shelves vs. what's actually still available to sell.

As such, Candid has an inventory state between In Stock and Available called Reserved. This optional middle state indicates inventory that hasn't been removed from your stock yet but is "reserved" so that new Candid orders don't accidentally sell it a second time. This is helpful when you have a limited quantity but are placing orders well into the future. In the crudest visual terms, these are committed, set-aside orders you can still physically tear into and sell to different buyers if you need to for some reason.

Available equals In Stock minus Reserved:

Candid lets you move inventory from In Stock to Reserved at any time after order approval. And, because this can introduce unwanted complexity, you can bypass it entirely.

Don't worry if it seems overwhelming – most people really only ever need to find the version that matches most closely with what they're already doing and never touch these settings again. But here's a quick overview of the four possible scenarios, which we make a point of outlining visually in the app for maximum clarity:

1. Automatically reserve when approved and capture when shipped
2. Skip reserved and automatically capture when approved
3. Skip reserved and automatically capture when shipped

Note: In all scenarios, all inventory is automatically removed from stock when the order is shipped if it hasn't already been captured.

Capture Scenario 1:

Automatically reserve inventory when an order is approved and capture inventory when it's shipped

This is Candid's default recommended setting. If you're connected to an ecommerce location, the flow looks like this:

This prevents you from selling the same product twice in Candid, but doesn't update your connected ecommerce or 3PL until it's actually shipped (or you've decided to manually capture prior to shipment):

Note: It's possible to unreserve/rereserve and uncapture/recapture at any point before shipment in this scenario.

Capture Scenario 2:

Skip reserved and automatically capture when approved

If you have products that have very limited availability or you have a system where you need to follow stock levels closely this is a good inventory option to select. When you choose this option all inventory on an approved order is captured. This means inventory is captured before you ship the order.

Note: This can also be helpful if you've integrated Candid with a 3PL. Please contact support if you have questions about this.

Capture Scenario 3:

Skip reserving inventory and automatically capture inventory when an order is shipped instead

If you have the second toggle set to "Leave It Alone", inventory will be neither reserved nor captured until you either do it manually or ship the order:

OR:

This is arguably the simplest setup, but simplicity isn't always best since you run the risk of overcommitting yourself if stock is limited and order volume unexpectedly increases.

FAQs

Are negative inventory numbers essentially sales numbers?

Yes. For example, if you have products that started out with zero inventory (like for preorders) those negative quantities reflect units sold for that product. To find out for sure what you started with we recommend running a product sales report for the the relevant date range.

If I reserve stock for an immediate order, do I still need to capture it?

Generally yes, but it depends on what you need:

"Reserved" = safely removes it from your available stock so that you can't sell it in Candid again.

"Captured" = is most relevant if you have Candid integrated with your ecommerce site, since that's the lifecycle event that tells the integration to pull stock from any connected apps. If you want your inventory updated everywhere as soon as an order is made then you will want to capture it.

Note: It's possible to just leave things in "Reserved" forever, but process-wise it's a bit of a loose end and the Candid equivalent of marking something unread in your inbox if that makes sense!

If you have questions about inventory or are having trouble deciding which settings to use please let us know: Contact Support