One of our goals with Report Toaster is to provide Shopify merchants with data they can't get from Shopify. Therefore, this is the next installment in what has now become a series - Data You Can't Get From Shopify: Volume 5.
This article will cover Inventory by Location, Inventory History, and Return Locations.
Inventory by Location
Many of our E-commerce merchants also run brick-and-mortar stores or have multiple warehouses. Under these circumstances, it's important to have a holistic view of inventory at different locations. While Shopify provides a Month-End Inventory Snapshot report, this data can't be accessed in real-time. In order to retrieve any current inventory values at the location level, it must be accessed one product variant at a time. As you can imagine, that's not very practical or efficient.
But don't worry, Report Toaster is all about making life easier for our merchants! We added Inventory Value by Location under our Inventory reports.
This means that now, Report Toaster users can view real-time inventory data by location. The report includes the quantity available, quantity incoming, value by price, and value by cost. And yes, those of you waiting for us to add incoming inventory quantities, we've added that on the inventory data by location report.
Because let's face it - who wants to wait until the end of the month to get the data they need?
Inventory History
On a related note, many Report Toaster customers have requested the ability to access historical inventory data (not just the monthly history that Shopify provides, but something weekly or even daily).
Using our Scheduled Reports feature, we've turned that request into a reality! Now Report Toaster customers can generate inventory history as often as they'd like. Weekly, daily or even hourly (if that's your thing). You can have the report delivered via email or just stored for later access.
You can learn more about how to configure your inventory history here, or contact us and let our support staff do it for you.
But don't wait! As the Chinese proverb says: "The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now".
Return Locations
Since this article has been all about inventory, let's continue with this theme! Many Report Toaster customers operate retail locations in addition to their online stores. Often, their customers return items ordered online to physical locations. At other times, items are returned to a location different than the purchase location.
Isolating these instances is not possible in Shopify. There are no reports which show returns and none where a return location can be chosen as a filter.
In fact, the only way to find them would be to search through the order list one at a time. As you can appreciate, this is very time-consuming for anybody running a multi-location retail operation.
So Report Toaster customers asked for a better way and we delivered! Our new returns report provides return information down to the product level, including both the purchase and return locations.
Now when an item is returned to a different location, our merchants will have instant visibility into exactly which items are being returned where. This means less time spent on digging through the data and more time doing what's important; running their stores.
We hope you enjoyed this installment in the series, but stay tuned as we continue to unlock more Shopify data. In the meantime, feel free to read the previous installment.
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