The Restock Suggestions page helps you decide whether or not to restock items based on their potential profitability. Here are the data points you should look at and how to interpret them.
The suggested restock quantities in RestockPro are meant to help you stay in stock without incurring long-term storage fees. But, they are still just suggestions, and you may need to look at other data in the Restock Suggestions grid to decide whether following the suggestion precisely will help you make a healthy profit, or whether you may need to tweak the suggestion to better achieve your business goals.
Here are some of the data points you should consider and how to use them when deciding whether to restock a product or how to update the suggested restock quantity:
Estimated Margin, EM%, and Markup %: First and foremost, you should focus on products with the best margin. Sort the grid by margin or create a filter that hides any products that don’t meet your minimum criteria (e.g. EM% is greater than 20%). Your 30D Velocity times your EM gives you a feel for the profit potential for the next month. (Learn more about the estimated margin calculation.)
Historical Sales: Review your sales figures from the past week, month, 3 months, and 6 months. If your product has not had major out-of-stock periods (check your Out of Stock Percentage on the Restock Suggestions page or use the Inventory Turn Report), the past sales give you a good indication of future potential demand.
Competition: RestockPro shows you how many FBA and non-FBA sellers there are for your SKU and even whether Amazon is competing with you. The more competitors there are, the less opportunity you have to own the Buy Box, and the harder it will be to make sales without lowering your price. Weigh the competitive factors and decide whether to restock SKUs with a lot of competition, or whether you can bundle SKUs to differentiate.
Supplier Cost: Lower cost items are less risky because there is less of a cash investment. If you have two products with the same margin and similar sales, you might evaluate which one to focus on based on the cost. (Make sure you enter your supplier cost and all additional costs for each product to see this information easily and get accurate margin and markup data.)
Category and Rank: The category and rank show the product's popularity on Amazon and may be another consideration for assessing potential sales.
Need More Data?
Beyond the Restock Suggestions page, RestockPro offers a variety of powerful reports with information organized more visually:
- SKU Profitability Report: This gives you a historical view of past sales and estimated profit.
- Monthly Sales Analysis: This shows a graphical analysis of the trend in sales and out-of-stock periods for up to a year.
- Supplier Performance: This helps gauge your supplier relationships and see which suppliers’ products yield the best sales and margins. This report also provides a graphical insight into aging inventory.
- Inventory Turn Report: This calculates how quickly your products are turning over. Items with high turn and low turn should be analyzed. High turn with high out of stocks might indicate you are not restocking aggressively enough. Low turn items might need to be moved faster by lowering the price, removing them, or bundling with other products as a kit.