We left this issue to near the end because you are unlikely to have to consider it in depth until you have actually started selling your goods.  Only then will you begin to build up a picture of what the levels of  demand for your various products are going to be. It would be a  mistake to build an elaborate stock control system in advance only to  find it totally irrelevant because you are selling so much of certain  ranges and so little of others.

This could almost require a book in itself! If you are a manufacturer then you may only need to know what is required to meet orders for the next week /  month(s). But if you are buying in, then of course you will need to have strict  control over what you have in stock and what is on order from your suppliers.  Sometimes this is addressed by your accounts package like Sage and Quick  Books and this may be sufficient for your needs.

If on the other hand you have a list of products that runs into the 1,000s, then clearly you will need to have a firm control over the situation. Order processing software systems such as TOPS © will usually have some kind of stock control system built into them, but this may in some circumstances require a bespoke solution depending on the seasonality of your business and matters like supplier's minimum orders and discounts.

• Suppliers
• Their minimum order
• Goods on back order
• Customers orders
• Discount levels
• Time to delivery
• Your seasonality
• minimum/maximum order for high season
• minimum/maximum order for low season
• Your normal delivery quantities
• Products from same supplier
• Relationship to other products in your catalogue(part of collection)
• Stored where in Warehouse
• Bespoke packaging