Shopify inventory reorder alerts: how Restoc connects
Restoc is a web app for Shopify stores that watches stock and tells you when a SKU crosses its reorder point. This page covers the connection underneath those alerts: the OAuth install, what the first sync actually reads, and the scheduled job that keeps the numbers current.
A screenshot of Restoc, which is not open yet, showing sample data. Nothing in it is a promise: what the product does is what this page says in words.
Your stock count is accurate, your reorder date is a guess
Shopify knows exactly how many units of each variant you hold right now. It does not know that the unit is leaving at nine a day, that your supplier needs eighteen days, or that today is the last day you can place the order and still have stock on the shelf when the box lands.
So the reorder decision happens somewhere else. A CSV export, a spreadsheet with a column of hand-typed lead times, a Sunday evening and a lot of squinting. That holds until the week you are busy with something else. Then a best seller hits zero and nobody notices until a customer emails to ask. Running out is not a rounding error: it is paid traffic landing on a sold-out page, and a buyer who goes elsewhere.
Reorder alerts only work if something watches the two numbers that matter, continuously: how much you hold, and how fast it is leaving. That is the whole job of the Shopify connection. Restoc is built to install on your store, read both, and keep them current without you exporting anything again.
What the connection has to carry
- Current stock, per variant. What you hold today, read from Shopify rather than typed anywhere.
- Sales quantity and date, per SKU. So a velocity window of 7, 14 or 30 days has something to average.
- A lead time, per SKU. The one number Shopify cannot know. You enter it, because only you know what your supplier does.
Those three feed the reorder point. The arithmetic itself, and how the window and lead time change the answer, is covered on our page about setting a reorder point in Shopify.
How the Shopify connection works
- Create your Restoc account
You sign in with an email address and a password. That is the sign-in method, and there is no second one to configure.
- Install through Shopify's OAuth flow
You approve the access request inside your Shopify admin. That approval is what lets Restoc read products, inventory levels and orders. The access token is stored server-side and is never shown in the app.
- The first sync reads your current inventory
The install pulls your products, their variants and the stock level of each one. It does not reach back and import past orders, so plan on starting from today rather than from your trading history.
- Sales history accrues forward from the orders that follow
Order webhooks record a quantity and a date against the SKU as orders come in, which is how velocity is assembled. On the day you connect, a SKU has no sales recorded yet, and the window you chose has to fill before the number means anything.
- A scheduled sync job rebuilds the picture
Rather than relying on any single event arriving, a scheduled sync job re-reads the store on a cycle, so the stock figure behind a reorder point is refreshed by that job on a known rhythm.
- Alerts and the weekly report run off that data
When a SKU crosses its reorder point, an email goes out, with Slack as well on Growth and Pro through an incoming webhook you set. Delivery runs through a background job written to be idempotent: one alert per crossing, not one per run. The weekly report lists the SKUs below reorder point with a suggested order quantity, and exports as CSV.
What the connection is meant to give you
No exports, no pasting
Stock levels come out of Shopify through the install you approved. Nothing to download on a Monday, nothing to paste into a sheet, no column that is quietly a week stale.
You supply the lead time, the engine does the rest
You set a store-wide velocity window of 7, 14 or 30 days and a lead time per SKU. The reorder point is calculated from those inputs by a tested function, so it moves when your sales move instead of sitting where you last typed it. Pro adds a per-SKU override of the velocity window.
One alert per crossing
The alerting job is written so that re-running it for the same SKU and the same crossing does not fire a second email or a second Slack message. Alert fatigue is how merchants end up ignoring the thing they installed.
Days of inventory remaining, on one screen
The dashboard shows current stock, days of inventory remaining and reorder status for each active SKU, which is the view that tells you what is urgent before an alert has to.
One bill, through Shopify
Subscriptions are billed by Shopify on your Shopify invoice, not as a separate card payment, with SKU caps enforced server-side per tier. The 60-day free trial is set up so at least one full weekly reorder cycle completes before any first charge.
What the connection does, and what it does not
We would rather you know the edges before you install than find them afterwards.
- Web app only. There is no mobile app and no browser extension. If that changes, this page will say so.
- No backfill of past orders at install. Sales history starts accruing from the moment you connect, as covered above.
- One location per plan. Every tier covers a single location today.
- Email and password to sign in. No single sign-on, and no two-factor authentication yet.
- Hosted on Amazon Web Services, in a single region alongside the app. Pages are served through CloudFront and the Postgres database stays in its region. There is no choice of data region, no independent security audit and no SOC 2 or ISO 27001 certification.
- Large catalogues. We are still hardening the Shopify product sync for the biggest catalogues the upper tiers are sold against. If you run well past a few hundred products, say so when you join the waitlist and we will tell you honestly where that work stands before you commit.
On data: what is stored is your name, email address and a password hash, your store's .myshopify.com domain and its access token, the tracked SKUs with their stock, lead time and computed reorder point, sales quantities and dates per SKU with the Shopify order reference, your alert settings, and your plan and trial state. No customer names, addresses or payment details are stored, and payment details stay with Shopify. Deleting your account in Settings removes all of it at once and cancels any active Shopify charge first.
Where Restoc is today
Restoc has not launched, so there is no install flow to walk into yet. We are making it for Shopify merchants running roughly 50 to 2,000 SKUs who want to be told when to reorder, and who do not want an ERP rollout to get there.
Starter is $29 a month for up to 200 tracked SKUs. Growth is $59 a month for up to 1,000 and adds Slack alerts alongside email. Pro is $99 a month for up to 2,000 and adds a per-SKU velocity window override. Each carries a 60-day free trial, and paying yearly costs ten months' price for twelve: $290, $590 and $990. Billing runs on your Shopify invoice.
Join the waitlist and we will tell you the day the install flow opens, including what the sync does and does not cover at that point.
Questions
What data does Restoc read from my store?
Products and their variants, current inventory levels, and order quantities and dates per SKU with the Shopify order reference. The access token granted at install is what permits that, and it is stored server-side rather than shown in the app. No customer names, addresses or payment details are stored.
How soon after connecting will I see a reorder point?
The install reads stock, not order history, so velocity has to accrue from the orders that arrive after you connect. A SKU with no sales inside your chosen window has nothing to average yet. A 7-day window starts producing a figure soonest, and a 30-day window takes a month to fill.
Does stock update between syncs?
The number behind a reorder point is refreshed by a scheduled sync job that re-reads your store on a cycle. That job is the dependable path today, so treat the dashboard as current to the last sync rather than to the second.
Do I need to keep Restoc open for alerts to fire?
No. Alert evaluation and delivery run as a background job, not in your browser tab. Email goes out on every tier, and Slack as well on Growth and Pro if you add an incoming webhook.
Is there a mobile app or a browser extension?
No. Restoc is a web app only. We would rather say that plainly than have you expect a phone app.
How do I sign in?
With an email address and a password. Your store is authorised separately through Shopify's OAuth install flow when you connect it.
What does it cost, and what are the SKU limits?
Starter is $29 a month for up to 200 tracked SKUs, Growth is $59 for up to 1,000, Pro is $99 for up to 2,000, each with a 60-day free trial and one location. Yearly is ten months' price for twelve. Those caps are enforced server-side at sync time, and we are still hardening the product sync for the largest catalogues, so ask us before you plan on the top of the Pro cap.
Can I install it now?
Not yet. You can join the waitlist. Restoc has not launched, so there is nothing to install today, and we will not pretend otherwise.